The National Academies’ Conclave on Great Powers and Extreme Risks

The creation of the Conclave is an active grantmaking effort by our Global Catastrophic Risks Fund to improve the effectiveness of backchannel diplomacy for combating extreme risks.

What problem are they trying to solve?

Great power nations need reliable ways to communicate with each other about topics that impact global security, especially transformative technologies like AI, bioengineering, and nuclear weapons that could potentially pose catastrophic risks.

One crucial communications channel is through backchannel diplomacy—unofficial, non-government dialogues between nations that can help promote understanding and facilitate problem-solving, even when the governments are not talking to each other for political reasons. Multiple backchannel dialogues on transformative technologies already exist, including several that Founders Pledge and our members have funded, such as:

• FarAI’s International Dialogues on AI Safety
• INHR's U.S.-China dialogues on AI-bio risks
• The Brookings Institution’s dialogues on the use of AI military systems
• Pacific Forum’s U.S.-China strategic nuclear dialogues

Though many of these dialogues have been highly effective, the overall landscape of backchannel dialogues is still highly fragmented and uncoordinated. Because these dialogues arose out of multiple independent civil society efforts, everyone has limited visibility into the broader landscape, and there’s no systematic way for organizers to share insights, coordinate efforts, or efficiently brief policymakers. Leading Chinese experts on AI, for example, have been invited to attend multiple dialogues to discuss similar topics, duplicating work that’s already been done, while other important topics get neglected and slip through the cracks.

What will they do?

The Conclave on Great Power and Extreme Risks will convene coordination meetings at the National Academies in Washington, D.C. twice a year, bringing together three key groups of stakeholders:

• Organizers of unofficial U.S. dialogues with China, Russia, and India that focus on extreme risks that could result in catastrophic harm, like AI risks, nuclear risks, biological risks, and related strategic stability issues
• Key policymakers from across the U.S. government, including the State Department, Department of Defense, National Nuclear Security Administration, and National Security Council
• Major funders of these dialogues from both private and public sectors

At each Conclave meeting, participants will share developments from recent dialogues and discuss emerging patterns, ensuring policymakers have visibility, in a way that respects the privacy agreements (e.g., the Chatham House Rule) of each dialogue. They’ll also coordinate future dialogue efforts to reduce inefficiencies and fill gaps.

The Conclave will be hosted by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine’s Committee on International Security and Arms Control (CISAC). As a Congressionally-chartered advisory body, NASEM has built trust with key policy stakeholders while maintaining independence and scientific credibility. Their nonpartisan nature also allows them to effectively engage with both Democratic and Republican administrations, which is crucial for maintaining influence through political transitions.

We believe the Conclave will lead to many benefits related to better coordination, such as more efficient resource allocation and an enhancement of our ability to detect, understand, and respond to crisis signals from other countries. Further, the Conclave has the potential to act as an engine for risk reduction by connecting government actors with the civil society ecosystem. The Conclave will allow organizers to:

• Develop a more comprehensive understanding of other governments’ attitudes and actions toward extreme risks
• Surface novel risk-reduction policy ideas
• Socialize proposals directly with policymakers
• Help policymakers filter policy ideas based on tractability with other countries

Through these pathways, we hope that the Conclave will be able to significantly enhance the effectiveness of unofficial dialogues for mitigating extreme risks.