Political Theory of Governing AI
Governing AI: Seeking Theoretical and Institutional Frameworks

The rapid adoption of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in the past decade is enabled by the computational capacities of power-efficient Graphical Processing Units (GPUs). Machine Learning (ML) researchers benefitted from this enhanced capacity because they could implement computational models and test them much faster. Several of these validated models were packaged into consumer products through web-based and mobile applications by technology companies.

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With the expansion of mobile internet, the user base of these algorithm-driven applications was quick and sudden. There was no limit to the social use cases of these apps. The unmediated and undocumented social transformation did not allow for insights and regulations. Internet-based technology companies have become giant economic powers that can impact multiple spheres of life, including socialisation, electoral processes, employment, marketing, monitoring, etc., with virtually no legal frameworks to check these practices. In addition, the emergence of Generative-AI (GenAI) opened Pandora's box of unregulated technology in the hands of the masses, designed by companies without necessary institutional oversight. 

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The impact of these transformations differs according to socio-political and economic positionality vis-a-vis the designers of AI technologies. Countries of the global south have unique challenges that need to be characterised theoretically before institutional capacities are designed to address them.