The International Congress for the Governance of AI (ICGAI), convened by the World Technology Network (WTN) and the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs (CCEIA), was a groundbreaking, collaborative initiative operating in 2018-2021, directed at catalyzing an agile and comprehensive governance network for artificial intelligence. It brought together representatives of governments, industry, international organizations, universities, research centers, leaders of underserved nations and communities, and other stakeholders.

A full list of organizers, chairs, and Advisors can be found on the Leaders and Advisors page.

Originally based around inclusive, high-level planning meetings held in 2018 and 2019 in New York and Geneva, as well as a series of high-level workshops held in various cities around the world in early 2020, ICGAI’s main focal gathering was planned as a large, in-person conference scheduled to be held in Prague in April 2020, and then, in the face of the sudden global pandemic, re-scheduled (only six weeks before the conference) as a series of smaller, virtual events held in 2021. More information about these events can be found in the Events tab.

An extraordinary group of the world's leading AI, ethics, and governance thinkers and doers were participating in the original Prague event and over three years in ICGAI overall. View the full list of speakers.

As we work to address issues of AI-related governance, balancing the need for innovation, competition, and cooperation, while minimizing risks and undesirable societal consequences posed a daunting international challenge. The frameworks being developed together sought to accommodate input from the various stakeholders, function as a trusted good-faith broker, monitor developments, flag concerns and explore creative means to manage issues through engineering, ethics, and/or oversight. We believe that any new international governance mechanism established is unlikely, at least initially, to have enforcement authority. Nevertheless, it can facilitate cooperation and light coordination between many stakeholders in the AI space.

Planning for ICGAI began in early 2018. Our intention from the start was to create a forum for all stakeholders to participate. There was never any illusion that ICGAI would be the vehicle itself for effective international governance of AI. Over the succeeding years, other significant international initiatives have entered the AI governance space. Some are more inclusive than others.  In this changing AI governance landscape, our interests lay in stimulating cooperation, effective governance, and meaningful inclusivity as we collectively navigate the challenges posed by emerging technologies.

Thus, the ICGAI virtual event/speaker series held in 2021, focused on helping to bring a degree of cooperation between the various initiatives, as well as focus on proposals and topics that are not being effectively covered elsewhere. It is also worth noting that the primary proposal that grew out of the ICGAI initiative by 2021, was for a Global Governance Network for AI (GGN-AI). Click here to read the GGN-AI proposal.

ICGAI hopes that a broadly inclusive, cooperative, trustworthy, robust and effective approach to the international governance of AI can be forged. As a first step, we supported the implementation of the United Nations Secretary-General’s Roadmap for Digital Cooperation, and contributed to consultations on the proposal to create a multi-stakeholder advisory body for AI. 

It would be naive to assume the international community can achieve consensus on all issues. Nevertheless, shared values can be underscored, best practices highlighted, and differences debated. We have sought to assist in meeting those goals.