Assessing AI Sovereignty, Agency & Dependence
8 July 2026 · 1:30 pm–2:25 pm · Sutherland
This workshop will present the AI Agency Assessment Tool - a world-first methodology to assess national AI capability. AI Sovereignty is often framed as binary. A country either has it or not. But for complex global AI supply chains this binary breaks down. AI Agency asks, "Can we influence outcomes and protect Australia's interests?". The tool expands sovereignty from a binary to a spectrum, asking “does Australia have access to a capability, do we control it, do we have resilient choice, and do we have export leverage?” This workshop will present the finding of Australia's AI Agency Assessment, and then invite the participants to join us for a deep dive on two particular questions. 1. In your sector, does AI adoption create dependence (for example, reliance on access to a single overseas provider) — and what would it look like to derisk that dependency (for example with sovereign control, resilient choice, or export leverage)? 2. Where in your organisation would clearer governance let you move faster, not slower — and where is uncertainty about accountability actually the thing holding AI adoption back? Outcomes of this workshop will help inform a proportionate, use-based approach to governance — one that focuses on accelerating safe AI adoption rather than restraining it.
Speakers
Johanna Weaver
Executive Director and Co-Founder, Tech Policy Design Institute
Johanna Weaver is Co-Founder and Executive Director of TPDi. She is a reformed commercial litigator, a recovering diplomat, and an escaped professor. Johanna concluded her term as Australia’s independent expert and chief cyber negotiator at the United Nations in 2021. In 2022, she was appointed Professor in the Practice of Cyber and Tech Policy at ANU. She has served to numerous boards, including the ICRC Global Advisory Board on Protecting Civilians from Digital Threats, the Minister for Government Services’ Independent Advisory Board, and the Data Standards Advisory Committee.
Zoe Jay Hawkins
Co-Founder & Deputy Executive Director, Tech Policy Design Institute
Zoe is Co-Founder and Deputy Executive Director of the Tech Policy Design Institute. Zoe brings extensive experience designing tech policy from government, big tech, academic and think tank perspectives. Zoe worked for the Australian government across communications, innovation, and foreign policy portfolios, as a ministerial adviser and in the public service. She is a Research Associate at the University of Oxford and an expert researcher for the OECD. Zoe’s work has been featured by The New York Times, TIME Magazine, BBC, The Economist, The Financial Times, Forbes, POLITICO, and Vogue.
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