Il consenso informato nella societÀ dell'informazione

Abstract

This paper responds to the chorus of criticisms now directed at the regulatory principle of informed consent. Four claims are made. The first claim is that, in the information society, we urgently need to clarify our informational rights; the second is that we should not forget that it is through the process of informed consent that we authorise acts that would otherwise infringe these rights; the third is that we need to differentiate between the information that an agent (A) is entitled to have qua rights-holder and the sense in which A must be informed before A can give a valid consent relative to A's rights; and the fourth claim is that, if we do these things, we will see that, pace its critics, informed consent should remain a central regulative principle in the information society.