Session
Description:
The rules governing AI are being written largely without the four billion people, most in the Global South, who will live with the consequences. This hybrid, Nairobi-hosted roundtable moves past "inclusion" as rhetoric to practical mechanisms for genuine agency: how low- and middle-income country governments, technologists, and communities can shape AI's rules, and how digital public infrastructure and digital public goods can be designed to narrow divides rather than widen them. Its centrepiece is an original, reusable tool, the "Representation Test", which participants co-build and pressure-test live: a simple diagnostic any policymaker, funder, or standards body can apply to check whether the people an AI-governance process affects are actually shaping it. Grounded in real practice - Nigeria's national AI strategy and UN digital-public-infrastructure safeguards, Kenyan energy-and-AI innovation, South Asia innovation and cross-continental research as speakers share replicable solutions, not just critique.
The rules governing AI are being written largely without the four billion people, most in the Global South, who will live with the consequences. This hybrid, Nairobi-hosted roundtable moves past "inclusion" as rhetoric to practical mechanisms for genuine agency: how low- and middle-income country governments, technologists, and communities can shape AI's rules, and how digital public infrastructure and digital public goods can be designed to narrow divides rather than widen them. Its centrepiece is an original, reusable tool, the "Representation Test", which participants co-build and pressure-test live: a simple diagnostic any policymaker, funder, or standards body can apply to check whether the people an AI-governance process affects are actually shaping it. Grounded in real practice - Nigeria's national AI strategy and UN digital-public-infrastructure safeguards, Kenyan energy-and-AI innovation, South Asia innovation and cross-continental research as speakers share replicable solutions, not just critique.
Policy Question(s)
Q1. What concrete mechanisms would give low- and middle-income countries genuine agency in shaping global AI governance, rather than inheriting rules designed elsewhere?
Q2. How should digital public infrastructure and digital public goods be governed and designed so that, in the age of AI, they narrow rather than widen divides — particularly for women, youth, and rural communities?
Q3. What does "shared responsibility" concretely require of AI-leading economies, multilateral bodies, and the private sector toward the majority of humanity least represented in AI governance today?
Expected Outcomes
The session directly advances its three policy questions by producing concrete answers, not just debate. Participants will co-build and pressure-test the "Representation Test" — a simple, replicable diagnostic for auditing whether any AI-governance process genuinely includes those it affects (answering Q1 on mechanisms for agency). They will leave with design principles for inclusive digital public infrastructure and digital public goods that narrow rather than widen divides (Q2), and a shared articulation of what "shared responsibility" concretely demands of AI-leading economies and the private sector (Q3). Outputs include a published rapporteur's report, the open-licensed Representation Test tool for reuse, and a continuing network carrying the work into national and multilateral processes. The intended effect is a "to be continued" momentum — a tool and a coalition that outlast the session and feed future IGF and intersessional work.
Format
Roundtable
Duration (minutes): 90
Format description: A classroom layout suits this working session: participants need a writing surface for the hands-on segment, and it accommodates a larger, engaged audience than a closed roundtable. The 90 minutes follow a clear arc: brief framing inputs from speakers (15 min), a moderated panel drawing out diverse perspectives (25 min), a facilitated workshop where onsite and online participants co-build and pressure-test the Representation Test at their tables (45 min), and a short synthesis (5 min). This deliberately weights the session toward participant co-production rather than presentation, over half the time is interactive. Theatre seating, lacking tables for the workshop segment, could not support it; a shorter slot would force a lecture. The panel gives speakers substantive airtime while the workshop ensures the output is created by the room, balancing familiarity with genuine, structured interaction.
Duration (minutes): 90
Format description: A classroom layout suits this working session: participants need a writing surface for the hands-on segment, and it accommodates a larger, engaged audience than a closed roundtable. The 90 minutes follow a clear arc: brief framing inputs from speakers (15 min), a moderated panel drawing out diverse perspectives (25 min), a facilitated workshop where onsite and online participants co-build and pressure-test the Representation Test at their tables (45 min), and a short synthesis (5 min). This deliberately weights the session toward participant co-production rather than presentation, over half the time is interactive. Theatre seating, lacking tables for the workshop segment, could not support it; a shorter slot would force a lecture. The panel gives speakers substantive airtime while the workshop ensures the output is created by the room, balancing familiarity with genuine, structured interaction.
Hybrid Format: A dedicated online moderator co-leads throughout, holding equal space for remote voices; an online-first rule reserves the first audience question and the first breakout report-back for online participants, structurally preventing the "remote afterthought" problem. After brief speaker framings (5 minutes each, no monologues), onsite and online participants join the same facilitated breakout prompts to co-build the Representation Test, contributing to a shared live document (Mentimeter for rapid input; a collaborative Google Doc for breakout work) visible to both audiences on the main screen. The synthesis draws visibly and equally from onsite and online contributions. The onsite and online moderators bridge the two groups, and the rapporteur captures all inputs live into the final tool. Tools: Zoom (Secretariat-provided), Mentimeter, and a shared collaborative document.
Organizer 1: Elizabeth Abubakar, Advisor, Tubariki Foundation & ONE Campaign
Organizer 2: Winfred Mutinda, Tubariki Foundation
Organizer 2: Winfred Mutinda, Tubariki Foundation
Speaker 1: Elizabeth Abubakar, Private Sector, African Group
Speaker 2: Winfred Mutinda, Civil Society, African Group
Speaker 3: Laila Nazam, Technical Community, Asia-Pacific Group
Speaker 4: Sarpong Eleanor , Private Sector, African Group
Speaker 5: Kawende Dylan , Technical Community, Western European and Others Group (WEOG)
Speaker 2: Winfred Mutinda, Civil Society, African Group
Speaker 3: Laila Nazam, Technical Community, Asia-Pacific Group
Speaker 4: Sarpong Eleanor , Private Sector, African Group
Speaker 5: Kawende Dylan , Technical Community, Western European and Others Group (WEOG)
Moderator
Elizabeth Abubakar, Private Sector, African Group
Online Moderator
Laila Nazam, Technical Community, Asia-Pacific Group
Rapporteur
Kawende Dylan , Technical Community, Western European and Others Group (WEOG)
What will participants gain from attending this session?
