Safeguarding a peaceful future for all: how UNESCO governs the risks of AI

• In Event: Global flows and non-state actors in education reform

Proposal

1. Introduction

A growing body of scholarship examines how international organizations seek to govern the future of education (e.g. Mertanen & Brunila, 2024; Robertson & Beech, 2024). However, this literature has not yet sufficiently addressed how these organizations respond to the rapid development of AI technologies in their future-making efforts.

This study addresses that gap. Drawing on a larger policy analysis of UNESCO’s AI Competency Framework for Students, the research focuses specifically on 1) how UNESCO frames potential risks of AI as challenges to human societies and 2) how these competencies are positioned as solutions to these challenges. This opens space for a critical examination of how narratives of AI-related risks are constructed, why particular competencies are presented as essential for safeguarding a peaceful world, and how such framing reinforces UNESCO’s positioning as the “guardian of the future of education” (Robertson, 2022, p. 188).

Drawing on the concepts of educational imaginaries (Rahm, 2023) and anticipatory governance (Guston, 2014; Kallo & Välimaa, 2025; Robertson, 2022), the study conceptualizes both the risk narrative and the AI Competencies as imaginaries that fit into UNESCO’s vision of the future, and analyzes them, showing how these imaginaries embed the organization’s anticipatory governance logics and assumptions.

2. Theoretical framework

First, educational imaginaries as “visions, policies, and projects of educating citizens” that “constitute ways to problematize, negotiate and ultimately govern citizens and citizenship at the intersection between technology and education” (Rahm, 2023 p. 46). These imaginaries are not passive ideals but active forces in shaping education policy, serving to guide decision-making about what kinds of knowledge, competencies, and values are worth pursuing.

Educational imaginaries consist of four interrelated components. First, problematization examines how certain issues are constructed as problems requiring (educational) intervention, while others are not. In doing so, it unpacks the underlying logics and assumptions of policies. Second, technology is a core driver and object of educational imaginaries. Third, collective actors are those who shape and disseminate imaginaries. Fourth, target populations refer to those constructed as needing intervention or education.

Second, in global education policy, anticipatory governance refers to how international organizations like UNESCO attempt to manage uncertain futures through present-day interventions. As Robertson (2022) explains, this involves positioning education as a site of future-making where policy becomes a tool to address imagined risks and opportunities. As such, it rests on foresight, engagement, and integration (Guston, 2013) and establishes global norms to address emerging challenges (Kallo & Välimaa, 2024).

The two theoretical resources complement each other in the analysis of UNESCO’s AI Competency Framework for Students and further illuminate UNESCO’s future-making project in the era of AI.


3. Methods

The study centered on UNESCO’s (2024) AI Competency Framework for Students and drew on related UNESCO (2015, 2019a, 2019b, 2021a, 2021b, 2021c, 2021d, 2022, 2023a, 2023b) documents and reports on AI and education to contextualize the analysis and strengthen the argument.

The analysis proceeded in several steps. It began by framing both the risk narrative and the AI competencies as educational imaginaries. These imaginaries were then broken down into four components: problematization (why particular risks and competencies are envisioned rather than others, and the governance logics underlying these choices), technology (how AI is incorporated into UNESCO’s policies and discourse), collective actors (who disseminates the “risk” discourse and promotes the competencies), and target populations (how this discourse and framework might influence students, parents, and educators).

The UNESCO documents mentioned above were then systematically reviewed, and themes were developed for each imaginary using thematic analysis (Clarke & Braun, 2017). These themes were then examined across the two imaginaries to construct a coherent narrative, which was further deepened through insights drawn from anticipatory governance literature.

4. Findings

The analysis shows that the risk narrative, as an educational imaginary, did not emerge in isolation but developed gradually through UNESCO’s human-centered approach to education. As AI becomes increasingly powerful, concerns have grown over its potential to undermine human agency and the principles of equity, justice, inclusion, and sustainability. These challenges are framed as such because they conflict with the vision of the future that UNESCO seeks to build.

Second, the AI competencies are framed as solutions to the anticipated challenges because they embed UNESCO’s core values and long-standing projects such as sustainability and lifelong learning. They emphasize not only what students, as future citizens, can do with AI, but also how they should use it responsibly. This alignment between the competencies and UNESCO’s broader agenda illustrates how the AI Competency Framework for Students is politicized and instrumentalized as part of UNESCO’s effort to govern the future of education.

Together, these findings suggest that the AI Competency Framework for Students operates as both a diagnosis of emerging risks and a prescription of competencies aligned with UNESCO’s agenda. By framing risks and solutions through its human-centered approach, UNESCO reinforces its role in shaping educational futures and positions itself as a key guardian of peace and sustainability in the age of AI.


5. Contribution

First, this study contributes to scholarly conversations on the governance of the future of education. As noted above, existing literature has not sufficiently examined how international organizations respond to AI in their governing efforts, and this research helps to fill that gap.

Second, the study develops an innovative theoretical framework that merges the concepts of educational imaginaries and anticipatory governance. This framework carries broader implications for future research on how the future is governed in education and beyond.

Third, this study is among the first to systematically analyze UNESCO’s 2024 AI Competency Framework for Students. Given UNESCO’s central role in shaping global education discourse and the limited scholarly engagement with this framework, the research fills an important gap.

Author

• Baiwen Peng, University of Minnesota