Nowadays AI has become a part of every field like education, business, healthcare and entertainment. AI is also changing world politics. It has a major impact on decisions made by government, public opinion and campaigns run by political parties. AI is not simply a technological tool but it is a new source of political power. Even politicians are using AI in order to make plans for the future,make faster decisions and understand humans.
AI is used by political parties in order to study about their voters. These parties send different messages to different groups of people based on their personal data like age, online behavior, location and interest. This whole process is called microtargeting. But it is not necessary that this microtargeting has a positive impact on society. Sometimes it also spreads half truth and manipulates people.
AI is also used to create bots. These are basically computer programs which automatically perform tasks without human help on the internet. So in politics they are responsible for spreading political content automatically. But in many cases bots spread biased or false information. Another important thing in AI is deepfakes.They are in the form of photos, videos or audio made by AI, they look and sound real. Deepfakes are dangerous because they can spread misinformation and can harm the privacy of a person.They can be used to affect a candidate’s reputation either in a positive way or negative way.
There are many countries in the world which are using AI for public services like in India the government is using AI in order to improve traffic control in busy cities like Delhi, Mumbai and Bengaluru. AI powered cameras and sensors are used to control signals and reduce jams.Indian government is also using AI in healthcare sectors
to deal with health problems. Estonia is also one of the first countries which actually used AI for public services. They introduced digital assistant Kratt to help citizens in renewing of documents and payment of taxes.One of the outstanding example is NHS National Health Services of United States where AI is used with googles deepmind for the detection of kidney diseases.Singapore is also using AI for the purpose of city planning and waste management. According to the experts AI should help humans but it should not replace them. Therefore it is the prime duty of the government to make sure AI is used responsibly and protection of data should be in human control.
In the past powerful countries were determined on the basis of their military or economic power but nowadays AI is the main source of power. Therefore every country is in the race to lead AI in different domains. The country which basically leads in AI gets more control over technology and even on military power and economic power. For example, the US uses AI for cyber defense, drone technology and intelligence analysis. The US government is also funding one of the important programs called (DARPA) Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency in order to make its defense system stronger and more advanced.
China has spent millions of dollars in the field of AI research. They are using AI in maintaining security, facial recognition, surveillance cameras and in a social credit system that tracks citizen behavior. On the other hand, the European Union (EU) has introduced the EU AI Act in 2024, the prime purpose of this act is focusing on security, transparency and protection of citizen rights.
AI also has a crucial role in diplomacy for the purpose of predicting conflicts and strategies regarding negotiation.Therefore, AI gives more power to the countries but there should be global rules to make sure that it is used ethically and fairly without causing any harm to people.
Moreover, AI has a positive impact on society but it also brings serious risks like the problem of biasness. For example there are some tools for facial recognition but they work better on light tone skin compared to dark skin which is basically a form of discrimination. Another important risk is privacy.AI has a control on the online activities of humans. So it is the major concern that data can be misused if it goes into the wrong hands.
AI is changing governance, global politics and power dynamics. It makes tasks easier and works at incredible speed. From traffic control in India to e-governance in Estonia and the defense system in the United States, AI has become part of modern Statecrafts. However, there are some serious risks like loss of privacy, manipulation, spreading of false information and bias. Therefore the government should take strong steps in order to bring transparency and fairness in the society. In addition to this, AI should be used wisely without causing any harm to humanity. The real goal should be to use AI as a helper not as a ruler.
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