The Government promotes the creation of a chair of Artificial Intelligence and Democracy

The Ministry of Economic Affairs and Digital Transformation, through the Secretary of State for Digitalization and Artificial Intelligence, the Institute of Democratic Governance and the European University Institute have signed a collaboration agreement for the creation of a chair of Artificial Intelligence and Democracy.

The specific collaboration for the creation of the new chair aims to carry out research, transfer, dissemination, teaching and innovation activities around the social and ethical challenges related to the development of Artificial Intelligence technologies as part of the digital transformation process facing our country.

Among the activities contemplated within the collaboration agreement is the organization and celebration of seminars related to the subject, the elaboration of research works and training activities of professors and collaborators linked to the chair; or the support of publications on subjects of study of the same, among others.

In addition, the project proposes programs aimed at hosting interns who come to the General Administration of the State temporarily, for the analysis of cases of application of Artificial Intelligence in the Public Administration. The purpose of these activities is to promote the exploitation of research synergies between universities and research centres through inter-university cooperation networks, as well as with companies and public administrations. All this in order to guarantee the democratic rights of citizens in the use of systems based on Artificial Intelligence. These objectives allow us to promote the value of the digital transformation of Spain: its social and humanist character, placing the person at the center and addressing the ethical, social or cultural dilemmas that digital transformation brings with it. The Second Vice-President and Minister of Economic Affairs and Digital Transformation, Nadia Calviño, already highlighted this differential value during her speech at the European Digital Assembly on 1 June, in which the Lisbon Declaration on a digital democracy with purpose was adopted. In addition, this chair continues to work on the important research and joint reflection collaboration at the university level in relation to the preservation of democratic rights and values in the digital world and around technologies such as Artificial Intelligence.

At the level of governance, the monitoring and proper functioning of the chair is guaranteed through the creation of a Monitoring Committee and a Scientific Committee. The latter will be a body composed of a total of six members of recognized prestige in the field of Artificial Intelligence and democracy appointed jointly by the Secretary of State for Digitalization and Artificial Intelligence (SEDIA), the Institute of Democratic Governance and the European University Institute.

The creation of this chair is part of the agenda Spain Digital 2025, in the National Artificial Intelligence Strategy, as well as inside of the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan. In addition, it is a first chair after which others will be launched in different topics related to AI.