Brokerage in the Black Box: Swing States, Strategic Ambiguity, and the Global Politics of AI Governance

TL;DR

The paper addresses fragmentation in global AI governance driven by U.S.–China rivalry and the opacity of frontier AI systems. It reframes AI opacity as a structural resource and analyzes how Technological Swing States leverage this opacity through institutional transparency to broker governance outcomes. Using comparative case studies of South Korea, Singapore, and India, it identifies three strategies—delay and hedging, selective alignment, and normative intermediation—that enable intermediary states to influence standards, norms, and policy. The findings illuminate a shift from bilateral dominance to a polycentric governance landscape, with practical implications for how states, firms, and international organizations design oversight and converge on responsible AI norms.

Abstract

The U.S. - China rivalry has placed frontier dual-use technologies, particularly Artificial Intelligence (AI), at the center of global power dynamics, as techno-nationalism, supply chain securitization, and competing standards deepen bifurcation within a weaponized interdependence that blurs civilian-military boundaries. Existing research, yet, mostly emphasizes superpower strategies and often overlooks the role of middle powers as autonomous actors shaping the techno-order. This study examines Technological Swing States (TSS), middle powers with both technological capacity and strategic flexibility, and their ability to navigate the frontier technologies' uncertainty and opacity to mediate great-power techno-competition regionally and globally. It reconceptualizes AI opacity not as a technical deficit, but as a structural feature and strategic resource, stemming from algorithmic complexity, political incentives that prioritize performance over explainability, and the limits of post-hoc interpretability. This structural opacity shifts authority from technical demands for explainability to institutional mechanisms, such as certification, auditing, and disclosure, converting technical constraints into strategic political opportunities. Drawing on case studies of South Korea, Singapore, and India, the paper theorizes how TSS exploit the interplay between opacity and institutional transparency through three strategies: (i) delay and hedging, (ii) selective alignment, and (iii) normative intermediation. These practices enable TSS to preserve strategic flexibility, build trust among diverse stakeholders, and broker convergence across competing governance regimes, thereby influencing institutional design, interstate bargaining, and policy outcomes in global AI governance.