September 19, 2024

Competition, Not Control, is Key to Winning the Global AI Race

By: Keegan McBride and Matthew Mittelsteadt

The United States, with much of the world’s AI-enabling infrastructure, has positioned itself as the global leader in AI innovation. That might not be the case for much longer. China continues to develop state-of-the-art AI systems, despite an extensive network of U.S. and allied export controls aimed at curtailing China’s technical progress. Beijing is expanding and accelerating new investments in AI and investing significant government resources into supporting its emerging domestic technology base. The result: global AI competition has now become synonymous with U.S.-China competition.

As the United States fights to maintain technological primacy, policymakers are enacting and considering new export controls to limit China’s access to the necessary components for building advanced AI systems, such as American-developed state-of-the-art models, semiconductors, and computational power.

If the United States fails to change course from an AI strategy based on control, not geopolitical competition, it will quickly find itself at a strategic disadvantage – with adversarial nations filling the void.

Getting export controls right is notoriously difficult. Not long after the United States passed its expansive export controls targeting China’s access to AI-relevant semiconductors in October 2022, cracks in the effectiveness of these controls appeared. In response, China increased investment in its domestic semiconductor manufacturing capabilities intending to achieve self-sufficiency. Markets, too, responded to these controls with successful smuggling efforts, pouring controlled chips into the PRC. Firms like NVIDIA diligently retooled products to route sales around legal strictures. For tangible goods such as semiconductors, the success of export controls has proved challenging.

Read the full article from Just Security.

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