AI & Democracy Foundation
The AI & Democracy Foundation (AIDF) is a San Francisco-based nonprofit founded by Aviv Ovadya that works to ensure democratic governance can keep pace with AI advances. The organization operates as both a funder and an advisor to philanthropic organizations, AI companies, civil society groups, and governments on their funding and use of democratic processes. AIDF develops frameworks and tools for integrating meaningful democratic participation into AI governance and alignment, including the Democracy Levels framework for evaluating democratic decision-making, deliberative workflow standards, and collaborative projects with organizations like the UK's ARIA on formal safety specifications for advanced AI systems.
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Theory of Change
AIDF believes that as AI systems become increasingly powerful and consequential, the decisions about how they are governed, aligned, and deployed should not be concentrated in the hands of a few organizations or individuals. Their theory of change holds that high-quality deliberative democratic processes for decision-making on AI can provide a path that both mitigates risks from dangerous concentrations of power and addresses the challenges of providing unfettered access to increasingly capable AI systems. By building the infrastructure for democratic participation (standardized process patterns, practitioner tools, facilitator networks), developing frameworks that define concrete levels of democratic governance (Democracy Levels), and working directly with frontier AI companies and government agencies to design and implement democratic input mechanisms for safety specifications (Safeguarded AI with ARIA), AIDF aims to create an ecosystem where democratic governance of AI is not just aspirational but practically achievable and scalable.
Grants Received
from Survival and Flourishing Fund
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Details
- Last Updated
- Apr 2, 2026, 9:59 PM UTC
- Created
- Mar 18, 2026, 11:18 PM UTC