Thammasat University students interested in artificial intelligence (AI), sociology, ethics, philosophy, development studies, digital management, and related subjects may find it useful to participate in a free 18 November Zoom symposium on AI and DEI: The Future of Digital Humanitarianism.
The event, on Monday, 18 November 2024 at 11am Bangkok time, is presented by the University of Tokyo, Japan.
Its website explains:
Founded in 2020, B’AI Global Forum has dedicated itself to exploring the intersection of AI and social justice. To commemorate its 5th anniversary, we are hosting a symposium featuring experts at the forefront of AI ethics, policy, and technology development.
We will explore how to harness AI creatively to achieve diversity, equity, and inclusion by highlighting not only the potential of AI but also its impact on our rights and daily lives, as well as socioeconomic injustices on a global scale.
Program
Moderator: Ai Hisano (University of Tokyo)
Opening Remarks, Atsushi Tsuda (University of Tokyo)
Reflections on the first 5 years of the B’AI Global Forum, Yuko Itatsu (University of Tokyo)
Keynote Speech 1 Anita Gurumurthy (IT for Change)
“Diversity, Equality, and Inclusion in the Epoch of AI: Lessons from Southern Feminism”
Keynote Speech 2 Steph Wright (Scottish AI Alliance)
“Reframing the narrative of our AI future”
Panel discussion
Moderator: Grant Jun Otsuki (University of Tokyo)
Panelists: Anita Gurumurthy (IT for Change)
Steph Wright (Scottish AI Alliance)
Yasuko Kosaihira (SoftBank Corp.)
Yee Kuang Heng (University of Tokyo)
Closing Remarks, Kaori Hayashi (University of Tokyo)
The TU Library collection includes several books about different aspects of humanitarianism and AI.
Students are invited to register at this link:
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScX2k6duUbLeUiP3sxjHjrQ54AwxEEchSFeFYxmuspLajDCgA/viewform
For questions or further information, please write to:
bai.global.forum@gmail.com
Diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) are organizational frameworks which seek to promote the fair treatment and full participation of all people, particularly groups who have historically been underrepresented or subject to discrimination on the basis of identity or disability.
Digital humanitarianism is the use of technology to address humanitarian crises, such as by analyzing data and mobilizing online communities. Digital humanitarians are professionals and volunteers who use a variety of tools, including:
- Crowdsourcing: To analyze social media, text messages, and satellite imagery
- Artificial intelligence: To analyze data
- Big data: To make sense of large amounts of information generated during disasters
Digital humanitarians use these tools to: predict and respond to humanitarian crises, address unmet socio-economic needs, and allocate development assistance.
The rise of digital humanitarians has transformed the way societies prepare for, respond to, and understand humanitarian disasters. However, some have raised concerns about the potential pitfalls of digital humanitarianism, such as the dehumanization of refugees through images.
An Open Access article published in 2021 in International Political Sociology investigates Digital Humanitarianism and the Visual Politics of the Refugee Camp: (Un)Seeing Control.
The article’s abstract:
Digital visual technologies have become an important tool of humanitarian governance. They allow the monitoring of crises from afar, making it possible to detect human rights violations and refugee movements, despite a crisis area being inaccessible. However, the political effects of such “digital humanitarianism” are understudied.
This article aims to amend this gap by analyzing which forms of seeing, showing, and governing refugee camps are enabled by digital technologies. To this end, the article combines scholarship on the politics of the refugee camp with the emerging body of work on digital humanitarianism. It proposes the notion of a “visual assemblage of the refugee camp” to conceptualize the increasing adoption of visual technologies in refugee camp governance. Using the two paradigmatic cases of Zaatari and Azraq, two refugee camps for displaced Syrians in Jordan, the text outlines how this visual assemblage enacts the refugee camp in different ways—thus bringing about different versions of the camp.
The case study reveals three such enactments of the refugee camp—as a technology of care and control; as a political space; and, as a governmental laboratory—and discusses how these interact and clash in everyday camp life.
Biographies of symposium participants from the event website:
Anita Gurumurthy
Executive Director and Founding Member, IT for Change. Gurumurthy leads research and advocacy on data and AI governance, platform regulation, and feminist digital justice. She co-chairs the T20’s digital transformation working group in the G20 Brazil 2024 and serves on international committees including the UN Technology Facilitation Mechanism.
Steph Wright
Head, Scottish AI Alliance. Wright led Data Lab’s support for Scotland’s AI Strategy and now leads its implementation, aiming for Scotland to be a leader in the development of trustworthy, ethical, and inclusive AI. She co-founded Diverse AI and was recognized as one of the 100 Brilliant Women in AI Ethics and Top 10 Women in Tech in Scotland in 2023. Wright has also recently been awarded the DataIQ 2024 Award for Data and AI for Good Champion.
Yasuko Kosaihira
Deputy Director, AI Strategy Office, SoftBank Corp. After working at Deloitte Tohmatsu Consulting and Fast Retailing, Kosaihira joined SoftBank. By spearheading investments in and promotions of new business ventures such as RPA (Robotic Process Automation), shared office spaces, and machine learning AI, she is advancing the innovation of business models and user experiences.
Yee Kuang Heng
Professor, Graduate School of Public Policy, The University of Tokyo. Heng specializes in international security, foreign policy, and the strategic impact of advanced technology in the Asia-Pacific. He earned a PhD in International Relations from London School of Economics in 2004, and taught at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy and Trinity College Dublin before joining the University of Tokyo in 2016.
Grant Jun Otsuki
Associate Professor, Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, The University of Tokyo. Otsuki specializes in the anthropology of science and technology, as well as Science and Technology Studies. Before joining the University of Tokyo in April 2024, he earned a PhD in Anthropology from the University of Toronto (2015) and served as a senior lecturer at Victoria University of Wellington. He received the STS Infrastructure Award in 2024.
Atsushi Tsuda
Executive Vice President of the University of Tokyo. Specializing in biological oceanography (zooplankton ecology), Tsuda served as Director of the Atmosphere and Ocean Research Institute from 2015, was appointed Vice President in 2019, became Executive Vice President in 2021, and assumed his current position in 2023.
Yuko Itatsu
Principal Investigator of the B’AI Global Forum; Professor, Graduate School of Interdisciplinary Information Studies, The University of Tokyo.
Itatsu specializes in social and cultural history of the 20th century and beyond.
Ai Hisano
Associate Professor, Graduate School of Interdisciplinary Information Studies, The University of Tokyo; 2020-2021 University of Tokyo Excellent Young Researcher. Hisano’s expertise lies in the history of technology, capitalism, and the senses.
Kaori Hayashi
Executive Vice President for Globalization, and Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion; Professor, Graduate School of Interdisciplinary Information Studies, The University of Tokyo. Hayashi specializes in media and journalism studies.
(All images courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)