Abstract
We've been reading for years about the effects artificial intelligence is starting to have on democracies worldwide, but its longer term impacts will be much more surprising. Deepfaked audio and video of politicians and AI-fueled disinformation campaigns on social media are only the tip of the iceberg. In the future, AI could shift the balance of power from corporations to governments by increasing the scale and scope of regulatory oversight, shift power from executives to legislatures by helping write more complex law, and even change the nature of judicial interpretation of law by helping legislators specify their intent with more than just plaintext. While there are significant reasons to distrust the corporate oligopoly leading the charge on AI, many of its impacts will be positive for democracy. It has a chance to help governments serve people more efficiently, be more responsive to constituents, and to give all of us a greater voice in governing. This starts with machine translation and AI accessibility services and will grow into AI tools that help policymakers have more deliberative discourse with constituents, and even AI that can act as our personal proxies for commenting on policy and voting. This talk explores these possible lasting ramifications of our transition to AI assistive technologies and advocates for the development of trustworthy AI systems capable of delivering better, more equitable, more just outcomes for democracy.
About the Speaker
Nathan Sanders is a data scientist focused on using technology to help vulnerable communities have greater participation in public policymaking. He has built and led data science and machine learning research teams in the media and biotech industries. Nathan is a past HKS Rappaport Public Policy Fellow, where he wrote a MA bill (now law) on environmental regulatory data transparency. As a past Fellow and current Affiliate of the Harvard Berkman Klein Center, he has co-founded the Massachusetts Platform for Legislative Engagement as well as the Harvard Climate Justice Design Fellowship program. He earned his Ph.D. in Astronomy & Astrophysics from Harvard in 2014. He is the co-author of a forthcoming book with Prof. Bruce Schneier on AI's impacts on democracy.
