Report by Beth Kerley, Carl Miller, and Fernanda Campagnucci: “Like social media before them, new AI tools promise to change the game when it comes to civic engagement. These technologies offer bold new possibilities for investigative journalists, anticorruption advocates, and others working with limited resources to advance democratic norms.
Yet the transformation wrought by AI advances is far from guaranteed to work in democracy’s favor. Potential threats to democracy from AI have drawn wide attention. To better the odds for prodemocratic actors in a fluid technological environment, systematic thinking about how to make AI work for democracy is needed.
The essays in this report outline possible paths toward a prodemocratic vision for AI. An overview essay by Beth Kerley based on insights from an International Forum for Democratic Studies expert workshop reflects on the critical questions that confront organizations seeking to deploy AI tools. Fernanda Campagnucci, spotlighting the work of Open Knowledge Brasil to open up government data, explores how AI advances are creating new opportunities for citizens to scrutinize public information. Finally, Demos’s Carl Miller sheds light on how AI technologies that enable new forms of civic deliberation might change the way we think about democratic participation itself…(More)“.