Center for Technology & Statecraft

CTS is a non-partisan policy research initiative solving unexplored AI policy challenges through technical, forward-looking research.

[Center for Technology & Statecraft @techstatecraft]

Announcing the Center for Technology and Statecraft:

[Saif M. Khan @KhanSaifM]

Today I’m launching the Center for Technology & Statecraft (CTS), an initiative inspired by the lessons I learned first as a policy researcher and later in the White House.

I'm an optimist about technology. Institutions adapt to disruptions — whether the industrial revolution, computing, the internet — through competition, self-correction, and iteration, and we mostly figure it out in the long run.

But we've never had to adapt to a technology that is both this transformative and developing this fast. AI capabilities continue to scale rapidly with no sign of slowing, and it's a full-time job just to keep up with model releases. I worry policy will stay reactive right up until we face immense disruptions — including basic challenges to human agency and relevance in a world of powerful AI.

Even still, I believe policy can steer this transition, but only with foresight and the right information.

CTS aims to provide just that. Our two initial policy focus areas:

1) How policy can shape virtual and physical automation over the next decade as we reimagine the social contract in light of advanced AI.

2) How to manage long-term strategic US-China AI competition while ensuring stability.

These focus areas will build on a deep model of the AI value chain, from chipmaking tools, to the compute, algorithms, and data that make AI, to the tokens, agents and robots that affect the world.

For more on our worldview and research philosophy, read https://t.co/yD25oZWBb4.

I’ve seen firsthand how technical, forward-looking research can inform policy if it’s ready for the policy window. After a decade as an IP and tech lawyer, I joined a think tank, CSET, in 2019 to study AI chips, their supply chains, and AI policy. This was three years before ChatGPT, so these weren't seen as urgent topics at the time.

Soon after, AI quickly became an increasingly salient policy issue. From 2021–2025 I served in the White House NSC and the Commerce Department and put new policy ideas into practice (alongside many brilliant colleagues).

One goal of CTS is to scale this kind of experience to a whole team: @KonstantinPilz @nchlsbrwn @amelia__michael @mary_clare_m already bring a wealth of technical and policy expertise and we’ll continue to grow to tackle an ambitious research agenda.

We're thrilled to be supported by and affiliated with @IFP, and grateful to the advisors and colleagues who helped get CTS off the ground, including @ohlennart, @fiiiiiist, @AlecStapp, and @calebwatney.

Our first major reports will launch soon. You can follow us at @techstatecraft.

[Konstantin F. Pilz @KonstantinPilz]

Today, I’m co-founding the Center for Technology & Statecraft; a response to a dawning technological revolution.

With the discovery of reasoning models two years ago, AI progress has accelerated beyond its already rapid pace. Within 1–2 years, many of our most important policy decisions will have a major AI component. ANd within this century, I think it’s more likely than not that AI’s impacts will rival the neolithic and industrial revolutions — the first of which was plausibly negative for the average person while the second greatly increased human welfare.

Although DC has attracted a wealth of talent over the last few years, AI policy still lags the pace of AI progress. In particular, we’re short on analysis that deeply understands the AI value chain, from semiconductor manufacturing equipment, to the global distribution of AI chips, from the economics of model deployment, to the effects of physical automation on the labor market.

To respond to this gap, CTS aims to ambitiously push the knowledge frontier of empirical AI policy. Saif M. Khan, our founding director, is among the most experienced AI policy makers I know. During his government tenure, he achieved outsized impact on early AI policy decisions thanks to the deep empirical understanding of semiconductors and AI he previously built.
Between him and the other founding members, we bring deep expertise in both policy and a technical understanding of AI. How are we hoping to make a difference? You can read more about our worldview and agenda in our launch essay at https://t.co/dixTp8MMDV

[Nicholas Brown @nchlsbrwn]

Today, I’m co-founding the Center for Technology and Statecraft (CTS), a new non-partisan policy research initiative in DC. 

AI’s capabilities and impacts continue to grow. Our mission is to produce research that helps policymakers navigate these impacts, with a focus on:

    1    How policy can shape virtual and physical automation over the next decade

    2    How the U.S. can manage national competition with China while ensuring stability

We aspire to produce research that is empirically grounded in the AI value chain, from chipmaking tools to tokens, while also presenting a high-level strategic worldview. For more on our research agenda, see https://t.co/iTLCynVXSb.

I’m excited to work with an exceptional team in this effort: @amelia__michael, @KonstantinPilz, @mary_clare_m, @KhanSaifM. Onwards!

[Mary Clare McMahon @mary_clare_m]

I recently joined the newly launched @techstatecraft as a Research Fellow. (And I joined Twitter to mark the occasion!)

CTS is a new AI policy research organization built around one question: what if AI policy is not just about governing a new technology, but is also about preparing for an economic and geopolitical transition – perhaps one akin to the agricultural revolution?

I’m excited to work with @KhanSaifM @nchlsbrwn @KonstantinPilz and @amelia__michael on some ambitious AI policy research.

Read more about our vision here: https://t.co/fmr8QC3s4Z

[Amelia Michael @amelia__michael]

I’m excited to be part of the newly launched Center for Technology & Statecraft, where I’ll be researching frontier robotics and its interactions with AI and compute.

AI’s integration into robotics could precipitate transformative changes to the economy, national security, and society at large, but there’s little analysis of what policymakers ought to do about it.

Because AI-integrated robotics is nascent and rapidly evolving, it’s inherently uncertain – we don’t really know what scaling laws for robotics will look like, how rapidly robotics capabilities will advance, or what robotics deployments will look like.

Developing good policy on frontier robotics will require foundational technical and strategic research to figure out what’s going on and what matters. I think CTS is one of the very best places to do this type of research.

[Saif M. Khan @KhanSaifM]

Today I’m launching the Center for Technology & Statecraft (CTS), an initiative inspired by the lessons I learned first as a policy researcher and later in the White House.

I'm an optimist about technology. Institutions adapt to disruptions — whether the industrial revolution, computing, the internet — through competition, self-correction, and iteration, and we mostly figure it out in the long run.

But we've never had to adapt to a technology that is both this transformative and developing this fast. AI capabilities continue to scale rapidly with no sign of slowing, and it's a full-time job just to keep up with model releases. I worry policy will stay reactive right up until we face immense disruptions — including basic challenges to human agency and relevance in a world of powerful AI.

Even still, I believe policy can steer this transition, but only with foresight and the right information.

CTS aims to provide just that. Our two initial policy focus areas:

1) How policy can shape virtual and physical automation over the next decade as we reimagine the social contract in light of advanced AI.

2) How to manage long-term strategic US-China AI competition while ensuring stability.

These focus areas will build on a deep model of the AI value chain, from chipmaking tools, to the compute, algorithms, and data that make AI, to the tokens, agents and robots that affect the world.

For more on our worldview and research philosophy, read https://t.co/yD25oZWBb4.

I’ve seen firsthand how technical, forward-looking research can inform policy if it’s ready for the policy window. After a decade as an IP and tech lawyer, I joined a think tank, CSET, in 2019 to study AI chips, their supply chains, and AI policy. This was three years before ChatGPT, so these weren't seen as urgent topics at the time.

Soon after, AI quickly became an increasingly salient policy issue. From 2021–2025 I served in the White House NSC and the Commerce Department and put new policy ideas into practice (alongside many brilliant colleagues).

One goal of CTS is to scale this kind of experience to a whole team: @KonstantinPilz @nchlsbrwn @amelia__michael @mary_clare_m already bring a wealth of technical and policy expertise and we’ll continue to grow to tackle an ambitious research agenda.

We're thrilled to be supported by and affiliated with @IFP, and grateful to the advisors and colleagues who helped get CTS off the ground, including @ohlennart, @fiiiiiist, @AlecStapp, and @calebwatney.

Our first major reports will launch soon. You can follow us at @techstatecraft.