Governing the automated welfare state: Translations between AI ethics and anti-discrimination regulation

There is an increased demand for utilizing technological possibilities in the Nordic public sector. Automated decision-making (ADM) has been deployed in some areas towards that end. While it is linked to several benefits, research shows that the use of ADM, with elements of AI, also implicates risks of discrimination and unfair treatment, which has stimulated a flurry of normative guidelines. This article seeks to explore how a sample of these international high-level principled ideas on fairness translate into the specific governance of ADM in national public sector authorities in Sweden. It does so by answering the question of how ideas on AI ethics and fairness are considered in relation to regulation on anti-discrimination in Swedish public sector governance. By using a Scandinavian institutionalist approach to translation theory, we trace how ideas of AI governance and public sector governance translate into state authority practice. Specifically, regarding the definition of ADM, how AI has impacted it as both discourse and technology, and the ideas of “ethics” and “discrimination”. The results indicate that there is a variance in how different organizations understand and translate ideas on AI ethics and discrimination. These tensions need to be addressed in order to develop AI governance practices.