It’s time to move on from AI nationalism

2025 will see a course correction in AI and geopolitics as world leaders realize that their national interests are better served by the promise of an increasingly positive and cooperative future.

In AI discourse, the post-ChatGPT years can be characterized as somewhere between a gold rush and a moral panic. In 2023, at a time of record investment in AI, tech experts including Elon Musk and Steve Wozniak published an open letter calling for a six-month moratorium on training AI systems stronger than GPT-4. others compared AI to “nuclear war” and “pandemic”.

It’s understandably judgmental from political leaders, pushing the geopolitical conversation about AI into some troubling places. Our analysis at the AI ​​& Geopolitics Project, my research organization at the University of Cambridge, clearly shows a growing trend towards AI nationalism.

For example, in 2017, President Xi Jinping announced plans to make China a superpower in the field of artificial intelligence by 2030.Next Generation AI Development Plan” aimed for the country to reach the “world leading level” in the field of artificial innovation by 2025 and to become a major artificial innovation center by 2030.

The CHIPs and Science Act of 2022 — a US ban on semiconductor exports — was a direct response to this, designed to take advantage of US domestic AI capabilities and limit China. Following an executive order signed by President Biden in 2024, the US Treasury Department also published draft regulations that would ban or limit investments in artificial intelligence in China.

AI portrays nationalism as a battle to win, not an opportunity to exploit AI. However, proponents of this approach would do well to learn deeper lessons from the Cold War concept of an arms race. At the time, the United States was able to use politics, diplomacy, and statesmanship to create a positive and enthusiastic vision for space exploration, while seeking to become the most technologically advanced nation. Successive US governments also managed to win support at the UN for a treaty that would protect space from nuclearization, ensure that no nation could colonize the Moon, and that space would be the “province of all mankind.”

The same political leadership is lacking in AI. And in 2025, we will begin to see a return to cooperation and diplomacy.

The 2025 artificial intelligence summit in France will be part of this change. President Macron is already moving his measure away from a strict “security” framework of AI risk, to one that he says focuses on more pragmatic “solutions and standards.” In his virtual address to the Seoul Summit, the French president made clear that he intends to address broader policy issues, including how to ensure society benefits from artificial intelligence.

Recognizing that some countries are left out of discussions around artificial intelligence, the UN also announced its plans for a more collaborative global approach in 2024.

Even the United States and China have started to get involved conventional diplomacyEstablishing a bilateral consultation channel on artificial intelligence in 2024. While the impact of these initiatives remains uncertain, they clearly indicate that in 2025 the world’s AI superpowers will embrace diplomacy over nationalism.