Showing 15 of 315 results

Government Strategy Needs Reimagining: An Experiment from Argentina
Global AI Watch

Government Strategy Needs Reimagining: An Experiment from Argentina

In Argentina, the Red de Innovación Local (RIL) experimented with its AI-powered platform, PortalRIL, to shift from fragmented work plans to an inquiry-driven planning process anchored in a “Question Tree.” By surfacing patterns, trade-offs, and synergies across teams, AI helped compress months of coordination into weeks of shared clarity. The result suggests that AI’s real promise is to expand strategic horizons and accelerate collective insight, freeing public servants to focus on judgment, identity, and long-term public value.

Published on Feb 18, 2026 by Giulio Quaggiotto

Evaluating AI Safety Through Local Policy: Findings from the UbuntuGuard benchmark
Research Radar

Evaluating AI Safety Through Local Policy: Findings from the UbuntuGuard benchmark

A new paper introducing the UbuntuGuard benchmark questions whether strong results on English-language safety tests consistently translate into responsible use. Built from policies developed by 155 African domain experts across ten languages and six countries, UbuntuGuard's framework assesses whether AI tools comply with the norms that shape services in non-Western contexts. The findings suggest that institutions, wherever they operate, need the capacity to define their own standards before using these tools to improve public-sector outcomes.

Published on Feb 17, 2026 by Elana Banin

Minding the brand: Leveraging AI to build a culture of recognition in government
AI for Governance

Minding the brand: Leveraging AI to build a culture of recognition in government

Max Stier argues that rebuilding trust in government begins inside agencies by recognizing and elevating the everyday excellence of career civil servants. Drawing on the Partnership for Public Service and federal workforce data, he argues that internal culture, not just external messaging, shapes public confidence. The post explains how AI can cut paperwork, reduce bias, recognize good work in real time, and tailor praise, helping leaders boost morale, reward strong performance, and better serve the public.

Published on Feb 16, 2026 by Max Stier

Global AI Watch: Korean Public Funds for Global AI Advancements
Global AI Watch

Global AI Watch: Korean Public Funds for Global AI Advancements

As Korea aims to become a top-three global AI power, the government has staked its strategy on “sovereign AI” as both an economic and national security priority. In this reflection, originally published in the Herald Insight Collection, Merve Hickok examines Korea’s multibillion-dollar investment in a national foundation model amid U.S.–China competition and the rise of Open-Source AI, asking whether alternative investments—such as small language models, compute and energy efficiency, and AI governance and evaluation—might better secure Korea’s long-term autonomy and global leadership.

Published on Feb 11, 2026 by Merve Hickok

How We Co-Designed an AI-Powered Tool for IEPs with Families in San Francisco
Research Radar

How We Co-Designed an AI-Powered Tool for IEPs with Families in San Francisco

As the AIEP project concludes its first pilot in San Francisco, it offers more than a new AI tool for navigating IEPs. It shows what becomes possible when families, educators, designers, and researchers co-design technology from the ground up. Through a free, open-source tool, a civic AI learning course, a community-centered playbook, and academic research, this work demonstrates a practical model for public-purpose AI rooted in lived experience, shared learning, and accountability. What began as support for parents has grown into a blueprint for building AI with communities, not just for them.

Published on Feb 10, 2026 by Sofía Bosch Gómez, Joanna French and Belén Farmer Martinez

Doing Democracy with AI: Designing Public Engagement for the AI Era
AI for Governance

Doing Democracy with AI: Designing Public Engagement for the AI Era

Leaders increasingly believe public engagement matters, but lack the practical know-how to do it well. Beth Simone Noveck and Dane Gambrell examine how institutions use AI and collective intelligence to engage the public at scale. Across countries and levels of government, engagement can move from performative to consequential when institutions build the capacity to design it well. That work now comes together in a new free course, Designing Democratic Engagement for the AI Era, created by InnovateUS, The GovLab, and the Allen Lab for Democracy Renovation, to help public professionals turn these lessons into practice.

Published on Feb 9, 2026 by Beth Simone Noveck and Dane Gambrell

Wicked Decluttering

Wicked Decluttering

What if the problem with government wasn’t too many rules, but how they’re organized? Boston’s permitting overhaul with AI for Impact shows how AI and collective intelligence can simplify the user experience without eroding the safeguards that matter.

Published on Feb 4, 2026 by Beth Simone Noveck

Research Radar: “Unboxing the Prompt”: How Community Feedback (and AI) Helped Us Build Better AI Together
Research Radar

Research Radar: “Unboxing the Prompt”: How Community Feedback (and AI) Helped Us Build Better AI Together

Families are expected to advocate for their children using IEP documents that are dense, technical, and often inaccessible. Instead of treating AI as a black box that produces generic summaries, this project takes a different approach of "unboxing the prompt" and inviting parents into the system's core logic. This post traces how community feedback reshaped the tool at every stage, from moving beyond one-size-fits-all summaries to extracting legally meaningful details, to designing for privacy, to preserving meaning across languages, and to foregrounding student strengths.

Published on Feb 3, 2026 by Dhruv Kamlesh Kumar

Experimentation as Public Infrastructure
AI for Governance

Experimentation as Public Infrastructure

Governments are adopting powerful new technologies faster than their systems are built to learn. This piece by Cassandra Madison at the Center for Civic Futures argues that responsible innovation requires more than access to tools. It requires safe, structured spaces for experimentation. By treating experimentation as public infrastructure, governments can learn early, surface risks before they scale, and make better decisions when the stakes are highest.

Published on Feb 2, 2026 by Cassandra Madison

Global AI Watch: Mapping the School, Seeing the System: How Spatial Context Reshaped Public Decision-Making in Uzbekistan and Bhutan
Global AI Watch

Global AI Watch: Mapping the School, Seeing the System: How Spatial Context Reshaped Public Decision-Making in Uzbekistan and Bhutan

Crowdsourced mapping of schools in Uzbekistan and Bhutan combined with AI data analysis created greater insight into on-the-ground conditions. By treating geography as essential, spatial data, participatory collection, and AI analysis reshaped how evidence-informed public investment and policy decisions are made in Uzbekistan and Bhutan.

Published on Jan 28, 2026 by Aziza Umarova

Reimagining Public Institutions: Rethinking Leadership for Organizational Transformation
AI and Problem Solving

Reimagining Public Institutions: Rethinking Leadership for Organizational Transformation

Organizations are among humanity’s most powerful inventions, but many of the structures we take for granted no longer serve the people inside them or the public they exist to support. Drawing on insights from Christian Bason, this piece by Anita McGahan explores how AI can help public organizations move beyond rigid hierarchies toward more humane, trust-based, and purpose-driven ways of working. The result is a vision of government that listens more effectively, empowers frontline staff, and delivers real value to people and communities.

Published on Jan 27, 2026 by Anita McGahan

Prediction Isn’t Intelligence: How Predictive Models Really Work in Government
AI and Service Delivery

Prediction Isn’t Intelligence: How Predictive Models Really Work in Government

A hiring tool changes your "personality" score based on whether there's a bookshelf behind you in an interview. A hospital model suggests asthmatics are safer—because it learned how to respond to the triage system, not the disease. This InnovateUS workshop explains why predictive AI needs governance, not just accuracy.

Published on Jan 27, 2026 by Stephan Schmidt

Launching the Observatory of Public Sector AI: An Invitation to Build the Evidence Base Together
AI and Labor

Launching the Observatory of Public Sector AI: An Invitation to Build the Evidence Base Together

The Observatory of Public Sector AI is a new research initiative of InnovateUS and The GovLab. The Observatory draws on anonymized data from more than 150,000 public servants nationwide. By analyzing how public employees learn, use, and adapt AI at work, the Observatory aims to identify which investments in skills and training strengthen government capacity, improve services, and deliver better outcomes for residents.

Published on Jan 26, 2026 by Beth Simone Noveck, Anirudh Dinesh, Gregory Porumbescu, Allison Wan and Amanda Welsh

Voices in Every Language: How India is Building More Inclusive AI
Global AI Watch

Voices in Every Language: How India is Building More Inclusive AI

India's Bhashini platform is democratizing access to digital services for 1.4 billion people by treating multilingual capability as public infrastructure. Through crowdsourced voice donations and open APIs, this initiative could transform how underserved populations access rights and resources that were previously locked behind language barriers.

Published on Jan 21, 2026 by Anirudh Dinesh

AI and the Future of State Regulation

AI and the Future of State Regulation

This piece examines how the Commonwealth of Virginia is using artificial intelligence to modernize regulatory review, shifting the focus from regulating AI to governing with it. Drawing on recent reforms led by the Virginia Office of Regulatory Management under Governor Glenn Youngkin, the article outlines how AI tools are being applied to analyze regulations, reduce administrative burden, and improve transparency. The "Virginia Model" offers a practical model for other states exploring how AI can strengthen core government functions.

Published on Jan 20, 2026 by Reeve T. Bull