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Between Acceleration and P(Doom)
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Pope Leo XIV called his first encyclical on AI Magnifica Humanitas — magnificent humanity. He opened it on the res novae: the new things of our moment, which he acknowledged are far from settled or fully knowable. That is a more honest starting point than most of what passes for AI debate today.
The dominant poles — unbounded acceleration on one side, civilizational risk on the other — share a common weakness. Both treat AI as arriving uniformly, like a flood. It does not. It percolates. Its arrival is uneven, pressure-dependent, following fissures through the economy in ways that are neither catastrophic nor frictionless. Construction workers building data centers are in high demand. Engineers at the AI frontier are commanding extraordinary salaries. The large middle — paralegals, junior analysts, insurance adjusters, knowledge workers whose jobs involve processing information and making routine judgments — is where the uncertainty lives. Early employment data shows remarkable stability in AI-exposed occupations. Yet, tech layoffs have simultaneously exceeded 115,000 through May. The picture is mixed in a way neither extreme predicted, and views on all sides are being forced to evolve accordingly.
This ambiguity has political and governance consequences. The distribution question — who captures the gains — is now at the center of a national debate that cuts across party lines. The AI safety and cybersecurity agenda has sharpened frontier models now capable of exploiting zero-day vulnerabilities have forced into the open governance questions that voluntary frameworks and light-touch executive action have failed to resolve. On the strategic front, Beijing emerged from the Trump-Xi Summit projecting confidence. Its innovation ecosystem is accelerating. Its nuclear capacity is expanding. The connection between AI governance at home and strategic competition abroad grows tighter by the month.
The work is to build an architecture that improves outcomes regardless of how fast AI moves. On the physical side: the data center buildout, spectrum for 5G and 6G, clean and reliable electricity, and the DOE's Genesis Mission are laying the substrate for AI-enabled discovery at national scale. On the human and strategic side: mathematical literacy, cyber force generation, allied investment frameworks, and a U.S.-ROK cyber alliance are the channels through which broad access to AI's productive frontier can be secured before those gains concentrate. That is the logic behind what I call the AI Homestead — not redistribution after the fact, but access before the frontier closes. Lincoln did not attempt to resolve the question of whether westward expansion was good or bad. He asked who would benefit.
The debate between acceleration and p(doom) will continue — in every domain, from labor to governance to competition to security. No one will get it entirely right. The work is to move it from assertion to architecture. More to come.
Publications
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Will the AI Economy Have a Middle Class? The Case for an AI Homestead Policy
May 22, 2026
Navin Girishankar argues that America needs an AI Homestead policy that offers the middle class a wages-to-wealth ladder for the coming AI economy. It is a commitment to upskilling, labor mobility, business formation, data as an asset, and community access to compute.
CSIS Commission on U.S. Cyber Force Generation
June 3, 2026
The CSIS Commission on U.S. Cyber Force Generation examines how the United States can build, organize, and sustain a dedicated cyber service.
New Light-Touch Trump AI Cyber Executive Order Reveals Accelerationists Still Rule the Roost
June 5, 2026
Aalok Mehta and Lauryn Williams unpack the Trump administration’s new executive order on cybersecurity risks from AI, arguing that its light-touch approach fails to adequately address mounting public concern over a lack of AI regulation.
CFIUS: Can the “Known Investor Program” Make U.S. Investment Screening More Efficient? May 19, 2026
Associate Fellow Andrea Leonard Palazzi reviews CFIUS’s Known Investor Program through the perspectives of key stakeholders, identifying success factors for the program and implications for broader CFIUS reform.
Defining Autonomy: Why Software, Not Drones, Will Decide the Next War
June 10, 2026
As the Pentagon revises its autonomous weapons policy, Kateryna Bondar argues that the definition of an autonomous weapon system must extend beyond the effector to include the software orchestration layer where lethal decisions are increasingly made.
Accelerating the EV Transition in the Global South Through India-Africa Partnership
June 11, 2026
This white paper examines how South Africa, Kenya, Nigeria, and Egypt can learn from India's decades-long electric vehicle policy journey to accelerate EV adoption through India-Africa partnerships. View more
Spectrum, 6G, and the Future of AI Leadership
May 6, 2026
As AI continues to develop, spectrum policy will become more essential to building the infrastructure needed to meet demand and realize its full capabilities.
A Confident Beijing Welcomes President Trump
May 11, 2026
Scott Kennedy lays out how China’s leaders are approaching the upcoming Trump-Xi summit, and why China feels remarkably more confident compared to the first such summit in 2017.
China’s Nuclear Energy Priorities Under Its 15th Five-Year Plan
May 11, 2026
China's 15th Five-Year Plan has far-ranging implications for the nuclear energy, not only for the future of global nuclear sector but also for China’s influence and competitiveness in innovation and supply chains.
What the Trump-Xi Summit Revealed, and Left Unsaid, About U.S.-China Tech Competition May 20, 2026
The Trump-Xi summit revealed how little progress has been made on the most consequential dimensions of U.S.-China competition: AI, cyber operations, export controls, and digital sovereignty.
Events
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EST Rapid Roundup: Unpacking the Trump-Xi Summit Pt.1 - Trade and Investment
May 20, 2026
Following the recent Trump-Xi summit, major questions remain about the future of U.S.-China trade and investment. Join CSIS Economic Security and Technology Department's Navin Girishankar, Philip Luck, Kate Koren, Scott Kennedy, and Rick Rossow.
EST Rapid Roundup: Unpacking the Trump-Xi Summit Pt.2 - Tech Competition
May 20, 2026
Following the recent Trump-Xi summit, major questions remain about the future of U.S.-China tech competition. Join CSIS Economic Security and Technology Department's Navin Girishankar, Aalok Mehta, Lauryn Williams, and James Lewis.
The Quad Convenes: Priorities, Partnerships and the Indo-Pacific
May 28, 2026
Speakers include Luke Collin, Principal, The Asia Group, Dr. Nishank Motwani, Vice President at Levenhall and Senior Fellow, Australian Strategic Policy Institute and Dr. Tanvi Madan, Senior Fellow – Foreign Policy, Center for Asia Policy Studies, Brookings.
Building America’s Cyber Force: Findings from the Commission on Cyber Force Generation
June 3, 2026
Please join us for a discussion on the report from the Commission on U.S. Cyber Force Generation, which examines how the United States can better build, organize, and sustain the cyber workforce needed to meet evolving national security demands.
Data Centers, AI, and the Future of U.S. Strategic Competitiveness
June 4, 2026
Join the CSIS Economic Security and Technology Department’s Matt Pearl, Aalok Mehta, Joseph Majkut, and Philip Luck for a discussion on the rapid expansion of data centers and what it means for the future of AI, energy, and U.S. competitiveness.
Manufacturing USA in 2030 and 2035: A Vision for Competitiveness and Innovation
June 3, 2026
Join Theresa Kotanchek and William Bonvillian for a discussion on the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine report, A Vision for the Manufacturing USA Program in 2030 and 2035 moderated by Dr. Sujai Shivakumar.
Podcasts
Electricity Whenever You Want It: Featuring Mateo Jaramillo, Co-Founder and CEO of Form Energy
June 10, 2026
Co-founder and CEO of Form Energy, Mateo Jaramillo, joins Navin Girishankar to discuss the challenge of building long-duration energy storage from the ground up.
Futures Summit: Commercial Diplomacy for U.S. Tech Exports
May 21, 2026
Navin Girishankar is joined by Cynthia Conner, Senior Manager for International Policy at Chevron; Nicole Issac, Vice President of Global Public Policy at Cisco; and Katherine F. Pickus, Chief Sustainability Officer at ADM.
Pope Leo Weighs in on AI and Trump Postpones Mythos-Inspired Executive Order
May 28, 2026
In this episode, Aalok Mehta makes his first appearance as the new host of the AI Policy Podcast.
Europe’s Cyber Deterrence Dilemma: Countering Russia in the Gray Zone
May 20, 2026
Lauryn Williams, Erica Lonergan, Ed Cardon, and Joshua Stiefel discuss a U.S. Cyber Force.
Innovation to Deployment: Fixing the Pentagon’s Acquisition Gap
May 6, 2026
In this episode of Cache Me if You Can, Lauryn Williams and Alexander Klimburg examine a core challenge at the heart of U.S. technology competition: the Pentagon’s struggle to procure and field emerging technologies at the speed of innovation.
U.S.-Canada Trade Tensions, New PRC Extraterritorial Rules, and Russia Sanctions Approaches
May 4, 2026
Bill and Scott discuss the state of U.S.-Canada trade relations in the context of USMCA review, new Chinese regulations, and EU and U.S. approaches to sanctioning Russia.
