Understanding the Governance Challenges of AI in the Context of the UK’s Growth Strategy

After the Brexit referendum, British economic policy has shifted towards initiatives aimed at addressing persistently low productivity and longstanding spatial inequalities as it has sought to develop its own industrial strategy. Successive governments have considered Artificial Intelligence (AI) as an important emergent sector within industrial strategy, which is seen as having the potential to unlock economic growth and productivity. The Starmer’s government has committed to making Britain an ‘AI superpower’ arguing it could have a transformative impact in reshaping the work of government and public sector productivity. In this article, we trace the evolution of AI policy in Britain, from its designation as one of the four ‘grand challenges’ facing Britain in the May government’s Industrial Strategy (2017) to the present day ‘AI Opportunities Action Plan’. We argue that successive governments have acknowledged AI’s potential, but to date the formation and implementation of AI policy has been marked by: (1) a lack of consistency around the role of AI as a driver of growth; (2) a lack of consistency regarding the role government should play in facilitating this; and consequently (3) a high degree of institutional and policy churn and instability. In this sense, British AI policy is an archetypal example of policymaking in an ‘incoherent state’. We examine both the barriers to, but also the potential solutions required, deliver on the Starmer Government’s mission to make Britain an AI superpower.