In September 2024, states adopted at the United Nations a Global Digital Compact, a first attempt at a shared framework for the digital sphere and artificial intelligence. President Macky Sall, a candidate for UN Secretary-General, takes seriously the question of the rules for this technology. It advances faster than the laws meant to govern it, and the vacuum fills on its own, to the benefit of those who build it.
Scattered standards for a borderless technology. Artificial intelligence ignores borders, and its governance stays split between blocs that each advance their own standards, with none binding everyone. A model trained on one continent decides on another, with no common rule following it. The risk lies in the gap between the speed of the technology and the slowness of the law.
A common framework still to build. The work opened by the 2024 Compact has barely begun. To carry it forward, the Secretary-General holds a rare capacity: bringing states around one table before accomplished facts stand in for law.
The finding of the 2024 report. The UN High-Level Advisory Body's report "Governing AI for Humanity" (2024) found that no global body yet governs a technology moving faster than the states meant to regulate it. It also notes that data and computing power remain concentrated in a handful of countries.
A seat for the majority of countries. The rules of artificial intelligence cannot be decided among a few capitals and a few companies: a framework written without the majority of countries would produce a governance the majority would not apply. The voice of the countries that endure the technology without producing it therefore weighs as much as that of the laboratories.
Artificial intelligence on the agenda of peace. The Secretary-General can place artificial intelligence on the agenda of peace and development and support the scientific advisory body the United Nations have begun to sketch. The office can also recall that trust in a technology is won on verifiable rules rather than on promises of self-regulation.
Multilateral negotiation and the vision for the UN. Bringing states around one table calls for the experience of twelve years as head of state and of the chairmanship of the African Union in 2022. That experience explains why the vision statement filed with the United Nations frames its proposals as obligations: peace and security conceived with development; a renewed multilateralism; stronger governance of the Organization.
Africa at its heart, the world in its sights.
The Global Digital Compact and the report "Governing AI for Humanity" are public. Read all public positions at www.mackysall.net