Good, Responsible, Caring: Sociotechnical Imaginaries of Ethical AI

• In Event: Innovation Under Fire: Shifting Imaginaries of Science, Technology and Society Governance – II

Abstract

Recent developments in Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning (AI/ML) have been met with regulatory responses all over the globe.
Narratives of urgency, inevitability, and path-dependency of technological development collide with scepticism and suspiciousness giving prominence to the voices arguing for the need of ensuring beneficial social outcomes. Consistently salient policy response globally is the set of instruments falling under the generic term of ‘ethical AI’ - that is ensuring in this way or another that either properties of the automated systems, or the processes surrounding its creation will guarantee desirable outcomes. One of the common ways of ideating such policies in international organisations and national governments alike is to convene advisory/expert groups tasked with coming up with principles/ guidelines. This paper will interrogate one of such recent processes - namely the creation of the draft of the AI Ethics Guidelines produced by the European Commission’s High-Level Expert Group on Artificial Intelligence. Through document analysis and interviews author attempts to shed light on how ethical expertise is mobilised and what imaginaries of public good does it perpetuate.

Author

• Maciej Kuziemski, Science Policy Research Unit, University of Sussex