From digital to AI-enabled government: Kazakhstan's next frontier
Kazakhstan built one of the world’s most advanced digital governments in less than two decades. Now the country is racing into the next phase: AI-enabled governance, sovereign AI infrastructure, and nationwide AI deployment. But this transition is exposing a harder question beneath the ambition: what happens when countries move toward frontier AI systems before large parts of the population have reliable electricity, affordable internet, laptops, or the skills needed to use AI meaningfully?
Published on Jun 3, 2026 by Gulnaz Kordanova
Research Radar
Research Radar: 10 Things Public Officials Should Know About AI Data Center
AI data centers are arriving in communities long before most public institutions have figured out how to govern them. Drawing on recent analysis, fieldwork, and an InnovateUS workshop, Deborah Stine examines the questions public officials are now confronting around electricity, water, jobs, infrastructure, public trust, and community impact. She argues that AI data centers are far more than technology projects; they are major public policy decisions that will shape how communities experience the AI economy.
Published on Jun 2, 2026 by Dr. Deborah Stine
AI and Education
The Scotsman: Scotland uniquely able to redefine the purpose of universities, Obama advisor claims
Ahead of a timely conversation around the civic role of the university in an age of democratic uncertainty and rapid technological change, Beth Simone Noveck spoke to the Scotsman about how Scotland's universities are uniquely place to reinvent the purpose of higher education.
Published on Jun 2, 2026 by Beth Simone Noveck
AI for Governance
Leadership is About Setting Goals, Supporting the Team, and Getting Out of the Way
Public servants are asking for leadership training at the same moment AI is reshaping government work. This reflection on InnovateUS’s Foundations of Leadership workshop series explores why the most important leadership challenges today are often deeply human ones: creating psychological safety, building real teams instead of loose groups, giving honest feedback, understanding strengths, and helping people perform under pressure and uncertainty. Across five sessions, participants wrestled with the gap between knowing what good leadership looks like and consistently practicing it within real organizations.
Published on Jun 1, 2026 by Anita McGahan
Global AI Watch
Bellagio: Five Days, 16 Members of Congress, and an Unusually Honest Conversation About AI
Mariana Becerra of the Eleanor Crook Foundation went to the Rockefeller Foundation’s Bellagio Center expecting a conversation about AI and geopolitical competition with bipartisan, bicameral members of Congress. She came back convinced that AI is already reshaping how public health systems function, how advocacy operates, and which organizations will have the capacity to influence policy. Drawing on conversations with lawmakers, researchers, and philanthropy leaders, this piece examines the growing gap between where AI governance debates are happening and the resulting consequences.
Published on May 27, 2026 by Mariana Becerra
Research Radar
Research Radar: The Six-Word Problem: Will Voice Improve How We Research the Impacts of AI?
AI for Impact Fellows Sai Punith Kolla and Swaapnika Chowdary Cherukuru built Public Voice, a lightweight voice-based feedback tool designed to capture concrete examples of how learners apply AI in practice. The piece explores the design challenge behind the tool, why voice responses may produce richer evidence than text surveys, and what it means to measure whether public-sector AI training is translating into real workflow change.
Published on May 26, 2026 by Sai Punith Kolla and Swaapnika Chowdary Cherukuru
AI for Governance
Why Effective AI Governance Depends on Strong Justice Systems
As governments rush to regulate AI, many governance frameworks still overlook what happens when people are harmed. This piece argues that AI governance will be tested by legal systems already struggling to deliver equal access to justice. Drawing on the recent report "A People-Centered Justice Approach to Implementing AI Governance," examples from Australia, the Netherlands, and the United States make the case for bringing courts, legal aid organizations, and justice institutions into the center of AI governance design.
Published on May 25, 2026 by Nate Edwards
Global AI Watch
Mandatory Reporting vs. Substantive Oversight: Examining AI Ethics in the Turkish School System
As governments search for ways to operationalize AI ethics inside public institutions, Türkiye’s new YAZEK system offers an early example of what procedural AI governance can look like in practice. The piece examines how the Ministry of Education embedded mandatory AI ethics declarations into everyday administrative workflows, while also exploring the system’s limits around verification, oversight, and remedy when automated systems cause harm.
Published on May 20, 2026 by Elif Davutoglu
Rethinking Regulation
The Reports Nobody Reads: How San Francisco Used AI to Declutter Its Municipal Code
In a new piece for the Rethinking Regulation series, Dane Gambrell examines how San Francisco used a custom AI tool developed with Stanford’s RegLab to scan 16 million words of municipal code and identify hundreds of outdated and duplicative reporting requirements across city government. The effort ultimately produced a 351-page ordinance proposing the deletion or consolidation of 174 mandates. The piece offers a grounded look at how AI can help governments make sprawling bureaucratic systems more legible and manageable.
Published on May 19, 2026 by Dane Gambrell
AI for Governance
The Future We Build: Hope and Public Service at Code for America Summit
A reflection from Rob Asaro-Angelo, Senior Fellow at the Burnes Center, from the 2026 Code for America Summit on why optimism in government depends on implementation. Drawing from conversations on procurement reform, service delivery, and AI in the public sector, the piece explores how public servants across the country are turning institutional frustration into practical change and why hope becomes credible when people have the tools, authority, and persistence to make systems work better.
Published on May 18, 2026 by Robert Asaro-Angelo
AI for Governance
AI Can Help Our Leaders Be Better
In an article originally published in The Times (Scottish Edition), Beth Simone Noveck argues that AI’s most important democratic use is helping governments listen. Drawing on examples from Camden and Scotland, the piece explores how AI could help public institutions process large-scale public input, strengthen participation, and rebuild trust at a time when governments face rising demand and declining capacity.
Published on May 14, 2026 by Beth Simone Noveck
Research Radar
Zero-Click Government: Omakase or Loss of Agency?
In the afterword to Gustavo Maia’s forthcoming book Zero-Click Government, Beth Simone Noveck explores the democratic risks and possibilities of anticipatory governance. While supporting efforts to reduce the administrative burdens placed on citizens, she argues that traditional requests and applications also served as an important democratic feedback signal, one that anticipatory systems risk losing when governments act on inferred demand. Her response examines what kinds of participation, transparency, contestation, and institutional learning are needed if public action is increasingly shaped by data and AI.
Published on May 13, 2026 by Beth Simone Noveck
Global AI Watch
AI Doesn’t Understand Kichwa: Ecuador’s Case for Inclusive AI Governance in the Justice System
In a new piece for Reboot Democracy, Rodrigo Cetina-Presuel, Marco Tello, and Jose M. Martinez-Sierra examine how Ecuador’s judiciary responded to the rapid arrival of AI by building a participatory governance process rooted in the country’s institutional and cultural realities. Through consultations with judicial officials, the process surfaced a critical gap ignored by most international AI frameworks: current AI systems cannot reliably interpret Indigenous languages or legal contexts such as Kichwa. The result was one of the region’s first judicial AI moratoriums, temporarily prohibiting the use of AI in Indigenous-language cases while Ecuador develops more legitimate and locally grounded governance mechanisms for the future.
Published on May 12, 2026 by Rodrigo Cetina-Presuel, Jose M. Martinez-Sierra and Marco Tello
AI for Governance
The Capitol Wire & Building Congressional Intelligence for Everyone
Congressional information has long been technically public but practically inaccessible, scattered across government sites and locked behind expensive subscription platforms. In response, Zach Florman, Communications Director for Rep. Laura Friedman, created the Capitol Wire tool. The Capitol Wire shows how AI can close that gap by turning floor schedules, bill texts, and legislative updates into real-time alerts and searchable policy briefs that are fast, verifiable, and free. The result is a tool that makes public information more legible for staffers, reporters, and citizens alike, and increases the likelihood of public engagement.
Published on May 11, 2026 by Zachary Florman
Global AI Watch
Progress on Global AI Governance: The CAIDP AI Index and Implications for the Public Sector
The 2026 CAIDP AI Index, ranking AI policy commitments across 90 countries, shows that while most governments now agree on core governance principles, the real divide lies in implementation. Many are advancing laws, oversight, and public participation, but progress lags in turning commitments into practice. As the baseline shifts from whether to govern AI to how, the report underscores that outcomes depend less on frameworks and more on the capacity of public institutions—and the civil servants within them—to operationalize these principles in everyday decisions.
Published on May 6, 2026 by April Yoder and Grace Thomson
InnovateUS 
