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Brainstorming on the implementation of UNESCO’s AI Ethics recommendation
The IFAP Chair, Ms Dorothy Gordon, opened the session by reminding participants that “ethics is central to every aspect of IFAP’s work.” She encouraged the Working Group to cooperate towards building peaceful and equitable knowledge societies.
Tawfik Jelassi, UNESCO Assistant Director-General for Communication and Information, pointed out the important role of IFAP in promoting a humanistic and multistakeholder approach to “implement useful, development-oriented Artificial Intelligence and digital transformation work, which respects and promotes human rights and ethical approaches in an inclusive and collaborative way.”
Ms Gabriela Ramos, UNESCO Assistant Director General of Social Sciences and Humanities, presented key elements of the UNESCO’s AI Ethics Recommendation, pointing out that it “is based on interconnected values and principles: respect, protection and promotion of human rights and fundamental freedoms, human dignity, diversity and inclusiveness. It is crucial to take such an ethical approach to address the important social challenges caused by the fast-moving Artificial Intelligence technology development.”
Prof. Fatima Roumate, member of the UNESCO Ad-hoc High-Level Expert Group, who drafted the Recommendation, shared the work behind its development, from the process of elaborating the first draft, to the multistakeholder consultations on the final draft.
The Chair of the IFAP Information Ethics Working Group, Prof. Yves Poullet, emphasized the need for ethical principles to be considered in the development of AI systems. He noted the importance of moving beyond a risk-based approach to Artificial Intelligence (AI), towards accounting for the harms “not only to our individual liberties but also to our societies”, which creates a need for preventive measures. Prof. Poullet highlighted the crucial role of the state in enabling a multistakeholder discussion of the impacts of certain AI applications.
Mr Dirk Pilat, Deputy Director of the OECD Directorate for Science, Technology and Innovation, stressed the relevance of pursuing multistakeholder exchanges within international organizations and institutions, to “understand how to approach AI emerging technologies.”
Mr Cordel Green, Executive Director of the Broadcasting Commission of Jamaica and Chair of the IFAP Information Accessibility Working Group, highlighted how the core values and principles of the Recommendation enable it to be an instrument to protect not only individual rights, but also collective and societal interests. Mr. Green pointed out that the Recommendation is key to protecting the right to privacy, understood through a broad perspective as a right to human flourishing. He called for no inference to be made from our “mental data” and advocated for media and information literacy to be recognized as a human right. Mr Cordel Green highlighted the need for the Recommendation to be operationalized by strong legislation and governance mechanisms.
Ms Marielza Oliveira, IFAP Secretary and UNESCO Director for Partnerships and Operational Programme Monitoring in the Communications and Information Sector, brought to attention the importance of building all digital ecosystems, particularly those based on AI given their far-reaching impacts on universal values and principles grounded on the human rights framework. She underlined the relevance of the Recommendation as an instrument to protect human rights and human dignity. Ms. Xianhong Hu, UNESCO Programme Specialist, presented the to illustrate how an evidenced-based approach to improve AI ecosystems can be developed, applied and governed, in an ethical and humanistic way.
Prof. Siva Prasad, Honorary Professor at the University of Hyderabad, acknowledged that “AI has further widened the inequalities and digital divides” and thus emphasized that the principle of inclusion must be present in all stages of the AI lifecycle, to avoid marginalization of peoples and cultures. Mr. Amaro la Rosa, Professor at Universidad Femenina del Sagrado Corazón (Peru) stressed the need for AI stakeholders to focus on democracy, human dignity, and cultural values.
Prof. Stefaan Verhulst, Chief Research and Development Officer of the Governance Laboratory (The GovLab), proposed AI localism as a way to meaningfully implement the Recommendation since major innovation processes and AI governance happen at the local level. He thus suggested that “the scope and applicability of the UNESCO Recommendation makes it an excellent foundation for public conversations around the use of AI at all levels.” Dr. Siddharth Peter de Souza, Post-Doctoral Researcher at the Tilburg Institute for Law, Technology and Society, echoed that the focus on local level allows us to bring together different perspectives: accessibility, capacity and universal application.
All the participants confirmed the importance in pursuing such exchanges to foster discussions between all interested parties to find both ethical and legal responses and to ensure that AI development remains human centered and mastered.
