Contesting the Rise of Artificial Intelligence: Collective Action Frames in Fields of Emerging Technologies

The concerns around the rapid rise of Artificial Intelligence (AI) have sparked several social movements that address diverse AI-related issues, each articulating distinct frames to guide their collective actions. These frames are multiple and sometimes conflicting since AI, as an emerging technology, is equivocal and continuously changing. In this study, we investigate how AI-oriented social movements deploy frames to influence the different groups in the AI field. Through qualitative content analysis of 39 social movement organizations’ websites, we identified two key theoretical dimensions: the dominant task of the frame, distinguishing between problem elaboration (diagnosis) and solution formulation (prognosis), and the temporal orientation of the frame, distinguishing between those focused on present versus future AI impacts. These dimensions divide the frames into four major categories: harms, risks, remedial, and preventative frames. We argue that frames with distinct dominant tasks complement each other, while the temporal dimension creates tension between differing frames.