1 Nine Action Areas in Which Technology Can Build and Protect

Data from the human, physical, biological, and cyber spheres and their integration with these technologies are central to the converging technology revolution. High-speed computing power and connectivity are the other two factors powering this revolution. The development of artificial intelligence (AI) is further enabling and driving the converging technology revolution. AI is itself a combination of information technology and cognitive science, and it is now increasingly viable through the availability of vast amounts of data, cheap high-speed computing power, and ubiquitous connectivity.

The converging technology revolution has the potential to restructure the delivery of publicly and privately provided services for human development through personalization, precision targeting, cost reductions, and new organizational and accountability arrangements. Improvements in other economic sectors, such as agriculture, energy, water, and transportation, can have an indirect impact on improvements in human capital formation.

However, the risks are high. Converging technologies, because of their digital nature, operate in cyberspace, and thus cybersecurity is essential to protect populations and their personal data. Furthermore, although they are designed for beneficial purposes, converging technologies exhibit functions that can be easily misused and so could have a dual-use potential. Examples of dual-use applications include predictive behavioral surveillance, data manipulation, and targeted misinformation by the state and other actors using data collected in the context of otherwise beneficial uses, such as personalized learning or medical diagnosis.

The most significant aspect of this revolution for human capital is its ability to affect the essence of human identity through human-machine augmentation and enhanced cognitive capacity and thus to reduce or widen inequality in human capital outcomes and power relationships. Earlier technological revolutions also required an adjustment of political and economic structures, laws and regulations, public policy, and societal norms and cultures. With the accelerating speed of the converging technology revolution, there is strong evidence that these superstructures are unable to adapt quickly enough, with negative implications for the region’s socioeconomic trajectories. In South Asia, where levels of human capital are already low, where public policy capacity is lagging, and where inequalities of gender, religion, caste, and community are deeply entrenched, the converging technology revolution could add to an already combustible social mix and lead to unpredictable consequences.

The converging technology revolution is transformational. Advances in science and better knowledge of the building blocks of matter and life are now permitting the creation of new materials with nanotechnology and altered or entirely new life forms with gene editing and gene drives. Data, an intangible, have become a critical new factor of production and value addition, while knowledge can be produced without direct human involvement and agency. In addition, the reach and dual-use characteristics of many of these technologies raise ethical, moral, social, and governance considerations that society has yet to address: