Blog
Our blog is the space for reflection, dialogue, and exchange on pressing questions at the intersection of technology, policy, and society.
Blog Menu​
Reflections from the India AI Impact Summit 2026, New Delhi
The moment you landed in Delhi, you could understand that something had shifted. Banners for the India AI Impact Summit stretch across the city. Around 20 Heads of State and Government, and roughly 60 ministers and vice ministers, did not travel here for a product showcase. The fourth iteration of this global summit series - following the UK, Seoul, and Paris - has arrived in India, and with it a clear signal for foreign policy: India is framing AI as a strategic state capability embedded in its Digital Public Infrastructure model, with the explicit aim of shaping global and regional governance debates.
Indeed, India is positioning itself here not only as a leader for the global majority, but as a global AI force in its own right: the summit showcased a range of Indian AI innovations, including domestically developed large language models. Notably, India is demonstrating an ability to develop digital public infrastructure and AI systems resource efficiently, showcasing an approach that contrasts with capital-intensive models elsewhere. From a European perspective, this diversification of technological pathways is not only welcome but geopolitically significant.​​​
​
Data Innovation Lab's Contributions: Translating AI into Diplomatic Practice
​​​
The Data Innovation Lab facilitated three sessions at the summit, each tackling a different dimension of AI's role in global affairs. We approached AI not only as an abstract policy issue but as a practical foreign policy challenge, one that requires
collaboration, shared standards, and tools.​​​​
Our opening session, Empowering Policymakers and Diplomats: Futures Literacy for Tech-Informed Foreign and International Digital Policy, set the tone. Drawing on perspectives from both Germany and India, we explored how policymakers can use futures literacy not as abstract foresight but as a practical tool to engage proactively with emerging technologies. The geopolitical landscape is shifting faster than traditional policy cycles can absorb. Combining economic and statistical foresight with genuine human centricity isn't a luxury; it's a prerequisite for staying relevant.
Our second session, NegotiateCOP – Democratizing Global Climate Negotiations Through Open-Source AI, introduced NegotiateCOP, an open-source AI tool co-developed by the German Government and GIZ, designed to support international negotiators at COP30. Climate negotiations are perhaps the most complex multilateral decision-making process in operation today. The NegotiateCOP tool helps structure and analyze complex negotiation texts, reducing information overload and enabling more evidence-based preparation. The key takeaway was clear: the real asymmetry in multilateral negotiations often lies not in diverging interests, but in unequal analytical capacity. Access, AI design, and governance determine whether such tools foster inclusion and cooperation or reinforce existing structural divides.
Our third session, AI as a Topic and a Tool: The Future of Foreign Policy in an Age of Algorithms, examined how AI is reshaping diplomacy itself. The conclusion was clear: middle powers bring different strengths, and the key is connecting them. AI tools will not replace diplomats, but used well, they are a meaningful complement. Multilateral governance frameworks are not optional; they are the only path that leads to somewhere sustainable.
We also co-organized a joint roundtable with the German Embassy New Delhi focusing on digital sovereignty from an Indo-German perspective. India's push toward "sovereign AI" frames AI as a public infrastructure layer rather than purely a market product. Those framing matters because alignment between German and Indian perspectives on digital sovereignty is not automatic, it is built upon sustained dialogue, institutional exchange, and joint technical experimentation so that sovereignty can be understood relationally.
Concrete outcomes of the summit included the announcement of an AI Pact between Germany and India as well as a Leaders Declaration signed by more than 90 countries and international organizations. Both their impact will depend on what follows: shared standards, interoperable infrastructures, cooperation with technology providers, and AI systems that can be deployed in public interest contexts.
Beyond Declarations: The Diplomatic Engagement in Shaping Technological Pathways
Some of the structural governance questions remained largely unaddressed. Beyond innovation narratives, the central issue is institutional responsibility: who shapes the guardrails, who ensures accountability for unintended consequences, and how do we embed safety, transparency, and societal well-being into the design and deployment of AI systems?
​Summit declarations are a start. But the real work happens in the infrastructure decisions, the standards, negotiations, and the unglamorous daily choices made by governments, academia, civil society institutions and companies that rarely make headlines. The summit theme Sarvajanа Hitaya, Sarvajanа Sukhaya (welfare for all, happiness for all), is a worthy aspiration. Turning it into reality will require more than ambition. It will require honesty about who is being left out and the political will to do something about it.
​​For tech-informed foreign policy, the implication is clear: The role of diplomacy is not to claim digital sovereignty in isolation, but to translate different approaches, build trust, and co-develop solutions that reduce technological dependencies while expanding collective agency. This is where foreign policy, technology, and international cooperation increasingly converge, and where initiatives like the Data Innovation Lab seek to operate.
​
AI as Geopolitics: What the Delhi Summit Signals for Tech-Informed Foreign Policy
Gunda Ehmke and Sebastian Blum,
March 2026
Disclaimer: The views expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the Data Innovation Lab or the German Federal Foreign Office.
​Since the end of World War II, the world has never witnessed as many armed conflicts as it does today. News headlines seem increasingly unpredictable, defying logic and consistency. In this context of geopolitical uncertainty and eroding trust in reliable global partnerships, Europe finds itself drawn to the idea of digital sovereignty, a strategic attempt to reclaim control over its digital destiny (1).
Indeed, the European Union can and should exercise sovereign authority over digital infrastructure: deciding which technologies are allowed on the Single Market, whether facial recognition by AI is permissible on European soil, and where users' data is stored. Yet this ambition gives rise to a paradox: The open, global, inclusive, and interoperable internet we seek is only possible if we renounce certain elements of control. Technologically speaking, the internet is a network of networks - by design, it transcends national boundaries. This fundamental architecture means that internet governance cannot be confined within national frameworks. It must be global by nature and involve collaboration across all stakeholder groups.
​​​
​The World Summit on the Information Society and its long Shadow​​​​​
To understand the global Internet governance ecosystem today, one must look back to the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS). Convened under the auspices of the United Nations, WSIS unfolded in two phases - in Geneva (2003) and Tunis (2005) - with the
goal of fostering a "people-centered, inclusive and development-oriented Information Society"(2). At WSIS, governments, private actors, the technical community (3), academia, and civil society debated who should govern this fast-growing digital space. ​​
One of the key outcomes was the recognition that no single stakeholder group should dominate Internet governance. Instead, multi-stakeholder cooperation became a guiding principle - although the exact meaning of this continues to be hotly debated.
Another tangible product of WSIS was the creation of the Internet Governance Forum (IGF), established by the United Nations General Assembly in 2006 as an open platform for dialogue on Internet-related public policy issues. Now, nearly two decades later, the world has changed dramatically. The Internet has evolved into a critical infrastructure for nearly all aspects of life. At the same time, new concerns like the rise of AI and algorithmic governance, geopolitical fragmentation of the Internet (so-called splinternet), and cybersecurity risks have emerged.​​​
The Future of the Internet
​
Against this backdrop, 2025 marked the 20th anniversary, and the start of the WSIS+20 Review Process, coordinated by the UN, aimed to assess the progress made since 2005 and to chart the path forward for global digital cooperation. This is also a test of the multistakeholder model and the question of who should govern the internet.​
The desire to protect something we care deeply about often leads us to guard it more tightly, to exert greater control. But the multistakeholder approach requires something different: engaging with perspectives we may deeply disagree with, respecting them as legitimate voices in a shared process. It requires trust - trust that our arguments will resonate with others and that we can build consensus around a vision for the internet that reflects shared values.
However, this model is not the only one on offer. Some countries are already demonstrating that a largely self-contained, state-controlled internet is technically and politically feasible. Such a system enables governments to closely monitor citizens’ online activities, censor content, and suppress criticism. Meanwhile, calls for more centralized and multilateral governance are growing increasingly prominent.
Digital sovereignty, then, must not be understood as isolation but as responsibility. It means deeper engagement in international forums, a willingness to understand why other actors pursue different governance models, and a readiness to defend one's values through dialogue, not disengagement. Europe’s pursuit of digital sovereignty should be rooted in openness, not closure; in cooperation, not unilateralism. If the multistakeholder model is to remain viable, it must be actively upheld through trust, persistence, and the courage to participate in difficult conversations. The WSIS+20 process offers a crucial opportunity to reaffirm the global, inclusive nature of the internet.
​
References:
(1) World Economic Forum. 2025. What is Digital Sovereignty and how are countries approaching it? Online: https://www.weforum.org/stories/2025/01/euro pe-digital-sovereignty/.
(2) UNESCO. World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS). Online: https://www.unesco.org/en/wsis.
(3) In the context of internet governance, the term refers to organizations and individuals upholding critical infrastructure, not people with a technical background.
Digital Sovereignty and Europe's Role in Internet Governance
Claire Sophie Patzig, November 2025
Disclaimer: The views expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the Data Innovation Lab or the German Federal Foreign Office.