Global AI Mobilisation: Power, Inequality, and the Future of Nations

AI mobilisation touches every facet of our world — from technology and business to politics and culture. Its hyper adoption is creating unequal opportunities and exposing old divisions between nations. Wealthy countries dominate research, development, and profits. Many nations in the global south fight to secure a place in the conversation.

The revolution is not only about faster processors or smarter chatbots. It’s about who controls the future of knowledge, labor, and governance. As artificial intelligence systems grow in sophistication, they alter economic power, labor markets, and even global diplomacy. In this race, access to resources such as data, computing power, and infrastructure is becoming the deciding factor.

What’s Happening & Why This Matters

AI is no longer confined to research labs or experimental startups. Its reach now extends into hospitals, schools, factories, and homes. Generative AI platforms such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Anthropic’s Claude have brought advanced tools to the public, while robotics companies push toward fully autonomous machines. The speed of innovation has left many governments scrambling to understand and regulate these technologies before they become too entrenched to manage.

Yann LeCun, Chief AI Scientist at Meta, predicts a dramatic leap in machine intelligence over the next three to five years. Today’s models are exceptional at manipulating language but lack the ability to reason and interact with the physical world. LeCun believes the next breakthroughs will focus on systems that can process and react to real-world experiences.

“If we get a system that is as smart as a cat or a rat, that would be a victory,” LeCun explained, emphasizing the long road ahead before machines reach human-level intelligence.

LeCun’s vision excites investors and technologists, but it also raises fears. Yoshua Bengio, another pioneer in deep learning, warns that without strong governance, AI could destabilize economies and societies. Bengio has called on governments to prioritize safety and ethics at the Global AI Summit in Paris, where world leaders and industry titans are debating how to balance innovation with responsibility.

The Global South: Exploitation and Opportunity

While much of the AI conversation centers on Silicon Valley, London, and Beijing, the global south faces a more complex story. According to Krystal Maughan, a PhD researcher studying AI ethics, developing nations often act as silent partners in the AI industry. They provide vast pools of low-paid labor for data labeling, the tedious process of tagging images, videos, and text to train machine learning systems. These workers, often based in Africa, South America, and parts of Asia, form the invisible backbone of AI progress but rarely share in its profits.

The comparison to colonial-era resource extraction is unavoidable. Just as countries in the global south export coffee, cocoa, or rare earth minerals while wealthier nations reap the profits, the same pattern now applies to digital labor and data. This digital extraction economy leaves local communities vulnerable and dependent on foreign corporations. Even when nations possess strong talent pools, limited infrastructure and inadequate cybersecurity frameworks prevent them from competing on equal footing.

Nigeria’s entry into the global AI dialogue offers a glimmer of hope. By joining 95 other countries in talks about ethical AI standards, Nigeria and its allies are demanding a seat at the table. These agreements, while imperfect, represent a critical step toward creating an international framework that respects diverse perspectives and priorities.

Energy, Resources, and Environmental Costs

Artificial intelligence is not just a matter of code and algorithms. The energy demands of large-scale AI models are staggering. Companies like Nvidia and Google rely on enormous data centers, each consuming as much electricity as a small city. This concentration of power raises questions about environmental sustainability and global energy equity.

Developing countries often bear the burden of energy-intensive industries without enjoying the benefits. AI’s hunger for computing resources risks worsening climate and economic crises in regions already facing poverty and instability. Without deliberate policies, these nations could be trapped in a cycle of exploitation where they provide resources but lack the means to harness the resulting technology.

Building AI Sovereignty

Some nations are beginning to resist this imbalance by forming coalitions similar to BRICS. These alliances focus on digital sovereignty, ensuring that local data, labor, and intellectual property remain under national control. Countries are exploring domestic AI initiatives, building their own data centers, and collaborating on open-source projects to reduce dependence on foreign tech giants.

This movement is gaining traction across Africa, Latin America, and Asia. It reflects a growing realization that control over digital resources is as vital as control over physical ones. In this sense, the AI revolution resembles past struggles for independence and self-determination.

Looking Toward the Next Technological Leap

The 2025 Queen Elizabeth Prize for Engineering, awarded to pioneers like Fei-Fei Li, Jensen Huang of Nvidia, and Yann LeCun, celebrates the breakthroughs that have brought AI to its current stage. Their work has laid the foundation for machines that can generate text, create art, drive cars, and assist with scientific discovery.

Yet these advancements are only the beginning. The next frontier will involve machines that understand and interact with the world in real-time. This shift could unlock industries we can barely imagine today, from fully autonomous domestic robots to AI-driven space exploration. However, without equitable distribution of these tools, the gap between the rich and poor nations could widen dramatically.

TF Summary: What’s Next

The coming years will define whether artificial intelligence becomes a unifying force or a source of division. Governments must act now to create inclusive policies that prioritize fairness, transparency, and shared benefits. For countries in the global south, building coalitions and asserting digital sovereignty are vital steps toward ensuring AI works for their citizens, not against them.

For the global north, the challenge lies in sharing resources and knowledge while addressing ethical concerns. The future of AI is not just about technological progress — it’s about rewriting the rules of global power.

MY FORECAST: AI will become a core issue in international relations, driving new alliances and conflicts. Nations that fail to secure digital sovereignty will find themselves permanently dependent on those that do.

— Text-to-Speech (TTS) provided by gspeech