A multistakeholder interactive policy lab

RSVP by 6 July: https://zoom.us/meeting/register/7VjbaNZDT0CbvIZV7RBaNQ 

Where: DiploFoundation, WMO Building, 7bis, Avenue de la Paix, CH-1202 Geneva, and online

When: 9 July 2026, 9:00–13:00 – light breakfast and lunch included

The Civil Society Alliances for Digital Empowerment (CADE), led by Diplo, in partnership with the Arab Reform Initiative, the feminist collective Pollicy, the Women of Uganda Network (WOUGNET), Women in Internet Governance, and the Center for AI Ethics and Governance in Africa (CAIEGA), invite you to join us to co-create and test an AI regulation sandbox on the sidelines of the ITU AI for Good Global Summit 2026. 

The AI for Good Global Summit celebrates the potential of artificial intelligence to serve humanity and advance the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Yet, the focus on efficiency gains, the acceleration of innovation, and how technological solutions obscure crucial power asymmetries, labour extraction, and democratic deficits embedded in AI systems. These dynamics are often codified in regulation and become difficult to reverse.

This side session, structured as an AI regulatory sandbox, convenes technologists, policymakers, civil society, trade union and labour representatives, legal specialists, and other specialists to reframe the global AI governance debate and draw on diverse experiences to tackle the questions facing us today. In the session, we centre justice as the fundamental test of whether AI truly serves humanity, using realistic scenarios to test governance structures and bring together varying – sometimes opposing – perspectives on regulation. 

We ask: How do we build AI governance that redistributes power, protects human dignity, recognises labour, prevents harm and exploitation, and expands democratic agency, particularly in the Global Majority, where extractive AI value chains, informal economies, and diverse epistemic traditions are often erased from policy conversations?

Session goal and objectives: (1) promote discussion between a plurality of actors who might not otherwise sit around the same table; (2) create a specialised roadmap with these actors around topics of importance in AI Governance; (3) expand the use of sandboxing as a methodology for foresight and democratic reinforcement in regulatory practices.

Agenda

9:00 – 9:30 Arrivals and breakfast

9:30 – 10:15 Introductions and opening presentations

10:15 – 11:30 Sandboxing break out groups centred around 4 themes

11:30 – 12:00 Discussion

12:00 – 13:00 Lunch and networking