Behind the Scenes in Global AI Diplomacy w/ Buffett Institute

The prevailing wisdom holds that the world is fragmenting and that an accelerating AI military race, great-power stalemate at the United Nations (UN) Security Council, and deep distrust of multilateral solutions have made cooperation on the technologies that will define this century all but impossible. Professor Garcia will take the audience behind the scenes of global diplomacy to reveal a more nuanced story. Drawing on more than a decade of participant observation at AI summits and negotiations as a Global Commissioner on the Responsible Use of AI in the Military Domain (The Hague, 2023–2026) and as a member of the International Panel for the Regulation of Autonomous Weapons (Berlin, 2017–2022), she shows that governance is not collapsing but rising in new forms. From the Berlin panel, which advised the UN's effort in Geneva to negotiate a new treaty on autonomous weapons — a process she has observed since 2014 — to the summits where AI governance is now being written, Garcia has watched these rules take shape from the inside. Where treaties stall and leaders hesitate, transnational political networks of scientists and civil society are assembling to move AI governance from principles to practice.