INITIATIVES · TECHNOLOGY AND THE AMERICAN FUTURE

Who gets to shape the AI future?

Artificial intelligence is moving from a specialized technology into the arrangements of everyday life — how people work, learn, create, receive care, find information, and participate in public life. The possibilities are real: AI may help people interpret complex information, overcome barriers of language and disability, advance science, and give small organizations capabilities once reserved for large institutions. The disruptions are real too: AI may eliminate jobs, weaken economic security, intensify surveillance, and concentrate decision-making power.

The people building and financing this technology are organized. The people living inside the transition are not organized to the same degree. That is a democratic problem, not merely a communications one — experts can tell us what AI systems can do, but not how gains should be shared, what risks are acceptable, or what one generation owes the next. Those are public questions.

What would it mean to build an AI future in which technological progress increases human flourishing and strengthens democratic self-government?

That is the governing question of the Technology Commission.

An honest starting point

This is not an announcement of completed authority — it's an invitation to help build that authority honestly. The Technology Commission is a citizen-centered public initiative, not yet a fully constituted body authorized to speak for the public. It is independent and non-governmental, with no regulatory or investigative authority, and it is not an industry council, a partisan campaign, or a vehicle for a predetermined policy agenda. Its purpose is to help citizens develop the knowledge and civic capacity to participate in decisions that will otherwise be made around them.

Beginning with work and dignity

The Commission's mandate is broad — AI touches education, health care, public information, government, science, culture, and community life — but its first public inquiry is deliberately narrow: Work, Dignity, and the AI Transition. Work provides more than a paycheck; it can provide security, identity, structure, relationships, and a sense of being needed. No one knows exactly how capable AI will become or how quickly different industries will adopt it — the Commission won't present forecasts as facts, but will help citizens prepare for several plausible futures and revise their thinking as evidence changes.

Understand · Deliberate · Act

Understand — The Civic Curriculum for the AI Age, Citizen Briefs, reporting, case presentations, and policy trackers, distinguishing evidence from prediction and a proposed policy from one actually enacted. [Explore the Civic Curriculum →]

Deliberate — Structured public conversations bringing workers, students, parents, educators, clinicians, technologists, and public officials together, with published findings showing where participants agreed, differed, and left questions unresolved. [Explore the Technology Commission →]

Act — Public questions, recommendations, civic tools, and local demonstrations, with proposals clearly labeled as proposals and implementation claims requiring evidence. [Explore the Citizen Toolbox →]

The standard: five dimensions, not one number

The Commission won't judge AI only by speed, novelty, or profitability. It asks whether people and communities are becoming more capable of flourishing, across five dimensions:

Comprehensibility — Can people understand where AI is used, what it does, and who's responsible?
Manageability — Do people have the skills, time, and support to navigate the change?
Meaningfulness — Does the transition protect or expand purpose, contribution, and belonging?
Agency and fairness — Can affected people influence decisions, correct errors, and challenge unfair treatment?
Democratic capacity — Are institutions transparent, accountable, and capable of distributing gains and burdens fairly?

Built in public

Every major product will say whether it's live, being tested, in development, or still a concept — a prototype won't be presented as a completed institution. Montgomery County, Pennsylvania serves as the initial field site, to test participation and tools in a real community before adapting the model elsewhere. On AI use specifically:

AI can assist. Human beings decide. Always.

Begin where you are

Understand one part of the transition through a Citizen Brief or Curriculum chapter.
Share one experience of how AI is changing your work, learning, care, or community.
Ask one public question an employer, technology company, official, or institution should answer.
Join the Commission and help shape what comes next.

[Join the Technology Commission →]