Defence organizations are increasingly turning to artificial intelligence (AI) for achieving tactical and strategic advantages over their adversaries. The growing sophistication of AI technologies has accelerated their adoption for a number of tasks and functions, allowing different stakeholders to plan and accommodate their respective military operations.
Reading of the Week: Artificial Intelligence, Non-Proliferation and Disarmament: A Compendium on the State of the Art
Cluster for Natural and Technical Science Arms Control Research
The 25th anniversary of UN Resolution 1325 calls for a reflection on the implementation of the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) agenda and on strategies to enhance women’s participation in all phases of peace processes. Despite the historic breakthrough achieved with this Resolution, the involvement of women in conflict prevention and mediation remains limited.
How Technology Can Empower Women Peace Mediators
Istituto Affari Internazionali
“Big Tech” - or large multinational corporations that manufacture, own, and operate the digital ecosystems and physical infrastructure constituting cyberspace - wield state-like influence, advancing their interests with a reach that rivals powerful state actors.
With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility: How to Make Big Tech Accountable for its Global Influence
War on the Rocks
The integration of technology in governance has created transformative possibilities across the world, enhancing the provision of public services. Africa has also benefitted from this wave of digital transformation. Introducing big data applications into governance systems in Africa presents enormous potential for overcoming challenges, including corruption, inefficiency, and poor service delivery.
Technology for Better Governance: Insights from Public Health Systems in Kenya
Observer Research Foundation
This brief discusses the role of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and digital technologies in meeting Africa’s development goals and argues that, for tech to make a real contribution to human development in the continent, the process of technology development should enable African agency.
The Role of AI and Digital Tools in Africas Development
Observer Research Foundation
The Middle East and North Africa will become one of the world’s foremost renewable energy producing regions and a hub for international renewable energy supply chains within the next 25 years. Morocco, the United Arab Emirates, and Jordan are spearheading the trend in the region through the development of their respective green energy ecosystems
MENAs Emergence as a Hub for Renewable Energy Supply Chains
Middle East Institute
The year 2024 has been dubbed ‘the election superbowl’ due to the higher number of elections taking place in different parts of the world, including in the United States and in the European Union. In Africa alone, over 20 countries have held or are approaching elections. South Africa and Rwanda already elected their presidents, while Ghana is preparing for its presidential election in December 2024
Artificial intelligence for electoral administration and management: A pathway for Africa-EU partnership
European Think Tanks Group
Despite the prevailing narrative that Africa is falling behind in the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR), the continent is actually home to half of the world’s mobile money accounts, making it a pioneer in integrating 4IR technology into the financial services industry, according to 4C Group and GSMA.
Transforming the financial services sector in Africa with 4IR technologies
Brookings
Whilst disinformation in politics predates the digital era, “the rapid expansion of access to mobile internet and to social media, combined with big data from platforms such as Facebook, Google and X, enabling the micro-targeting of millions of citizens with different messages for specific demographic groups, or individuals, has dramatically increased the reach and impact of digital disinformation”.
Countering digital disinformation: Opportunities for Europe-Africa collaboration
European Think Tanks Group
The digital revolution is not happening in a historical vacuum. It unfolds within a framework of confrontation or collusion between market forces and government forces. Depending on the market power that companies can exercise, the digital transition will have different impacts on income distributions between capital, labor, and land, as well as on income distribution within capital itself.
Capital, Labor, and Land in the Digital Transition
Policy Center for the New South
Internet filtering and the widespread use of Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) have become one of Iran’s most significant challenges, especially since the administration of the late President Ebrahim Raisi, when these practices expanded and grew more complex. With the inauguration of a new government following the July 2024 election of President Masoud Pezeshkian, one of the most pressing questions among the public is whether the administration has both the will and the ability to end the nation’s reliance on VPNs.
The VPN Epidemic in Iran: A Digital Plague Amid Global Isolation
Stimson
Small and medium-sized enterprises represent around 80-90% of private sector businesses in the MENA region, and they employ over 50% of the formal workforce in some countries. Of that, new digital startups are only a small part. Despite SMEs’ limited share in national output in MENA compared to other regions, digital transformation is a crucial opportunity for these businesses to benefit from the growing digital economy and provide a remedy to severe youth unemployment and slow economic growth.
As the source of the most employment, this sector should be targeted for greater integration of information and communication technologies (ICT), but businesses often lack the means of both financial support and know-how to increase their use of technology.
Reading of the Week: Assessing the Status of Digital Integration of Small and Medium Sized Enterprises in the Middle East and North Africa
Wilson Center
On July 16, the United States and Saudi Arabia announced a new framework for space collaboration and civil aeronautics that shakes up the space race. The agreement marks a turning point for the US-Saudi Arabia bilateral relationship, gearing it more toward scientific cooperation and demonstrating the pivotal role that emerging space powers, particularly in the Middle East.
US-Saudi space deal shakes up new space race
Middle East Institute
Countries across Africa have experienced massive internet connectivity disruptions this year due to cuts in the undersea fiber cables in the Red Sea and along Africa’s east and west coasts. This has left much of the continent disconnected from the digital world that many rely on for essential services, e-commerce, business and daily life.
Bridging Africas digital divide
Geopolitical Intelligence Services
Target Product Profiles (TPPs) are a staple of the health sector. They are used to communicate client needs and requirements for products not currently available on the market, with information on how the new product will be used, by and for whom, and the minimum and ideal performance criteria. TPPs guide the industry to develop products that meet current needs. They are not intended to act as final procurement specifications, but rather as a list of desired requirements, which combined, describes the ideal product considering the context. Clients recognize that innovation is an iterative process and suppliers must balance sometimes competing requirements against product development progress.
A Target Product Profile for an Innovative Road Construction Technology Solution
Center For Global Development (CGD)
This book provides an overview of the technical capabilities of 5G, discusses how they may impact the information and communication technology (ICT) industry, and explores how 5G can support the Fourth Industrial Revolution (Industry 4.0) and help countries make progress toward the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
The Path to 5G in the Developing World: Planning Ahead for a Smooth Transition
International Bank for Reconstruction and Development
Adoption of digital technologies is widely acknowledged to boost productivity and employment, stimulate investment, and promote growth and development. Africa has already benefited from a rapid diffusion of information and communications technology, characterized by the widespread adoption of mobile phones.
Digital Opportunities in African Businesses
World Bank Group
L'intégration de l'Intelligence Artificielle (IA) en Afrique laisse entrevoir des perspectives prometteuses et pose des défis substantiels. Si certains pays du continent se distinguent par leur engagement et eurs avancées dans la préparation à l'adoption de l'IA, d'autres font face à des obstacles majeurs, tels que les inégalités structurelles et les fractures numériques.
LIntelligence Artificielle en Afrique: defis et opportunites
Policy Center
Recent findings concerning the use of Western technology in weapons used by Russia have raised the issue of the effectiveness of sanctions and export control mechanisms established between 1975 and 1995. However, the global scene today is very different from that of the last decades of the 20th century.
Illicit technology transfers to countries of concern: challenges for the international community
Real Instituto Elcano
Just as important as a technology’s impact is the technology’s origin—or origins. Any given technology can be traced back, through its individual components and materials, to a number of sources. And the question about where those components and materials come from matters. Modern technology, economies, livelihoods, and weapons depend on critical. Where countries source these minerals makes a difference for national and strategic security.
The critical-minerals boom is here. Can Africa take advantage?
Atlantic Council
More recently, a new class of small modular reactors (SMRs) for power generation have been gaining in popularity and are supposedly better suited for use in developing countries. SMRs hold the promise of driving progress towards universal access to modern energy sources and several other Sustainable Development Goals in a climate-friendly way.
Small modular reactors may have climate benefits, but they can also be climate-vulnerable
Stockholm International Peace Research Institute
While supporters of the UN’s cybercrime treaty have seen their dreams deferred with the convention’s postponement, those concerned about the treaty’s potential impact on human rights and freedoms are breathing a momentary sigh of relief
A dream deferred or a near miss? UN committee postpones decision on cybercrime convention
Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime
From January 29 to February 9, 2024, UN delegates will meet in New York to conclude discussions on a new cybercrime convention. Different countries have varying ideas about what the treaty should cover and how it should protect human rights and freedom of speech.
Endgame: The final phase of the UN cybercrime negotiations?
Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime
The Strategic Foresight Analysis 2023 (SFA23) provides a shared understanding of the Evolving Security Environment to 2043, thus establishing the context for Allied futures thinking. Based on this context, the Future Operating Environment 2024 (FOE24) will address the military problem sets for Allied Warfare Development.
Unveiling the Future: The Release of Allied Command Transformations Strategic Foresight Analysis 2023
NATO Allied Command Transformation
The nations of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) have long been prominent in the global energy landscape, and their abundant hydrocarbon resources have served as the foundation of their economic growth and development.
Technologies and Innovation in the GCC energy sector
Economic Research Forum
The Africa Economic Symposium (AES) is the Policy Center for the New South’s new major conference, alongside the renowned Atlantic Dialogues and the African Peace and Security Annual Conference (APSACO). AES aspires to be a continent-wide annual gathering of prominent economists, policymakers, and academics.
Africa Economic Symposium
Policy Center For the New South
Until recently, the ability to keep one’s thoughts private was taken for granted. But recent developments call into question this assumption, as increasingly subtle, powerful and invasive technologies are becoming more pervasive. This policy brief offers case studies illustrating how technology threatens our freedom of thought and points to some directions for research.
New Technologies Challenge Freedom of Thought: Cases and Directions for Research
Centre for International Governance Innovation
The digital revolution has become a cornerstone of economic diversification efforts in emerging markets, particularly in countries seeking to reduce their dependence on oil and gas production. Among these nations, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia stand out for their ambitious smart city initiatives, integral to their broader strategies for economic transformation.
Transformational implications of moving toward smart cities in the Gulf
Middle East Institute
On November 16, the World Economic Forum’s AI Governance Summit convened over 200 global leaders, tech experts, academics, innovators, and policymakers to address the evolving landscape of artificial intelligence (AI) governance and shape its responsible future
Reading of the Week: The future of the world is intelligent. Insights from the World Economic Forums AI Governance Summit
Brookings
As Africa looks to close the development gap, it has turned to space as a catalyst for economic growth and social change. The creation of the African Space Agency (AfSA) in 2017 and its formal inauguration in January of this year demonstrate that African leaders want to develop comprehensive, home-grown solutions to promote solidarity and a new way of thinking about the continent’s role in the future space economy.
Who Woke the Sleeping Giant? Africas Emerging Space Programs Take Off
Stimson
India’s G20 presidency spotlighted the pivotal role of digital public infrastructure in fostering sustainable and inclusive development. Such a network is crucial for Africa’s rapidly expanding digital landscape. Yet without strategic actions the continent risks succumbing to a new type of resource curse — the digital one.
Reading of the Week: How to Achieve African Digital Sovereignty
The South African Institute of International Affairs
In October this year, Africa’s air force chiefs of staff and air force industry representatives gathered in Senegal. They agreed the continent urgently needed to develop sophisticated air defences in response to a growing threat – the proliferation of unmanned aerial systems (UAS), or drones.
Drones as weapons. Africa needs better data to anticipate risk
Institute for Security Studies
Possession of legal identity is a link between citizens and the myriad government services and social, economic and legal rights available to them. However, around 50% of Africa’s population do not have a legal identity, making it increasingly difficult for people to access vital government services such as healthcare and social grants, and to set up bank accounts, register SIM cards, and apply for other important documents such as passports.
Digital Identification and Biometrics In East Africa: Opportunities and Concerns
South African Institute of International Affairs
The Oxford Institute for Energy Studies started researching the role of hydrogen in the energy transition in 2020. Since then the interest in hydrogen has continued to grow globally across the energy industry. A key research question has been the extent to which clean hydrogen can be scaled up at reasonable cost and whether it can play a significant role in the global energy system. In April 2022, OIES launched a new Hydrogen Research Programme under the overarching theme of ’building business cases for a hydrogen economy’. This overarching theme was selected based on the observation that most clean hydrogen.
Clean Hydrogen Roadmap: Is Greater Realism Leading to More Credible Paths Forward?
The Oxford Institute for Energy Studies
Physical and electronic infrastructure must be in place to support digital identification, document exchange, payment and online trade in Africa. Physical or ’hard‘ infrastructure includes a reliable power supply, internet connectivity and secure data-storage facilities. This infrastructure enables broadband internet access, providing a foundation for individual and business participation in the digital economy.
Strengthening Africas Digital Infrastructure for Greater Economic Resilience
The South African Institute for International Affairs
There are many ways in which technology could help to counter the diversion of conventional weapons. Yet despite some discussions in international meetings on conventional arms control, we see limited evidence of technologies being used to strengthen or enhance efforts to prevent, detect, and investigate the diversion of conventional arms, their ammunition, and parts and components.
Technologies to Counter the Diversion of Small Arms and Light Weapons, and Components of Conventional Weapons
UN Institute for Disarmament Research
A zero draft of the United Nations Treaty on Countering the Use of Information and Communications Technologies for Criminal Purposes, or more succinctly referred to as the cybercrime treaty, has been produced and will be debated in an August 2023 UN session in New York. In this context, states are debating the first global cyber-treaty, with a focus on criminality and state powers to address crime.
Closing Pandoras box: UN Cybercrime Treaty negotiations
Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime
The Typology of Online Harms aims to provide a foundational common language, facilitating multistakeholder and cross-jurisdictional
discussions to advance digital safety. Developed by a working group of the Global Coalition for Digital Safety, comprising representatives from industry, governments, civil society and academia, this typology serves as a foundation for facilitating multistakeholder discussions and cross-jurisdictional dialogues to find a common terminology and shared understanding of online safety.
Toolkit for Digital Safety Design Interventions and Innovations: Typology of Online Harms
World Economic Forum
The oil and natural gas industry has historically played a pivotal role in the economies and political power structures of Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries, generating fortunes from the export of these fossil fuels and thus enhancing their international influence. However, as the world shifts toward a cleaner, more sustainable future, the GCC states are also embracing this proud transition, moving from oil wells to power cells.
From oil wells to power cells: How Saudi Arabia and its Gulf neighbors are securing their future through battery technology
The Middle east Institute
Accelerating the growth of the green economy should happen rapidly through policy actions. If the global green transition is left to market forces, it can have grave consequences for the world. Considering the varied levels of technological advancements among countries, some will be better placed to develop and push forward green technology, whereas others will simply be adopting these new technologies.
Egypts Green Transition: Nurturing a Sustainable Economy and Workforce
Middle East Council on Global Affairs
Despite some progress having been made, a large proportion of the African population is excluded from the digital economy due to physical infrastructure barriers.
Strengthening Africas Digital Infrastructure for Greater Economic Resilience
The South African Institute of International Affairs
On the morning of 22 May, 2023, an artificial intelligence (AI) generated image of an explosion at the Pentagon surfaced online and spread like wildfire throughout social media. Multiple news sources reported and shared the AI-generated image on their platforms. As a result, markets responded to the reports and image, and the S&P 500 index fell in just minutes after its reporting, causing a $500 billion market cap swing, even though this image was quickly proven as fake.
The Newest Weapon in Irregular Warfare. Artificial Intelligence
Irregular Warfare Center
Artificial intelligence (AI) is playing an increasingly important role in our daily lives. Having experienced considerable growth in recent years, artificial intelligence corresponds to technologies capable of processing hybrid sources, particularly unstructured data. The adoption and use of these modern technologies in the African context are currently low because of some emerging challenges. These difficulties may have a direct influence on African economic development. In this paper, we highlight the opportunities and challenges facing the adoption of AI technologies in Africa.
Artificial Intelligence Revolution in Africa: Economic Opportunities and Legal Challenges
Policy Center For The New South
Artificial intelligence and systems need sufficient safeguards in place to avoid exacerbating biases in the nuclear security field.
New threats require innovative approaches to mitigation efforts and emerging technologies are a crucial part of nuclear security infrastructure. But embracing new tools comes with new considerations and risks. Responsible nuclear security practitioners must ask: what happens when the tools for protection begin working against those they are meant to protect? Such is the concern with artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) for nuclear security.
Dont Blame the Robots. Artificial Intelligence Bias & Implications for Nuclear Security
Stimson Center
The military use of space is not new, yet it has developed and become more advanced today. Major powers, such as the US, China, and Russia, now have their own military units specialized in space operations, indicating that space has become a new war-fighting domain. Although more nations develop and test sophisticated space capabilities, including kinetic and non-kinetic weapons, a conventional war in space is not expected. The stakes are high as the world has grown increasingly reliant on the information and connectivity that the military, civil, and commercial space systems provide, creating new realms of vulnerability. There are several weaknesses in the existing legal framework, looking at the Outer Space Treaty adopted during the Cold War.
Increased Militarisation of Space. A New Realm of Security
Beyond the Horizon
Brain capital is a novel framework that recognizes brain skills and brain health as indispensable drivers of the modern knowledge economy. The concept of “green brain capital”, which we are scoping in this paper, places a central emphasis on the brain to deliver a healthy and sustainable environment and, vice versa, on a green environment to promote and safeguard brain health.
Brain Capital is Key to a Sustainable Future
Baker Institute for Public Policy
Space activity is experiencing a boom with the scope and importance of space technologies and services fueling rapid growth upon growth.
While the space boom is catalyzing transferal of the ownership of previously public infrastructure and capabilities to corporate control, many space technologies have critically important military and civilian applications.
The role of space technologies in power politics: Mitigating strategic dependencies through space resilience
Finnish Institute of International Affairs
The UN Ad Hoc Committee negotiating a treaty on Countering the Use of Information and Communications Technologies for Criminal Purposes (henceforth ‘AHC’) has completed its deliberations on a negotiating text before a zero draft treaty will be provided to states in June 2023.
Still poles apart: UN Cybercrime Treaty negotiations
Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime
This study, led by Global TIES for Children, is the first to evaluate a phone-delivered version of a parenting program in the Middle East and the first randomized-controlled evaluation of an audio-only parenting program for a community sample (that is, a sample without diagnosed health problems or disabilities). Though extremely relevant for humanitarian and crisis situations, when in-person programs are difficult, very little is known about the impacts of audio-only remote caregiver programs.
Lessons and impacts of a phone-based parenting program for Syrian and Jordanian families with young children
Relief Web
Since the early 1980s, the U.S. has embraced a predominantly laissez faire approach to economic development. Recently, however, there has been a momentous shift to embrace place-based industrial policy and an intentional effort to reshore “critical industries” through a multitrillion-dollar wave of legislation, including the CHIPS and Science Act (CHIPS), Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), and Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA).
The CHIPS and Science Act wont build inclusive innovation ecosystems on its own
Brookings
The cost of capital (CoC) for renewable power generation technologies is a major determinant of the total price to purchasers of renewable electricity. Both reliable data, and a deep understanding of the composition of the CoC and its drivers, are therefore critical information. Crucially, even small differences in the CoC that are not properly accounted for can result in misleading cost calculations and lead to poor policy making.
The Cost of Financing for Renewable Power
International Renewable Energy Agency
Although a considerable body of research has examined the relationship between information and communication technology and the food production process, less attention has been paid to whether internet utilization impacts food production in north African countries. This research sought to investigate the short and long-run relationship between internet utilization and food production in north Africa. Yearly data sets from 4 countries (Algeria, Tunisia, Egypt, and Morocco) were used, covering the period 1990-2021.
Internet and Food Production: Panel Data Evidence from North African Countries
Economic Research Forum
Digitalization is one of the main forces shaping the modern global economy—and an area in which the Arab world has fallen behind. Policy-makers in the region must find ways to capitalize on the enormous dividends of new digital technologies and mitigate their risks. Reaping the benefits will require improved education and training, better cybersecurity, more private sector support, and international cooperation.
How can the digital economy benefit everyone in the Arab world and prevent the region from falling farther behind?
Economic Research Forum
This Energy Insight explores the interplay between the decarbonization and digitalization of the electricity sector. While decarbonization has been studied extensively, there has been less attention paid to the digital transition. Not only can digital technologies improve efficiency and reduce operational costs, they also can enable new energy ecosystems, create new business models, and accelerate the energy transition.
The implications of digitalization on future electricity market design
The Oxford Institute for energy studies