Description
The governance of GenAI is often framed as a computational task (how can code and data ensure that AI systems reliably do what designers want them to do?), an abstract normative question (which norms should AI systems behave in accordance with?), or a narrowly legal challenge (how can different regulatory bodies define, codify, and enforce these norms, in computational and institutional terms?). Yet it is also, obviously and perhaps centrally, a political problem: which actors, representing whose interests, have less or more power and legitimacy to influence the mechanisms whereby GenAI is governed into being? Who’s set to benefit and lose from these processes?The need for perspectives rooted in political theory is made increasingly urgent by two trends in how GenAI governance is defined. First, the discourse about what governance means and what constitutes success is rapidly consolidating around a narrow set of actors and understandings. As it is often spurred by private companies which operate with limited public oversight, this kind of discourse and its related proposals call for an inquiry into the rights, responsibilities, and ideologies that underpin them, particularly as the datasets and training used for governing GenAI have previously resulted in bias, exclusion and the reinforcement of existing systems of oppression. Second, governance proposals aspire to a global scope, implicitly advancing claims about universal values. Such disregard for pluralism raises questions about legitimacy, and concerns about the associated asymmetries in geopolitical power. Importantly, these trends unfold amid a historical crisis of liberal democracy.
As GenAI becomes increasingly embedded in everyday life, its governance is no longer just about preventing reward hacking during training or the hypothetical, potentially catastrophic consequences of mis-specified goals. It is about institutionalising quotidian norms and inequities, thus encoding particular visions of social order into what is quickly becoming a pervasive, all-purpose sort of infrastructure.
To truly understand and intervene in the governance of GenAI, we need first treat it as a collective and contested political practice. This workshop addresses this urgent task by inviting contributions that grapple with the visible and covert disagreement, authorities, and rationalities that shape the emergence of GenAI under conditions of extreme uncertainty.
In particular, we welcome scholars working on topics related, but not limited, to the following guiding questions:
1.How should we conceptualise GenAI governance as a form of power, and in which ways does it differ (or not) from previous control systems?
2.How does GenAI governance intersect with theories and the current realities of democracy and authoritarianism?
3.Can traditional approaches explain the political economy of GenAI?
4.In what ways do existing GenAI governance proposals implicitly rely on contested political assumptions (e.g. moral realism, liberal individualism, etc)?
To what extent and how should GenAI governance be democratised?
Wednesday 2 September
11:30–13:00
Registration
12:30–14:00
Lunch
14:00–16:00
Session 1
Bradley Ward (University of Southampton) — Can AI Revive the State? AI and Public Sector Reform under the UK Labour Government
Respondent: Klara Matusewicz & João C. Magalhães
Elinor Carmi (City St George’s, University of London) — Stop Experimenting on Us: What States Can Learn from the Pharmaceutical Industry about AI Governance
Respondent: Jelena Belic
16:00–16:30
Tea and Coffee Break (optional)
16:30–17:30
Session 1 (continued)
Klara Matusewicz & João C. Magalhães (University of Manchester) — Alignment Moments: Mapping the Politics of AI Normativity
Respondent: Bradley Ward
17:45–19:00
Wine Reception
19:30
Conference Dinner
Thursday 3 September
09:30–11:30
Session 2
Charlotte Spencer-Smith (Austrian Academy of Sciences / University of Klagenfurt), Ricarda Drüeke (University of Salzburg, Austria) & Corinna Peil (University of Salzburg, Austria) — Governing Discourse: Gender, Alignment and the Normativity of Generative AI
Respondent: /
Jelena Belic (Leiden University) & Bauke Wielinga (TU Delft) — Who Is Responsible for Algorithmic Structural Injustice?
Respondent: Katia Schwerzmann
11:30–12:00
Tea and Coffee Break (optional)
12:00–13:00
Session 2 (continued)
Katia Schwerzmann (Ruhr-Universität Bochum) & Alex Campolo (Durham University) — Alignment: From the Governance of Models to Geopolitics
Respondent: A.T. Kingsmith
13:00–14:00
Lunch
14:00–16:00
Session 3
A.T. Kingsmith (Hasso Plattner Institute) & Brett Zehner (University of Exeter) — The Missing Subject of Synthetic Data: Ruptures in Political Epistemology After Generative AI
Respondent: Alex Campolo
16:00–16:30
Tea and Coffee Break (optional)
16:30–17:30
End of Workshop
Final notes, next steps, etc.
17:30 onwards
Drinks at a Local Pub (self-organised)
| Period | 2 Sept 2026 → 4 Sept 2026 |
|---|---|
| Event title | MANCEPT Workshops 2026 |
| Event type | Conference |
| Location | Manchester, United KingdomShow on map |