Speaking at the Digital World Congress (DWC): AI for Social Development – co-hosted with the United Nations Research Institute for Social Development (UNRISD) – Professor Hinton He stressed that rapid advances in AI must be more carefully guided to serve society, rather than weaken it..
“If you’ve ever been out in a car with no brakes, you’re in trouble if you go down a hill,” he told attendees. “But without the handle, it’s even more of a problem.”
His remarks come during a busy week of AI policymaking, with governments and UN panels stepping up discussions on governance, inclusion and risk management as artificial intelligence continues to integrate across the global economy and society.
haves and have nots
The speed of growth of AI is astonishing. According to the United Nations Trade and Development (UNCTAD) 2025 Innovation Report: Global AI market is projected to grow from $189 billion in 2023 to $4.8 trillion by 2033an economy larger than Japan was built in just 10 years.
But the ability to build and shape it remains in the hands of just a few economies and companies, UNCTAD Acting Secretary-General Pedro Manuel Moreno warned at the Committee on Science and Technology for Development (CSTD), also meeting this week.
That concentration risks deepening global inequality. Doreen Bogdan-Martin, Secretary-General of the United Nations International Telecommunication Union (ITU), noted that the adoption of generative AI in the industrialized “Global North” is growing almost twice as fast as in the developing “Global South.”
”If left unaddressed, this is the second major discrepancy, widening the gap between countries that are shaping artificial intelligence and those that are simply consuming it.– said Ms. Bogdan Martin, adding that gaps in infrastructure, investment and capacity cannot be bridged by any single country or organization alone.
The surge in international activity on AI and digital technologies this week in Geneva and elsewhere reflects a global push to ensure all countries can benefit from and regulate artificial intelligence as it increasingly shapes our economies, societies and daily lives.
Distinctive areas of debate are emerging.
The focus of the Science and Technology Committee for Development is: World-class digital policy making, Discussion at the AI For Social Development conference Highlighted the need for transparent, accountable, and rights-based AI governance This is to address risks such as bias, opaque algorithms, and the concentration of large amounts of data in the hands of a few privileged large corporations.
Participants at the global conference, convened by UNRISD and the international NGO World Digital Technology Academy, considered the growing role of AI in social protection, labor markets, education and the transition to green energy, while stressing the importance of protecting vulnerable populations and ensuring that the benefits of technological innovation are shared more equitably.
A data-driven approach
Any proposals on AI governance must be data-driven, and this is the fundamental work of the United Nations’ Independent International Scientific Panel on AI, which held its first face-to-face meeting in Madrid on Wednesday.
At the Scientific Panel’s first in-person meeting in Madrid, co-chair Maria Ressa explained the group’s mission to provide independent, scientific and authoritative assessments of how AI systems are shaping society.
Ressa, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate and active Filipino journalist, warned that increasingly powerful AI tools are accelerating the destruction of democratic institutions through “narrative wars” that fabricate and amplify falsehoods on a massive scale. weakening of institutions such as the media and courts; And ultimately, lack of accountability leads to strategic corruption.
The findings will inform discussions at the UN Global Dialogue on the Governance of Artificial Intelligence, another important UN AI initiative. The dialogue will take place in July, also in Geneva.
The findings of the scientific panel, which Ressa co-chairs with prominent Canadian computer scientist Yoshua Bengio, will feed into discussions at the United Nations Global Dialogue on Artificial Intelligence Governance, another important United Nations AI initiative, which also meets in Geneva in July.
The Global Dialogue brings together all 193 United Nations member states, the private sector, civil society, academia, and the technology industry to share best practices and build a common approach to AI governance.
”Policy dialogue will be based on science and evidence, with a holistic perspective, and a scientific perspective from an interdisciplinary lens from around the world.” said Amandeep Gill, United Nations Special Envoy for Digital and Emerging Technologies.
“This is how policy discussions should be, and the United Nations is extremely proud to be facilitating the first-ever convergence of science and policy in fast-paced emerging technologies.”
