Artificial Power: 2025 Landscape Report
A prominent critical-AI research institute's annual landscape report shapes the international policy conversation APS practitioners will encounter — worth knowing the argument.
Key points
- AI Now Institute's 2025 report argues AI companies have accumulated disproportionate market and political power.
- Report proposes concrete strategies for policymakers to rebalance AI governance toward public accountability.
- US-centric advocacy framing limits direct applicability to Australian regulatory or procurement contexts.
Summary
The AI Now Institute's 2025 Landscape Report, 'Artificial Power', argues that AI companies and their principals have accumulated structural economic and political power that undermines public accountability. It covers themes including AGI mythology, infrastructure consolidation, deregulation as industrial policy, and market rigging by dominant AI firms. The report concludes with a 'roadmap for action' framing AI governance as a question of power rather than progress, and is directed at community organisers, policymakers, and the public. The report is US-centric in its examples and policy recommendations, though the structural critique of market concentration has some resonance for Australian AI governance debates.
Implications for Australian agencies
- Monitor Policy teams working on AI market regulation or procurement concentration may want to monitor AI Now's analysis as background to international governance debates.
- Consider Agencies developing AI governance frameworks could consider whether arguments about AI market concentration align with or inform Australian competition and procurement policy thinking.
Implications are AI-generated. Starting points, not advice.
"Artificial Power: 2025 Landscape Report" Source: AI Now Institute – Publications Published: 3 June 2025 URL: https://ainowinstitute.org/publications/research/ai-now-2025-landscape-report The AI Now Institute's 2025 Landscape Report, 'Artificial Power', argues that AI companies and their principals have accumulated structural economic and political power that undermines public accountability. It covers themes including AGI mythology, infrastructure consolidation, deregulation as industrial policy, and market rigging by dominant AI firms. The report concludes with a 'roadmap for action' framing AI governance as a question of power rather than progress, and is directed at community organisers, policymakers, and the public. The report is US-centric in its examples and policy recommendations, though the structural critique of market concentration has some resonance for Australian AI governance debates. Implications for Australian agencies: - [Monitor] Policy teams working on AI market regulation or procurement concentration may want to monitor AI Now's analysis as background to international governance debates. - [Consider] Agencies developing AI governance frameworks could consider whether arguments about AI market concentration align with or inform Australian competition and procurement policy thinking. Retrieved from SIMS, 18 May 2026.