THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | JUNE 2024 37 involved in any AI application: both the creator, whether that is an individual or organization, and the end users, as well as “third party” beneficiaries. For example, if a predictive policing algorithm is developed for State’s Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs, stakeholders might include diplomats and their international law enforcement partners as well as local community members and potential false positive communities who will be affected by the algorithm. With AI development, the most affected stakeholders are often neglected and excluded from the process. Decisions determined by AI can be life-changing or life-and-death. Yet at present affected parties are rarely a part of any AI system evaluation. That should change. The vision for responsible AI should be designed to survive well beyond the average two-year political cycle. If we think about America’s grand narrative during the Cold War period or during the Global War on Terror, these decades-long visions and policies not only displayed America’s identity and values, but they also showed what success would look like spanning generations. They were also easy to understand for our international partners and did not change regardless of who was in the White House and Congress. To help design a durable vision for AI, State needs to work closely with the rest of the U.S. government with meaningful engagements from civil society and the private sector. The AI Safety Institute at the Commerce Department’s National Institute of Standards and Technology is a public-private consortium that can offer insights and collaboration. This requires a cultural mind shift because AI is one of the few fields driven first and foremost by nongovernmental organizations and companies. Then, once the vision and values are set, through public diplomacy efforts, they should be communicated strategically and be held as the North Star for subsequent strategy and implementation plans. We can’t continue passing the buck down to the next generation, because if we don’t get this right from the get-go, it will be too late. We need to have these hard conversations now, which the State Department, through its unique position of influencing the world, should not shy away from. n
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