Neurotechnologies: The New Frontier for International Governance

11 April 2023

Key points

  • Advances in neuroscience and artificial intelligence (AI) are leading to the rapid development of neurotechnologies that are giving us unprecedented access to and understanding of our brains. With this comes the capability to decode, alter or enhance targeted cognitive processes.
  • Broad positive medical applications stem from this, such as the potential curing of mental disorders, or the regaining of lost mobility through the operation of new-age prosthetics controlled with brain-computer interfaces. However, access to mental processes presents us with unprecedented privacy, ethical and security risks.
  • New governance frameworks to govern the development and use of neurotechnologies are required to ensure the risks stemming from these new technologies are mitigated before their broad adoption.
  • These governance frameworks should be participatory, flexible, global, inclusive, multilateral and multistakeholder. Given the heterogeneity of the technologies in question, their applications and the actors involved in the field, the seamless integration of different governance instruments could be necessary. Additionally, these efforts should not be siloed from governance in seemingly separate – but converging – technological fields such as AI.
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Neurotechnologies: The New Frontier for International Governance
Information
By Dr Ricardo Chavarriaga, Dr Jean-Marc Rickli and Mr Federico Mantellassi

Dr Ricardo Chavarriaga is the head of the Swiss office of the Confederation of Laboratories for AI Research in Europe, a Senior Researcher at Zürich University of Applied Sciences and a Polymath Fellow at the Geneva Centre for Security Policy (GCSP). He is also chair of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Standards Association industry connection group on Neurotechnologies for Brain-Machine Interfacing, and Vice-chair of the IEEE P7700 Working Group on Recommended Practices for the Responsible Design and Development of Neurotechnologies.
Dr Jean-Marc Rickli is Head of Global and Emerging Risks and the Polymath Initiative at the GCSP. Among other positions, he is also the co-chair of the Emerging Security Challenges Working Group of the NATO Partnership for Peace Consortium.
Mr Federico Mantellassi is a Research and Project Officer for the Global and Emerging Risks Cluster at the GCSP. He is also the Project Coordinator of the GCSP’s Polymath Initiative.