The Future of International Scientific Assessments of AI’s Risks
This is a link post for a paper which was led by Hadrien Pouget (Carnegie Endowment for International Peace) and Claire Dennis (Centre for the Governance of AI). IAPS staff Renan Araujo and Oliver Guest were among the paper’s coauthors.
Managing the risks of artificial intelligence (AI) will require international coordination among many actors with different interests, values, and perceptions. Experience with other global challenges, like climate change, suggests that developing a shared, science-based picture of reality is an important first step toward collective action. In this spirit, last year the UK government led twenty-eight countries and the European Union (EU) in launching the International Scientific Report on the Safety of Advanced AI.
The UK-led report has accomplished a great deal in a short time, but it was designed with a narrow scope, limited set of stakeholders, and short initial mandate that’s now nearing its end. Meanwhile, the United Nations (UN) is now moving toward establishing its own report process, though key parameters remain undecided. And a hodgepodge of other entities—including the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the emerging network of national AI Safety Institutes (AISIs), and groupings of scientists around the world—are weighing their own potential contributions toward global understanding of AI.
How can all these actors work together toward the common goal of international scientific agreement on AI’s risks? There has been surprisingly little public discussion of this question, even as governments and international bodies engage in quiet diplomacy. Moreover, the difficulty of the challenge is not always fully acknowledged. Compared to climate change, for example, AI’s impacts are more difficult to measure and predict, and more deeply entangled in geopolitical tensions and national strategic interests.
To discuss the way forward, Oxford Martin School’s AI Governance Institute and the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace brought together a group of experts at the intersection of AI and international relations in July.