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Towards 2025 HDR

Harnessing the opportunities of the digital transformation to advance human development

The 2025 Human Development Report (HDR) is part of a trilogy of reports that looks at a new uncertainty complex comprised of intensifying polarization, destabilized planetary systems, and expanding societal transformation driven by digitalization, including more powerful and far-reaching artificial intelligence (AI) applications.

The 2025 HDR takes a people-centered approach that considers how ideas, knowledge, and information are central to human development. The knowledge/information environment is being reshaped by innovative technologies, creating new challenges and opportunities. Navigating this new context in a way that expands capabilities and agency will shape the course for human development for the next decades. 

The 2025 HDR will explore:

  • How a life stage perspective illuminates the different impacts of digitalization on various age groups, including people of all ages living with disabilities. It analyzes how digitalization is reshaping key areas of human development, including health, education, social norms, relationships, and agency, changing not only the way societies operate but also the way human beings function. Early childhood, for instance, is a vulnerable stage of life, during which digital technologies shape developing brains and bodies. For school age children, digital technologies bring exciting opportunities for learning, both in school and at home, while also presenting risks that seem to be correlated with a deterioration of wellbeing amongst young people. At adult age, digitalization may radically shift the daily activities of work, care, and social interactions within families and with friends. Older people often have as much access to digital technologies as younger people, but how will the digital technologies be used and shaped by the ageing population in many countries?
     
  • How broader systemic aspects of digitalization shape economic and political processes, which constitute the foundation for individual flourishing. For instance, digitalization, and particularly AI, have the potential to disrupt political processes, but they can also enhance inclusiveness and transparency. The report uses a human rights lens to shed light on the tensions that may emerge around preserving freedoms of expression or association with a fundamentally reshaped information environment. It will also examine the implications of lack of diversity in the data used to train AI algorithms. When it comes to the world of work, AI can both augment and replace people, so it is important to consider how to prevent emerging patterns of inequality in human development. New technologies offer the promise of new possibilities to address the challenges of the Anthropocene, but computational and material demands can also exacerbate pressures on the planet through natural resource extraction and energy consumption.

Societal transformations have required institutional and policy innovations in the past, while at the same time mobilizing new coalitions to empower people to navigate new realities. The report will lay out a road map that seeks to inspire people at large, as well as decision makers, to harness digital technologies for human flourishing. Among others, this includes leveraging digital advancements to enhance human capabilities and implementing policies that enable people to exercise their agency in the digital space.

 

Timeline of global consultations

The 2025 HDR Advisory Board Members

The 2025 HDR Advisory Board is co-chaired by Laura Chinchilla, Former President of Costa Rica, and A. Michael Spence, Philip H. Knight Professor Emeritus of Management in the Graduate School of Business at Stanford University. (See the complete list of members below.)

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    Laura Chinchilla

    Former President of Costa Rica (Co-Chair)
    Laura Chinchilla served as president of Costa Rica (2010-2014) after serving as minister of public security, congressperson, and vice president. During her years in public service, Mrs. Chinchilla prompted police and justice reform measures to tackle crime and violence, digital and open government, the promotion of women's rights, and early childhood protection. She also promoted environmental sustainability policies, especially preserving marine biodiversity, for which she was distinguished with international awards. She is Co-Chair of the Inter-American Dialogue, Co-Chair of the Leadership Council of the Concordia Summit, and a member of the World Leadership Alliance Club de Madrid, the Advisory Board of IDEA International, the International Olympic Committee, Water and Sanitation for All, the Euro-America Foundation, and the Adrianne Arsht Latin America Center at the Atlantic Council, among other organizations. She was Chair of the Kofi Annan Global Commission on Elections and Democracy in the Digital Age and Head of the Organization of the American States Electoral Observation Missions in México (2015), United States of America (2016), Paraguay (2018), and Brazil (2018). She is a speaker and consults for several international organizations on institutional reform, democratic governance, and security, and has been a fellow and visiting professor at the Institute of Politics and Public Policy of Georgetown University (USA), the Instituto Tecnológico de Monterrey (México), and the Universidade de Sao Paulo (Brazil).
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    A. Michael Spence

    Philip H. Knight Professor Emeritus of Management in the Graduate School of Business at Stanford University (Co-Chair)
    Michael Spence is the Philip H. Knight Professor Emeritus of Management in the Graduate School of Business at Stanford University, a Senior Fellow of the Hoover Institution at Stanford and a Distinguished Visiting Fellow of the Council on Foreign Relations. He is an Adjunct Professor at Bocconi University in Milan, and an Honorary Fellow of Magdalen College, Oxford University, and a Distinguished Academic Visitor at Queens’ College, Cambridge. In 2001, he received the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences for his work in the field of information economics. He is the author of “The Next Convergence: The Future of Economic Growth in a Multispeed World,” Farrar, Straus and Giroux (May 10, 2011). His new book, written with Gordon Brown, Mohamed El-Erian and Reid Lidow is “Permacrisis: How to Fix a Fractured World,” Simon and Schuster, Sept 2023. He is a Senior Advisor to Jasper Ridge Partners and a Senior Advisor to General Atlantic Partners. He chairs the Advisory Board of the Asia Global Institute and was the Chairman of The Independent Commission on Growth and Development (2006-2010). He is a member of the Advisory Council of the Luohan Academy in Hangzhou. He served as Dean of the Stanford Business School from 1990 to 1999 and Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences at Harvard University from 1984 to 1990. He was awarded the John Kenneth Galbraith Prize for excellence in teaching and the John Bates Clark Medal, awarded to American economists under age 40 for a "significant contribution to economic thought and knowledge."
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    Masood Ahmed

    President Emeritus of the Center for Global Development
    Sir Masood Ahmed has been President Emeritus of CGD since July 2024. He joined the Center in 2017, capping a 35-year career driving economic development policy initiatives relating to debt, aid effectiveness, trade, and global economic prospects at major international institutions including the IMF, World Bank, and DFID. Prior to CGD, he served for eight years as director, Middle East and Central Asia Department at the IMF, where he oversaw the Fund's operations in 32 countries, and managed relationships with key policymakers and stakeholders. Ahmed also served as Director General, Policy and International at the UK government's Department for International Development (DFID), where he advised UK ministers on development issues and oversaw the UK's relationship with global development institutions. At the World Bank, Ahmed served in a variety of operational and policy positions, including Vice President for Poverty Reduction and Economic Management in which role he oversaw the design and launch of the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) Initiative and the Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP) approach. In 2023 he was made a KCMG in recognition of his contribution to international development.
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    Deemah AlYahya

    Secretary-General, Digital Cooperation Organization
    Deemah AlYahya is a digital economy expert and a tech diplomat who serves as the Secretary-General of the Digital Cooperation Organization (DCO). The DCO is the world’s first standalone intergovernmental global organization focusing on accelerating digital transformation and advancing digital economy, while empowering women and youth. As the Secretary-General, AlYahya is an advisor, connecting heads of state, government ministers and private sector digital economy leaders together. She facilitates multilateral, multistakeholder digital cooperation to bridge the gap, bringing all digital economy key stakeholders to co-design high-impact initiatives to ensure every country, business, and person has a fair opportunity to prosper in an inclusive and sustainable digital economy. AlYahya is an Edison Alliance champion for digital inclusion, advocating for equitable access to technology for all. As a Commissioner with Broadband Commission for Sustainable Development, she is committed to fostering digital cooperation to ensure universal connectivity and bridge the digital divide.
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    Kaushik Basu

    Professor of Economics and the Carl Marks Professor of International Studies at Cornell University
    Kaushik Basu is Professor of Economics and the Carl Marks Professor of International Studies at Cornell University, and served a three-year term as President of the International Economic Association. He was Chief Economist of the World Bank from 2012 to 2016, and prior to that Professor Basu served as the Chief Economic Adviser to the Government of India, 2009 to 2012. Earlier, he had been Director of the Center for Analytic Economics, 2006-09, and Chairman of the Department of Economics at Cornell, 2008-9. During his early career in Delhi, he founded the Centre for Development Economics, and served as its first Executive Director. Basu has published extensively in the areas of development economics, industrial organization, welfare economics and morals, and game theory. He is the author of several books, including, Policymaker’s Journal: From New Delhi to Washington D. C., Simon and Schuster, 2021, and The Republic of Beliefs: A New Approach to Law and Economics, Princeton University Press, 2018. In 2008 Kaushik Basu was conferred one of India’s highest civilian awards, the Padma Bhushan, by the President of India.
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    Haroon Bhorat

    Professor of Economics and Director of the Development Policy Research Unit at the University of Cape Town
    Haroon Bhorat is Professor of Economics and Director of the Development Policy Research Unit at the University of Cape Town. He is one of the most cited South African economists globally, with a total citation estimate of 8400 and an h-index of 52. He is a Non-resident Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution and a Research Fellow at IZA. Haroon was a Cornell University research fellow and studied at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is a member of the World Bank Economic Review editorial advisory board, and a regular referee for journals including World Development, American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, the Journal of African Economies and the Journal of Development Studies. He is currently a member of the Steering Committee of the International Economic Association (IEA). He was a member on the Advisory Board of the UNDP’s 2019 and 2020 and 2025 Human Development Reports and served on the World Bank’s Advisory Board of the Commission on Global Poverty. He was also a previous member of the UNU World Institute for Development Economics Research (UNU-WIDER) Board. He is an advisor to the President of South Africa - Cyril Ramaphosa - serving on his Presidential Economic Advisory Council (PEAC). He also served as an economic advisor to two past Ministers of Finance and previous Presidents Mbeki and Motlanthe of South Africa.
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    Diane Coyle

    Bennett Professor of Public Policy, University of Cambridge, Co-Director, Bennett Institute for Public Policy, University of Cambridge
    Professor Dame Diane Coyle is the Bennett Professor of Public Policy at the University of Cambridge. Prof Coyle co-directs the Bennett Institute where she heads research under the themes of progress and productivity and has advised the government on economic policy. Professor Coyle is also a Director of the Productivity Institute, a Fellow of the Office for National Statistics, and an expert adviser to the National Infrastructure Commission. She has served in several public service roles including as Vice Chair of the BBC Trust, member of the Competition Commission, of the Migration Advisory Committee and of the Natural Capital Committee. Diane was Professor of Economics at the University of Manchester until March 2018 and was awarded a DBE for her contribution to economic policy in the 2023 King’s Birthday Honours. Her research interests include economic statistics and the digital economy, competition policy and digital markets, the economics of new technologies, natural capital, and infrastructure. She is the author of numerous books including Cogs and Monsters, Markets, State and People: Economics for Public Policy, and GDP: A Brief but Affectionate History, all published by Princeton University Press, and she has published extensively in journals such as Nature, Economica, Regional Studies, Journal of Economic Methodology, and Review of Income and Wealth. Her new book, The Measure of Progress, is out in April 2025.
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    Gretchen C. Daily

    Director, Natural Capital Project and Bing Professor of Environmental Science, Stanford University
    Gretchen C. Daily is an ecologist focused on bringing the values of nature into decision-making. Her work spans research, education, and engaging leaders – in communities, government, the private sector, and civil society – to pioneer and scale practical approaches to valuing nature. Her research focuses on harmonizing biodiversity and agriculture; enhancing the benefits of nature to people through investment and stewardship; and new policy and finance mechanisms for green and inclusive development. She co-founded and is faculty director of the Natural Capital Project, a 20-year-old global partnership whose mission is to help secure the well-being of people and nature. They do this by co-developing with decision-makers a systematic approach to valuing nature’s benefits in sustaining and fulfilling human life. She is an elected member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and the American Philosophical Society. She has published several hundred scientific and popular articles and a dozen books, including Nature’s Services: Societal Dependence on Natural Ecosystems (1997), The New Economy of Nature: The Quest to Make Conservation Profitable (2002, with journalist Katherine Ellison), Natural Capital: Theory and Practice of Mapping Ecosystem Services (2011, with colleagues), The Power of Trees (2012), and Green Growth that Works: Natural Capital Policy and Finance Mechanisms Around the World (2019, with colleagues).
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    Renée DiResta

    Associate Research Professor at Georgetown University McCourt School of Public Policy, previously Technical Research Manager at Stanford Internet Observatory
    Associate Research Professor at Georgetown University McCourt School of Public Policy, previously Technical Research Manager at Stanford Internet Observatory. In these roles, Renee studies aversarial abuse online, ranging from state actors running influence operations to AI-enhanced scams, and considers policy, education, and design solutions to respond to emerging challenges. Prior to joining Stanford Internet Observatory, she worked on tech startups, venture capital, and quantitative finance. She was the Director of Research at AI narrative analysis startup Yonder (acquired by Primer), and part of the founding team at supply chain logistics startup Haven (acquired by FourKites). Before moving into startups, she was Principal at seed-stage venture capital fund O’Reilly AlphaTech Ventures (OATV). She spent seven years on Wall Street as an equity derivatives trader and market maker at Jane Street. She has degrees in Computer Science and Political Science from the Honors College at Stony Brook University. 2019-2020 Emerson Fellow; 2018-2019 Mozilla Fellow; 2017 Presidential Leadership Scholar; Council on Foreign Relations term member; Truman National Security Fellow. She held affiliations with the Harvard Berkman-Klein Center, and the Columbia University Data Science Institute. Founding Advisor to the Center for Humane Technology, and appeared in The Social Dilemma.
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    Marc Fleurbaey

    Research Director, CNRS and Professor, Paris School of Economics; Associate Professor, Ecole normale supérieure, Paris
    Marc Fleurbaey is a Professor at the Paris School of Economics, Associate Professor at Ecole normale supérieure, Paris, and Research Director at the National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS) in Paris since July 2020. Prior to that, he was the Robert E Kuenne Professor in Economics and Humanistic Studies, and Professor of Public Affairs and the Center for Human Values at Princeton University, an economist at INSEE (Paris), and a professor of economics at the Universities of Cergy-Pontoise and Pau (France). He has also been a Lachmann Fellow and a visiting professor at the London School of Economics, a research associate at the Center for Operations Research and Econometrics and the Institute for Public Economics (IDEP, Marseilles), and a visiting researcher at Oxford. He is a former editor of the journals Economics and Philosophy and Social Choice and Welfare. He is a co-editor of Rethinking Society for the 21st Century, Report of the International Panel on Social Progress (2018), and the Oxford Handbook of Well-being and Public policy (2016), the author of Fairness, Responsibility, and Welfare (2008), a co-author of A Manifesto for Social Progress. Ideas for a Better Society (with O. Bouin, M.L Salles-Djelic, R. Kanbur, H Nowotny, and E. Reis, 2018) Beyond GDP (with Didier Blanchet, 2013), A Theory of Fairness and Social Welfare (with François Maniquet, 2011), and the coeditor of several books, including Justice, Political Liberalism, and Utilitarianism: Themes from Harsanyi and Rawls (with Maurice Salles and John Weymark, 2008).
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    Sheila Jasanoff

    Pforzheimer Professor of Science and Technology Studies at the Harvard Kennedy School
    Sheila Jasanoff is Pforzheimer Professor of Science and Technology Studies at the Harvard Kennedy School. A pioneer in the social sciences, she explores the role of science and technology in the law, politics, and policy of modern democracies. Her books include The Fifth Branch, Science at the Bar, Designs on Nature, The Ethics of Invention, and Can Science Make Sense of Life? She founded and directs the STS Program at Harvard, where she also formed the Science and Democracy Network; previously, she was founding chair of the STS Department at Cornell. In 2022, she received the Government of Norway’s Holberg Prize for law, humanities, and social sciences. Her other honors include the SSRC’s Hirschman prize, the Humboldt Foundation’s Reimar-Lüst award, and a Guggenheim Fellowship. Jasanoff has held distinguished visiting professorships at leading universities in Europe, Asia, Australia, and the US. She is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Philosophical Society, foreign member of the British Academy and the Royal Danish Academy, and member of the Council on Foreign Relations. She served on the AAAS Board of Directors and as President of the Society for Social Studies of Science. She holds AB, JD, and PhD degrees from Harvard, and honorary doctorates from the Universities of Twente and Liège.
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    Ravi Kanbur

    T. H. Lee Professor of World Affairs, International Professor of Applied Economics and Management, and Professor of Economics at Cornell University
    Ravi Kanbur is T.H. Lee Professor of World Affairs, International Professor of Applied Economics and Management, and Professor of Economics at Cornell University. He has served on the senior staff of the World Bank including as Chief Economist for Africa. He has also published in the leading economics journals, including Journal of Political Economy, American Economic Review, Review of Economic Studies, Journal of Economic Theory and Economic Journal. He has served as Co-Chair of the Food System Economics Commission, Chair of the Board of United Nations University-World Institute for Development Economics Research, member of the OECD High Level Expert Group on the Measurement of Economic Performance, President of the Human Development and Capability Association, President of the Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, member of the High Level Advisory Council of the Climate Justice Dialogue, Co-Chair of the Scientific Council of the International Panel on Social Progress, and member of the Core Group of the Commission on Global Poverty.
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    Luis Felipe López-Calva

    Global Director, Poverty and Equity Global Practice, World Bank Group
    Luis Felipe López-Calva is the Global Director for Poverty and Equity at the World Bank Group. He rejoined the World Bank in 2022 from the United Nations Development Programme, where he served as UN Assistant Secretary General and Regional Director for Latin America and the Caribbean since 2018. In his previous tenure at the World Bank, he held various positions including Practice Manager of the Poverty and Equity Global Practice for Europe and Central Asia, Co-Director of the World Development Report 2017 on Governance and the Law, Lead Economist and Regional Poverty Advisor in the Poverty and Equity Global Practice for Europe and Central Asia, and Lead Economist in the Poverty, Equity and Gender Unit in the PREM Directorate for Latin America and the Caribbean. He has led lending projects in policy operations for US$ 1.1 billion. He has held research and teaching positions (permanent and visiting) at El Colegio de Mexico, ITESM-Mexico and the University of California in San Diego. He has also held visiting scholar positions at Harvard University (Ivy League Exchange Scholar), Stanford University (Stanford Center for International Development), and the World Institute for Development Economics Research (WIDER, United Nations University). He holds a Master’s degree in Economics from Boston University, as well as a Master’s and a PhD in Economics from Cornell University.
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    J. Nathan Matias

    Assistant Professor, Cornell University Department of Communication
    Nathan is an Assistant Professor in the Cornell University Department of Communication, where he leads CAT Lab. He works with social media companies, news organizations, and online communities to test ideas for a flourishing internet and evaluate the social impact of online platforms. Nathan developed CAT Lab as part of his PhD at the MIT Media Lab and MIT Center for Civic Media. Nathan, who is Guatemalan-American, has a background in tech startups and nonprofits. His research regularly appears in the news, and his writing has appeared in The Atlantic, PBS, the Guardian, and many others. Nathan has a PhD and a MSc from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a Masters degree from the University of Cambridge.
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    Arvind Narayanan

    Professor of Computer Science at Princeton University and the director of the Center for Information Technology Policy
    Arvind Narayanan is a professor of computer science at Princeton University and the director of the Center for Information Technology Policy. He is a co-author of the book AI Snake Oil and a newsletter of the same name which is read by 40,000 researchers, policy makers, journalists, and AI enthusiasts. He previously co-authored two widely used computer science textbooks: Bitcoin and Cryptocurrency Technologies and Fairness in Machine Learning. Narayanan led the Princeton Web Transparency and Accountability Project to uncover how companies collect and use our personal information. His work was among the first to show how machine learning reflects cultural stereotypes, and his doctoral research showed the fundamental limits of de-identification. Narayanan was one of TIME's inaugural list of 100 most influential people in AI. He is a recipient of the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE).
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    Rapelang Rabana

    Co-CEO of Imagine Worldwide
    Rapelang Rabana, co-CEO of Imagine Worldwide, is deeply committed to education and skills development in Africa. Imagine operates across Sub-Saharan Africa, providing tablet-based learning programs to develop literacy and numeracy skills in millions of young children. From her first startup straight out of university, to being the Chief Digital Officer of one of South Africa’s largest IT companies, Rapelang has amassed almost 20 years’ experience building innovative technology-enabled enterprises, advising corporations and mentoring startups across sectors. Prior to Imagine, she founded Rekindle Learning, an AI-enabled edtech company that support high-performance organizations to easily codify and share institutional know-how amongst their teams, in particular young workers. Featured on the cover of ForbesAfrica magazine before the age of 30, named Entrepreneur for the World by the World Entrepreneurship Forum, and selected as a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum - Rapelang is an internationally lauded technology entrepreneur. She holds a B. Business Science (Computer Science) and an M.Sc from the University of Cape Town.
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    Francesca Rossi

    IBM Fellow and the IBM AI Ethics Global Leader, TJ Watson Research Center, New York, USA
    Francesca Rossi is an IBM Fellow and the IBM AI Ethics Global Leader. She is based at the T.J. Watson IBM Research Lab, New York, USA, where she leads research projects and she co-chairs the IBM AI Ethics board. Her research interests focus on artificial intelligence, with special focus on constraint reasoning, preferences, multi-agent systems, computational social choice, neuro-symbolic AI, cognitive architectures, and value alignment. On these topics, she has published over 220 scientific articles in journals and conference proceedings, and as book chapters. She is a fellow of both the worldwide Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI) and the European one (EurAI). She has been president of IJCAI (International Joint Conference on AI) and is the current president of AAAI. She is a member of the board of the Partnership on AI and she co-chairs the Responsible AI working group of the Global Partnership on AI. She also co-chairs the OECD Expert Group on AI Futures and she has been a member of the European Commission High Level Expert Group on AI.
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    Emma Ruttkamp-Bloem

    Head of the Department of Philosophy and AI Ethics Lead of the Center for AI Research, University of Pretoria
    Emma Ruttkamp-Bloem is a philosopher of science and technology, an AI ethics policy advisor, and a machine ethics researcher. Emma is a member of the UN Secretary General’s AI Advisory Body. She is the Chairperson of the UNESCO World Commission on the Ethics of Scientific Knowledge and Technology (COMEST). Currently, she is the Head of the Department of Philosophy, University of Pretoria, and leads the AI ethics group at the South African Centre for AI Research (CAIR). Emma led the UNESCO Ad Hoc Expert Group that prepared the draft of the 2021 UNESCO Recommendation on the Ethics of AI and contributed to development of its implementation instruments. She continues working with UNESCO as a member of UNESCO’ AI Ethics without Borders and Women4EthicalAI initiatives. She is a member of the Global Academic Network, Centre for AI and Digital Policy, Washington DC and has worked in projects related to AI ethics and governance with the African Union Development Agency (AUDA)-NEPAD and the African Commission on Human and People’s Rights (ACHPR). is a member of various international AI ethics advisory boards ranging from academia (e.g., the Wallenberg AI, Autonomous Systems and Software Programme Human Sciences), the inter-governmental sector (e.g., as member of the advisory board for the Global Commission on Responsible Artificial Intelligence in the Military Domain), to the private sector (e.g., SAP SE). She is an associate editor for the Journal of Science and Engineering Ethics, and a member of the editorial board of the Journal of AI Law and Regulation and the Cambridge Forum on AI: Law and Governance.
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    Zeynep Tufekci

    Henry G. Bryant Professor of Sociology and Public Affairs at Princeton University
    Zeynep Tufekci is the Henry G. Bryant Professor of Sociology and Public Affairs at Princeton University. She is also a columnist for The New York Times. Her work focuses on social media, media ethics, the social implications of new technologies, such as artificial intelligence and big data, as well as societal challenges such as the COVID-19 pandemic using complex and systems-based thinking. According to The Chronicle of Higher Education, she is one of the most prominent academic voices on social media and the new public sphere. In 2022, Tufekci was a Pulitzer Prize finalist for her "insightful, often prescient, columns on the pandemic and American culture", which the committee said "brought clarity to the shifting official guidance and compelled us towards greater compassion and informed response." Before becoming a regular columnist, she was a frequent contributor to The New York Times and The Atlantic. She has also written columns for Wired and Scientific American. Prior to Princeton, she was a professor at Columbia University's Craig Newmark Center for Journalism Ethics and Security, a faculty associate at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society at Harvard University, and an associate professor at the School of Information and Library Science at the University of North Carolina and Associate Professor at the University of Maryland Baltimore County.
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    Krushil Watene

    Peter Kraus Associate Professor in Philosophy, University of Auckland Waipapa Taumata Rau, New Zealand
    Krushil Watene is Peter Kraus Association Professor in Philosophy at the University of Auckland. Her research addresses fundamental questions in ethics, politics, and Indigenous philosophy. In particular, it engages at the intersections of diverse philosophical traditions, transdisciplinarity, and the role of local communities for global change. Her primary areas of expertise include mainstream theories of well-being, development, and justice. Much of her work is written from the perspective of the 'capability approach' - improving people's lives by expanding their real opportunities to live the kinds of lives they value and have reason to value - and centers Māori and other Indigenous Philosophies. Prof. Watene's work is applied and engaged - encompassing a range of justice and ethical issues, in such areas as health policy, environmental sustainability, and a variety of development considerations, as they feature within communities. Prof Watene holds a PhD in Philosophy from the University of St. Andrews. She was awarded a Rutherford Discovery Fellowship in 2018 for research on intergenerational justice. She serves on the research committee of Ngā Pae o te Māramatanga – New Zealand’s Māori Centre of Research Excellence, and is a member of the International Science Council's Committee for Freedom and Responsibility in Science.
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    Meredith Whittaker

    President of Signal
    Meredith Whittaker is Signal's President. She has over 17 years of experience in tech, spanning industry, academia, and government. Prior to joining Signal, she was the Minderoo Research Professor at New York University (NYU) and served as the Faculty Director of the AI Now Institute which she co-founded. Prior to NYU, she worked at Google where she founded Google's Open Research Group, and co-founded M-Lab. She also helped lead organizing at Google and was a central organizer of the Google Walkout. She has advised the White House, the FCC, the City of New York, the European Parliament, and many other governments and civil society organizations on privacy, security, artificial intelligence, internet policy, and measurement. And she recently completed a term as Senior Advisor on AI to the Chair at the US Federal Trade Commission.
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    Linghan Zhang

    Professor at the Institute of Data Law, China University of Political Science and Law
    Linghan Zhang is a Professor of Law at the Institute of Data Law, China University of Political Science and Law, and was a Visiting Scholar at Cornell Law School. She is a member of the UN High-Level Advisory Body on AI, the Information and Communication Science and Technology Committee of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the Cybersecurity Legal Advisory Committee of the Ministry of Public Security, and the China Information Security Law Committee. For years, she has participated in legislative advisory work on algorithm regulation, platform governance, data security, and artificial intelligence governance in China. In 2024, she served as the lead drafter for the drafting expert group of the China Artificial Intelligence Law (Scholar Proposed Draft). Her research mainly focuses on legal issues related to AI, algorithms, data, and platform governance, and has had a broad impact on both academia and policymaking. In 2024, she was named to TIME’s 100 AI List of the World’s Most Influential People in Artificial Intelligence.
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