IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - March 2021 - 96

Last Word

Champions of AI4Eq: Equity as an
Adaptive Challenge
Christine Perakslis
College of Management, Johnson & Wales University, Providence, RI 02903 USA
 Equity can be defined as a state, quality, or ideal
of being just, impartial, and fair [1]. The World Health
Organization (WHO) defines equity as " the absence
of avoidable or remediable differences among groups
of people, whether those groups are defined socially,
economically, demographically, or geographically. "
When benchmarking those who operationalize
equity well, five Ps are often used as an overarching
equity lens [2]. AI4Eq was our purpose in this issue;
our community addressed the remaining Ps very well.
AI4Eq is about people. Our community explored
the risks and rewards of artificial intelligence (AI)
for diverse populations who vary geographically,
socially, and demographically. We celebrated AI
for mental health equity when access is augmented
for marginalized populations. We applauded AI as a
complement to current services; practitioners would
be less overtaxed and more productive, thereby serving vulnerable populations better.
AI4Eq is about place. Our experts recognized
how humans are differently situated in terms of the
equity barriers they experience. We reproved epidemiological models that cannot be adapted to varied
cultural contexts. We questioned the legitimacy of
using AI-driven facial recognition policy within particular social settings.
AI4Eq is about processes/procedures. Collectively, our experts alerted us to possible systemic,
structural, and institutional inequities throughout
AI design, development, and deployment (AI-DDD).
The authors proposed frameworks that create and
guard robust participatory processes, thereby
avoiding exclusions of, and meaningfully including, those who are impacted by the AI systems.

AI4Eq is about power. Our peers implored us
to adopt existing human rights approaches to shift
power dynamics away from the few and toward " equal
availability " of the benefits of AI. We acknowledged
skewed decision-making due to unrepresented data,
and, on the contrary, unbiased AI-decision-making
resulting in a fair distribution of such public resources
as energy and water. Our authors proposed accountability-infused counterbalances to power abuses such
as global governance of algorithmic systems, exposing equity-tokenism, and assigning direct responsibility to people in each phase of AI-DDD, from designers
who would embrace " equity-by-design " to administrators who manage programs in which AI is utilized.
We commit to equity as a leading principle. We guard
against equity as an afterthought. We recognize that
equity will be a point of tension [3]. Advancing equity in
AI will be a journey. We ready ourselves for equity-perpetuity with not only technical challenges, but also
mostly adaptive challenges as we champion AI4Eq. 

 References
[1] Annie Casey Foundation. (Jun. 26, 2019). A Guide to
the Accountability for Equitable Results Framework.
[Online]. Available: https://www.aecf.org/resources/
introduction-to-the-results-count-path-to-equity/
[2] Multnomah County Office of Diversity and Equity.
(Mar. 24, 2014). The Equity and Empowerment Lens.
[Online]. Available: https://multco.us/diversity-equity/
equity-and-empowerment-lens
[3] TCC Group Solutions for Social Impact. (Apr. 2019).
Equity and Evaluation. [Online]. Available: https://
www.tccgrp.com/wp-content/uploads/EquityPanel_
Booklet_Final.pdf

Christine Perakslis is an Associate Professor
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MTS.2021.3057501
Date of current version: 16 March 2021.

in the MBA Program, College of Management,
Johnson & Wales University, Providence, RI, USA.
Her e-mail address is christine.perakslis@jwu.edu.

IEEE Technology and Society Magazine

https://www.aecf.org/resources/introduction-to-the-results-count-path-to-equity/ https://www.aecf.org/resources/introduction-to-the-results-count-path-to-equity/ https://www.multco.us/diversity-equity/equity-and-empowerment-lens https://www.multco.us/diversity-equity/equity-and-empowerment-lens https://www.tccgrp.com/wp-content/uploads/EquityPanel_Booklet_Final.pdf https://www.tccgrp.com/wp-content/uploads/EquityPanel_Booklet_Final.pdf https://www.tccgrp.com/wp-content/uploads/EquityPanel_Booklet_Final.pdf

IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - March 2021

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