The goal of this roundtable is to bring together and learn from a range of perspectives on the question of what kind of civic infrastructure - foundational systems and services that enable people to be active, responsible and knowledgeable with respect to government - can enable effective transparency and accountability around government AI for the public and civil society.
mySociety creates and runs digital services to break down barriers to democratic participation, and Connected by Data campaigns to put community at the centre of data narratives, practices and policies by advocating for collective and open data governance.
We are particularly interested in the extent of overlaps between transparency and accountability needs and AI evaluation and assurance, and the role public digital services could play in serving civil society as intermediaries supporting transparency and accountability around government AI use. We want to understand what the needs are, who is working in this area already, and where there is scope for further research or infrastructure.
The outcomes of the workshop will shape our future research and development in this area, and we will write them up in a brief public report. The geographic scope is the UK, with an interest in learning from, and spreading our learning to other jurisdictions, where appropriate.