Preamble for LessWrong

I've seen many prescriptive contributions to AGI governance take the form of proposals for some radically new structure. Some call for a Manhattan project, others for the creation of a new international organization, etc. The OGI model, instead, is basically the status quo. More precisely, it is a model to which the status quo is an imperfect and partial approximation.

It seems to me that this model has a bunch of attractive properties. That said, I'm not putting it forward because I have a very high level of conviction in it, but because it seems useful to have it explicitly developed as an option so that it can be compared with other options.

(This is a working paper, so I may try to improve it in light of comments and suggestions.)

Version 1.0 first published on July 10th. Version 1.11 formatted for LessWrong and republished by Ben Pace on August 27th.

Open Global Investment as a Governance Model for AGI^[1]

(2025) Nick Bostrom
[Working paper, version: 1.11 (August 2025). (First version: July 2025)]
www.nickbostrom.com

ABSTRACT
This paper introduces the “open global investment” (OGI) model, a proposed governance framework for artificial general intelligence (AGI) development. The core idea is that AGI development could proceed within one or more corporations in a context that (a) encourages wide international shareholding, (b) reduces the risk of expropriation, (c) implements strengthened corporate governance processes, (d) operates within a government-defined framework for responsible AI development (and/or a public-private partnership), and (e) includes additional international agreements and governance measures to whatever extent is desirable and feasible. We argue that this model, while very imperfect, offers advantages in terms of inclusiveness, incentive compatibility, and practicality compared to prominent alternatives—such as proposals modelled on the Manhattan project, CERN, or Intelsat—especially in scenarios with short AGI timelines.

Introduction

Various governance models have been proposed for projects that aim to develop and deploy transformative AI.^[2],^[3] Some have favored an American-led “Manhattan project for AI”—a vision in which the U.S. competes with an analogous project in China in a battle for perpetual cosmic hegemony.^[4] Others have proposed an ownership and governance...

Phlegmatic

Phlegmatic

Phlegmatic

Phlegmatic