00:00Rachel Adams is the founder and CEO of the Global Center on AI Governance.
00:05Rachel, thank you for joining me.
00:07One thing that's becoming increasingly clear from this G7 summit
00:11is the power held by the US in terms of owning AI infrastructure.
00:18How concerned should other countries be, do you think,
00:21particularly countries in the global south?
00:24Well, I think we should be really concerned,
00:27and so much of what's happening in France with the G7 at the moment
00:32is because of Europe's own anxiety about not having control
00:37over this really critical infrastructure and AI models
00:41that are entirely or almost entirely US-owned.
00:45So I think particularly what happened with Anthropik
00:49and closing access for foreign nationals to their latest models
00:53shows this kind of critical gap in global AI governance and cooperation.
01:00So for many European countries, they're thinking about
01:03how do we invest in creating our own models and capabilities,
01:08and for global south countries, they're thinking about
01:10how do we have and access the kind of resources that we need to do this.
01:15What role do you think China can play in ensuring that this inequality
01:20isn't further exacerbated by the AI boom?
01:25Well, I think it's a very interesting move that China's made
01:28precisely at the moment when these kind of Western G7 countries are coming together.
01:34China's kind of indication that we need a broader, more inclusive approach
01:42to global governance reflects a much wider demand for representation
01:47from all corners of the world in these really, really important conversations.
01:51We've got to remember that the global south is already bearing so many costs
01:56from the global AI industry, from the creation of new precarious work
02:01that doesn't allow anyone to escape a life of poverty,
02:05or from the reduction of jobs in the digital economy
02:10that were once offshore to those places.
02:13So some of the signals that China's making about the importance of thinking
02:17structurally in terms of the labour implications
02:20are going to be music to the ears of many global south countries
02:24who are really worried about the impacts it's going to have on inequality and jobs.
02:31Briefly, if you will, so then China has announced the Global AI Conference
02:35to be held in July in Shanghai.
02:37Now, it's expected to accelerate the establishment
02:41of the World Artificial Intelligence Cooperation Organisation.
02:45Bit of a mouthful.
02:46Briefly, how important do you think that is?
02:49I think it's very, very important,
02:52partly because I know that many countries from Africa, Latin America,
02:57the Caribbean, other less wealthy countries in Asia
03:01are looking for other centres of power
03:04around which to coordinate cooperation on artificial intelligence.
03:10I think it's still going to matter how far we are asking for
03:16and demanding for AI development that is accountable in the public interest,
03:22democratic, includes time for public deliberation.
03:27So some of the kind of emphasis on we need to move fast and quickly
03:30that's taking place around the G7 and the CEO lunch and engagements
03:36is really kind of at the opposite end of what we want to see
03:40in terms of democratic engagement.
03:41So China's important, but how it's done in terms of those values
03:46is really going to matter still.
03:48Rachel Adams, thank you very much indeed for that.
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