Peace & Freedom: 2023 Fall/Winner issue

a sense of global responsibility and ethical awareness that
they could pave the way to disaster.
As we do with nuclear weapons, we question how useful
AI weapons will be. If you use AI weapons on an enemy’s
homeland and if your adversary also has them, when your
adversary strikes back, your country will be devastated….
clearly a suicidal option. And if your adversary doesn’t have
AI weapons, it’s not war, it’s genocide. Will AI weaponry be
a deterrent? Not according to some Pentagon AI specialists,
who fear with time, a rogue group or nation could destroy us.
Other AI specialists, even in the Defense Advanced Research
Projects Agency (DARPA), have admitted that with very complex
weapon systems, there is no way to completely eliminate
mistakes and oversights that could lead to disasters. 1
The Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom
(WILPF) has confronted the menace and humanitarian disaster
of war for the past 108 years and sees this dialogue on military
applications of AI as vital. Like Europe, we want to take
a safer and saner approach to global security: to only use AI
for peacemaking, arms control, and the avoidance of war; or,
at least, to avoid unnecessary killing in war.
WILPF members, please ask your legislators to vote for just
and sane regulations of AI and demand a budget that includes
AI for PEACE and finding ways to safely wean off nuclear
weapons and lethal autonomous weapons.
Notes
1. For expert opinion on the R & D of AI weapons, read Paul Scharre’s
Army of None: Autonomous Weapons and the Future of War (W.W.
Norton & Company, 2018).
In this article, artificial intelligence (AI) refers to the ability of
a computer or computer-controlled robot to perform tasks
commonly associated with intelligent beings. The term is
frequently applied to the project of developing systems with
the ability to reason, discover meaning, generalize, or learn
from past experiences.
CSW Practicum Now Open to
Young Activists
By Shilpa Pandey
Coordinator, UN Practicum in Advocacy
As a young woman growing up in India and dreaming
about a just society where women get to participate
in the decision-making
process as much as men
do, I often wondered how to go
about it. In my search for a platform
that would allow me to bring
suppressed voices to the front lines,
I discovered WILPF in India. One of
the things that struck me was that
WILPF had a consultative status
with the United Nations (UN) and
that meant the work our activists
did at the local community level
found its voice resonating at the
global arena through our organization’s
representatives who had a seat at the table at the UN.
As years went by, and having myself worked professionally
with the United Nations agency in India as a consultant, I often
pondered how we can expose more and more young women
activists to these kinds of experiences. How can we engage
young women who are interested in learning more about
how the UN functions or how voices from their communities
might reach some of the highest levels of decision making?
Well, the answer came to me when I moved to the United
States and became active with the US section of WILPF. I came
to learn about the CSW programs that WILPF offers.
Due to its consultative status with the UN, WILPF US is able
to offer a UN Practicum in Advocacy program that allows us
to take select participants to the UN during the first half of
March held at the UN headquarters in New York City, and
to participate as delegates at the annual Commission on the
Status of Women (CSW) programs.
During other years, these programs
were restricted to only those
applicants who were enrolled in
universities or colleges in traditional
study programs. But this year
we have opened these programs
to young activists who may not
be enrolled in a formal study program
but are community leaders
and budding activists who want
to make a change. We know these
young activists can benefit from
International delegates to the UN at CSW 67, 2023.
Photo credit: Shilpa Pandey.
WILPF’s programs as they network,
attend, and participate in all of the
panels, events, and other forums that are available during
the annual CSW sessions.
The application for the year 2024 is already open and I
am hoping that we see more and more young women from
diverse communities apply for these.
I feel honored to be a coordinator for this program which
truly is an example of bringing local voices to the global forum.
PEACE & FREEDOM FALL/WINTER 2023 | 21