Summary contributed by Alexandrine Royer, administrative coordinator at The Foundation for Genocide Education. Mini-summary: Although it may not always seem evident, the development of AI technologies is a part of the patterns of power that characterize our intellectual, political, economic and social worlds. Recognizing and identifying these patterns is essential to ensure that those at the bottom of society are not disproportionately affected by the adverse effects of technological innovation. To protect and prevent harm against vulnerable groups, the authors recommend adopting a decolonial critical approach in AI to gain better foresight and ethical judgement towards advances in the field. They offer three tactics that can lead to the creation of decolonial artificial intelligence: creating a technical practice for AI, seeking reverse tutelage and reverse pedagogies and the renewal of affective and political communities.

This paper explores the important role of critical science, and in particular of post-colonial and decolonial theories, in understanding and shaping the ongoing advances in artificial intelligence. Artificial Intelligence (AI) is viewed as amongst the technological advances that will reshape modern societies and their relations. Whilst the design and deployment of systems that continually adapt holds the promise of far-reaching positive change, they simultaneously pose significant risks, especially to already vulnerable peoples. Values and power are central to this discussion. Decolonial theories use historical hindsight to explain patterns of power that shape our intellectual, political, economic, and social world. By embedding a decolonial critical approach within its technical practice, AI communities can develop foresight and tactics that can better align research and technology development with established ethical principles, centring vulnerable peoples who continue to bear the brunt of negative impacts of innovation and scientific progress. We highlight problematic applications that are instances of coloniality, and using a decolonial lens, submit three tactics that can form a decolonial field of artificial intelligence: creating a critical technical practice of AI, seeking reverse tutelage and reverse pedagogies, and the renewal of affective and political communities. The years ahead will usher in a wave of new scientific breakthroughs and technologies driven by AI research, making it incumbent upon AI communities to strengthen the social contract through ethical foresight and the multiplicity of intellectual perspectives available to us; ultimately supporting future technologies that enable greater well-being, with the goal of beneficence and justice for all.