Who Is Going to Regulate AI?

As businesses and governments race to make sense of the impacts of new, powerful AI systems, governments around the world are jostling to take the lead on regulation. Business leaders should be focused on who is likely to win this race, more so than the questions of how or even when AI will be regulated. Whether Congress, the European Commission, China, or even US states or courts take the lead will determine both the speed and trajectory of AI’s transformation of the global economy, potentially protecting some industries or limiting the ability of all companies to use the technology to interact directly with consumers. In the US, multiple actors are jostling to lead the regulation of AI. First, there’s Congress, where Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) is calling for preemptive legislation to establish regulatory “guardrails” on AI products and services; Second, there’s the Biden Administration, where there is some competition among federal agencies to implement a White House blueprint for an AI Bill of Rights, which was introduced last October 2022; Then, there are more provincial efforts: AI-related legislation has already been introduced in at least 17 states. So far, there are few specifics in any of these proposals, with the kinds of hypothetical harms from AI falling into existing categories, including misinformation and copyright and trademark abuse. In any case, regulators will likely have little impact on the technology’s development in the short term. However, limitations suggest that major regulation is more likely to come first from outside of the US.

[ Blair Levin is currently a Nonresident Senior Fellow with the Brookings Institution and Policy Advisor with New Street Research. Larry Downes is a co-author of Pivot to the Future:  Discovering Value and Creating Growth in a Disrupted World.]