AP reported that Pope Leo XIV formally launched Magnifica Humanitas, calling for robust state and international regulation of AI and warning that opaque algorithms controlled by a handful of private companies risk producing new forms of dehumanisation. Reuters reported that the Pope told the Vatican audience some autonomous weapons systems have advanced practically beyond any human reach to govern them, and called for ownership of AI data not to be left solely in private hands.

Regulation

  • The Holy See promulgated Magnifica Humanitas on 25 May 2026, an encyclical applying Catholic social doctrine directly to AI governance. The 43,000-word document calls for algorithmic transparency and accountability, treats data and digital platforms as goods subject to the universal destination principle, demands subsidiarity in platform governance, and prohibits AI systems designed to enable autonomous lethal decisions or mass surveillance.
  • The Holy See also published the Pope's address at the Synod Hall presentation on 25 May 2026, which framed the encyclical's governance demands as equivalent to Rerum Novarum's intervention during industrialisation. The address identified AI warfare, labour displacement and the concentration of data ownership as the three immediate regulatory priorities.

Academia

  • arXiv hosts 'Big AI's Regulatory Capture: Mapping Industry Interference and Government Complicity' by Abeba Birhane and six co-authors, submitted 7 May 2026 and accepted at FAccT 2026. The paper develops a 27-mechanism taxonomy of corporate capture of AI regulation, identifies discourse influence and law evasion as the dominant mechanisms, and argues that the scale of capture by major AI companies and complicit governments constitutes a governance emergency.
  • arXiv hosts 'Governing What the EU AI Act Excludes: Accountability for Autonomous AI Agents in Smart City Critical Infrastructure' by Talal Ashraf Butt, Muhammad Iqbal and Razi Iqbal, submitted 1 May 2026 and submitted to Computer Law & Security Review. The paper maps the accountability deficit for multi-agent urban AI systems excluded from key EU AI Act explanation and impact-assessment rights, and proposes a 25-measure governance architecture tracing obligations to the AI Act, ISO/IEC 42001 and the NIST AI Risk Management Framework.

Events

  • Singapore Management University's Yong Pung How School of Law will host the 21st International Conference on Artificial Intelligence and Law (ICAIL 2026) from 8 to 12 June 2026. The conference is the principal international academic forum at the intersection of AI and law, covering legal reasoning systems, AI in judicial and regulatory processes, and the governance frameworks applicable to AI deployment.
  • UNIDIR will convene the Global Conference on AI, Security and Ethics 2026 on 18 and 19 June 2026 at the Palais des Nations in Geneva and online. The two-day programme brings together diplomats, military experts, industry and civil society to examine AI governance in the security domain, grounded in international law and the recent UN General Assembly resolutions on responsible military AI.

Sources: AP, Reuters, Holy See, arXiv, IAAIL, UNIDIR

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