About the Webinar

Good governance of AI (artificial intelligence) is proving remarkably tricky. Regulatory practice needs to delicately balance concerns like safety, data privacy, and openness to future innovation, with different losers and winners depending on which of these is prioritised. These competing concerns are exacerbated by how the technology involved is dynamic, so no rule can be stable or immutable. Countries, some sub-national units like powerful cities, and regional/multilateral organisations have all weighed in with views on what good governance looks like and how it can be enacted – including but not restricted to safety institutes, legislation like the EU’s and entities like the United Nations High Level Advisory Body on AI.

This session explores a question that has been under-explored so far: how best to sequence domestic and international policy on AI. In some instances, domestic policy has provided a starting point e.g. bilateral efforts like the Singapore-US crosswalk that explores the inter-operabilities between the two countries’ domestic regulatory frameworks. But does this lead to optimal national and global outcomes, given that countries could also learn from international regimes (e.g. for civil aviation and nuclear energy), coordinating to manage large AI firms and ensure non-zero-sum outcomes, before enacting domestic approaches?

The webinar will also explore this question from both theoretical and policy perspectives, drawing on the speakers’ involvements in AI-related initiatives in the University of Oxford, the OECD and more widely.

About the Speakers

Aaron Maniam currently researches and teaches at the University of Oxford’s Blavatnik School of Government, on both Master of Public Policy and executive education programmes. He focuses on issues connecting technology, public policy and public administration, as well as public sector foresight, strategy and planning. He co-chairs the World Economic Forum’s Global Future Council on the Future of Technology Policy and is a member of the OECD’s Expert Group on Artificial Intelligence (AI) Futures.

In his 20-year career in the Singapore Public Service, Dr Maniam was most recently Deputy Secretary of the Ministry of Communications and Information (MCI) from January 2020 to June 2023. Prior to this appointment, he was Director (Industry) at the Ministry of Trade and Industry (2014-2017), Director of the Institute of Public Sector Leadership at CSC (2011-2013), Deputy Director at the Strategy Policy Office (2008-2011) where he was the first Head of the Centre for Strategic Futures, Assistant Director (2004-2006) and First Secretary at MFA (2006-08), posted in Washington DC. Dr Maniam holds a BA in Philosophy, Politics and Economics, Master of Public Policy, and a PhD in Public Policy from the University of Oxford, and an MA in International and Developmental Economics from Yale University.

Robert Trager is Co-Director of the Oxford Martin AI Governance Initiative, International Governance Lead at the Centre for the Governance of AI, and Senior Research Fellow at the Blavatnik School of Government at the University of Oxford. He is a recognized expert in the international governance of emerging technologies, diplomatic practice, institutional design, and technology regulation. He regularly advises government and industry leaders on these topics.

Dr Trager has written two books and numerous articles in leading social science journals, including the American Political Science Review, International Organization, International Security, Foreign Affairs and many others. His award-winning research has been covered in popular press outlets like the New York Times, Economist, Financial Times, Washington Post, NPR, Fortune, Foreign Policy, and Foreign Affairs. From 2017-2021, he was the Assistant Director for Research of the Burkle Center for International Relations. He was Associate Editor of one of the international relations field’s leading journals, the International Studies Quarterly, and sat on the boards of the Institute for Global Cooperation and Conflict, the Berkeley Risk and Security Lab, and the Burkle Center.

Before moving to the University of Oxford, Dr Trager was Professor of Political Science at the University of California, Los Angeles and held faculty positions at Yale University and an Olin Fellowship at Harvard University.

About the Discussant

Benjamin Ang is Senior Fellow and Head of the Centre of Excellence for National Security (CENS), oversees Future Issues in Technology (FIT), as well as Head of Digital Impact Research (DIR) at RSIS.

He leads the CENS policy research team that writes, publishes, and lectures internationally on national security issues related to cyber, international cyber norms, disinformation, cybercrime, foreign interference, hybrid threats, digital security, social cohesion, polarization, and social resilience. At FIT, he leads the team exploring policy issues in artificial intelligence, space, quantum technology, smart cities, biotechnology, and other emerging technologies. Through DIR, he networks with the wide array of RSIS experts who study the impact of digital technology into their respective security domains.

He has given expert testimony at the United Nations Open Ended Working Group on Cyber, testified before Singapore’s Parliamentary Select Committee on Deliberate Online Falsehoods, and regularly lectures at the UN-Singapore Cyber Fellowship.

Prior to this, he had a multi-faceted career that included time as a litigation lawyer arguing commercial cases, IT Director and General Manager of a major Singapore law firm, corporate lawyer specialising in technology law and intellectual property issues, in house legal counsel in an international software company, Director-Asia in a regional technology consulting firm, in-house legal counsel in a transmedia company, and senior law lecturer at a local Polytechnic, specialising in data privacy, digital forensics, and computer misuse and cybersecurity.

Benjamin graduated from Law School at the National University of Singapore and has an MBA and MS-MIS (Masters of Science in Management Information Systems) from Boston University.

He also serves as Co-Chief Data Officer of AI.Singapore, the national programme that builds national capabilities in AI, and volunteers on the Executive Committee of the Internet Society Singapore Chapter. He is qualified as an Advocate and Solicitor of the Supreme Court of Singapore and was a Certified Novell Network Administrator back in the day.