AI safety is having a moment. After years as a topic for techies and futurists, the potential risks from artificial intelligence systems – from cyberattacks to hyper-persuasion to rogue behavior – are suddenly under discussion both in the corridors of power and around kitchen tables.

In fact, the conversation now reaches beyond classical safety concerns, getting into AI’s impact on economic life and the environment, as well as possible responses, from alignment research to government regulation.

This expanding public discussion is coming none too soon, as recent news about AI security breaches makes clear. However, something important is still missing. For all its vibrancy, the public debate has not yet focused on one of the most important requirements for AI safety: constitutional democracy.

To see why democracy matters for AI safety, imagine that we have already built a powerful AI system that is “safe” in all the now-familiar senses: it cannot escape human control, cannot launch cyberattacks or make bioweapons, and cannot power killer robots. Now picture that system in two different political contexts, one democratic, the other authoritarian.

Placed inside a healthy democracy – a constitutional republic, with free and fair elections, protected civil liberties, and robust rule of law – AI could bring massive benefits, advancing science and medicine, expanding education and bolstering economic prosperity. Under the right conditions, AI could strengthen democracy itself, helping citizens make their voices heard, improving policymaking and making government services more efficient and accountable.

Now consider the authoritarian scenario. Here, everything flips. AI becomes a tool for government surveillance and censorship, for propaganda and for political suppression and entrenchment. No imagination is required to conjure this scenario. It is already playing out in China, Russia, Iran, Venezuela, several Gulf states and elsewhere.

Placing these two........

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