OECD AI Principles

What it is

The OECD AI Principles are the first intergovernmental standard on artificial intelligence. They were adopted in 2019 and updated in May 2024 to reflect developments such as generative AI. Dozens of countries and the European Union have signed up to them, including some outside the OECD.

The five principles

1. Inclusive growth, sustainable development and well-being.
2. Human rights and democratic values, including fairness and privacy.
3. Transparency and explainability.
4. Robustness, security and safety.
5. Accountability.

The five recommendations for governments

1. Invest in AI research and development.
2. Foster an inclusive AI-enabling ecosystem.
3. Shape an enabling, interoperable governance and policy environment.
4. Build human capacity and prepare for labour market transition.
5. Co-operate internationally for trustworthy AI.

Why it matters

The principles are not a law and do not contain checklists. Their value is vocabulary. The OECD's definition of an AI system was used as the basis for the definition in the EU AI Act, and the same themes (fairness, transparency, robustness, accountability) appear in the NIST AI Risk Management Framework, ISO/IEC 42001, India's AI Governance Guidelines, Saudi Arabia's AI Ethics Principles and the UAE's AI charter. If you learn these five ideas well, you can read any national AI policy and see what it borrowed and what it added.

How to use it

Read the principles once and write one sentence each on how you would show evidence for them in a real product. For example, accountability might mean a named owner for every AI system in an inventory. The OECD.AI site also has a policy observatory that tracks national AI policies, which is useful when you compare countries.

Is it worth your time?

Yes, as a first read for anyone new to AI governance, especially from a policy, law or business background. It is short, and it makes every other framework easier to follow.

Free or paid?

Free.