Maximilian Mayer
Professor of International Relations and Global Politics of Technology with University of Bonn
From the perspective of constitutionalism, AI governance is not merely a technical issue but a compound challenge spanning law, society, and technology. Currently, technology companies such as Anthropic are employing “constitutional language” to construct their governance framework documents, seeking to define the relationship between large language models and social order, reflecting deep corporate engagement in shaping global AI governance rules. Meanwhile, the revival of “private constitutionalism” — from cryptocurrency governance to the concept of technological republics — is positioning technology companies as rule-makers operating in parallel with nation-states. At present, the depth of AI regulation by national governments still falls short of the governance explorations undertaken by technology companies themselves, creating a notable gap between the two.
