We’re living through the early stages of a profound transformation – not just in technology, but in our entire economic and social reality.

Artificial intelligence is already reshaping the way we work, communicate, learn, and govern. As I wrote recently on Substack, it has become clear to me that – even with all of the media attention and public interest in this topic – we are still in fact underreacting, and we are dangerously underprepared for what this will mean.

By “we,” I mean American society in general, but also the political and policy world in particular, certainly including the Democratic Party.

We’ve been focused, understandably, on the physical dangers and potential misuse of AI. But we’re not doing nearly enough to reckon with the deeper transformations already underway: changes to our experience of work and unemployment, citizenship and power, isolation and belonging.

This is not just a tech challenge. It’s a test of our democracy – of whether public institutions can keep up, and whether we can bring moral clarity to choices that will define this century.

How we navigate the swift development of AI is a deeply political set of challenges. And it requires leadership with the imagination and urgency to match the scale of the moment.

Indeed the biggest leadership challenge of the next decade may well be that of managing the impact of AI—making sure it makes people better off, not worse off.

I’ll have much more to say about this in the months ahead, but what I want to stress now is that we must learn to think of this less as a technology issue, of interest only to tech buffs, and instead understand it as an issue bearing on everyday life and requiring urgent political attention.

I’m at work coming to terms with these and other changes, and developing policy and political answers that can meet the true nature and scale of the challenges of the 2020s.

Pete Buttigieg is a husband, dad, veteran, writer, and proud Midwesterner. He formerly served as the 19th US Secretary of Transportation and Mayor of South Bend. Now, he’s committed to supporting emerging leaders, showing up in communities we too often ignore, and helping win more elections.

If you support Pete, and would like to help him to keep up the momentum, consider becoming a monthly sustaining supporter to Win the Era today.

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