Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite, Technologie

For the president of France, AI is the next revolution

- Nicholas Thompson

In the past year, Emmanuel Macron, the president of France, has come to obsess over artificial intelligence. He wants his country to start catching up to the US and China, and he wants to ensure that the smartest minds in AI choose Paris over Palo Alto. He recently gave a long speech laying out his vision and explains that the French government will spend about R23 billion in the coming years to support research in the field, encourage AI startups, and collect data that can be used and shared by engineers. Afterwards, he gave an exclusive interview about his plans.

NICHOLAS THOMPSON: It seems that you feel there are French or European values that can help share the development of AI. What are those values?

EMMANUEL MACRON: I think artificial intelligence is the next disruption to come. So I want to be part of it. Otherwise, I will just be subjected to disruption without creating jobs in this country.

But AI will raise a lot of issues in ethics, in politics. It will question our democracy and collective preferences. It could totally dismantle our national cohesion and the way we live together. This huge technological revolution is, in fact, a political revolution.

When you look at artificial intelligence today, the two leaders are the US and China. In the US, it is entirely driven by the private sector: large corporations and some startups. All the choices they will make are private choices. On the other side, Chinese players collect a lot of data driven by a government whose principles and values are not ours. Europe is the place where the DNA of democracy was shaped, and therefore I think Europe has to come to grips with what could become a big challenge for democracies.