Biden Signs Executive Order Advancing Racial Equity for Government A.I (opens in new tab)

Today, President Biden signed an executive order to further advance racial equity in federal government. The executive order, which builds on previous equity-focused executive orders issued by the Biden Administration, imposes several new obligations on federal agencies related to racial and socioeconomic equity, including bold new equity obligations for A.I. systems developed, acquired, and used by federal agencies. First, federal agencies are now required to design, develop, acquire, and use A.I. in ways that advance equity—an obligation that echoes EPIC’s own concerns with many of the automated systems used by government agencies. Second, the executive explicitly directs agencies to prevent and address algorithmic discrimination as part of a broader effort to advance civil rights. The Biden Administration’s decision to highlight algorithmic discrimination—even going so far as to explicitly adopt the term’s definition from the White House’s recent Blueprint for an A.I. Bill of Rights—is a major step forward for algorithmic accountability across the federal government.

Moves like this will be another illustration of the international export of domestic cultural pathologies of the US, onto the wider world. That different countries have different ideas on what we mean by race and equity will be overwhelmed by the US version of 'what is', derived as it is from the unique conditions of race relations in that country. This is the real power of the US - the stealth insertion of society changing values, through the near total monopoly of the information technology infrastructure.