The International Conference “AI for People” was born out of the idea of shaping Artificial Intelligence technology around human and societal needs. While Artificial Intelligence (AI) can be a beneficial tool, its development and its deployment impact society and the environment in ways that need to be thoroughly addressed and confronted.

This year’s edition will focus on Democratizing AI. Democratizing AI refers to the democratization of its stages of design, development, deployment and use. Still, the term ‘democratization’ and whether it is desirable remains vague. Its meaning varies from ‘increased access’ to ‘increased agency’ over these stages for a larger, though undefined, number of people. It might refer to calls for open-source initiatives, to wider access to AI applications for people, to the unrecognized labor and rights of the humans working behind it. The conference will be an occasion to unpack what ‘Democratizing AI’ really means in different contexts. The conference will provide its participants with opportunities to gain a better understanding of and critically examine what ‘democratizing AI’ entails. Additionally, it should serve as an incubator for interdisciplinary communities, in and out of academia (e.g. from researchers to artists to activists), to propose and share ideas about whether and if so, how to effectively ‘democratize’ AI, together with its risks and opportunities.

The conference will be interdisciplinary and it welcomes contributions from different disciplines, spanning from computer science, the social sciences, and the humanities. Possible topics include but are not limited to:

We welcome contributions from the following fields:

    AI and human and civic rights
    AI and Work
    Open-source software and initiatives
    AI policy
    AI for Good
    AI initiatives around democracy (e.g. e-voting, e-citizenship, smart city initiatives, etc.)
    AI and Political Philosophy