AI WITHOUT BOSSES

This online course is distinct from other offerings in four ways.

First, it is a course on AI for the co-op movement.

Second, it is a course on co-ops and AI for anyone curious about how solidarity enterprises are building alternatives in this sector.

Third, it departs from many AI conversations by moving beyond the usual American and European frame. It brings in leaders from the Majority World to guide the discussion, leading up to the PCC conference in Bangkok this November.

Lastly, the course is unusual by design. Past participants have included students from across The New School, cooperative entrepreneurs from across Africa, engineers in Bangalore and Trivandrum, robotics professors in Slovenia, co-op members curious about AI, and researchers studying its social effects.

The course moves beyond familiar AI debates to examine the technology’s supply chains and consider how extractive systems might be replaced with solidarity-based alternatives such as cooperatives.

Global Online Course Dates:

8/26/2026 – 12/14/2026

Pre-register for the community section of this class will open on June 23rd at which point we’ll email you asking you to register.

https://forms.gle/zXadtikEM6atbhAp6

Course Description:

As AI reshapes economies and reorders public life, the dominant paradigm barrels ahead, pursuing scale and control above all else. More energy, more proprietary data centers—no brakes. As infrastructure consolidates, tech oligarchs drift rightward, shaping data monopolies, state power, and labor conditions. Growth erodes worker rights, algorithmic accountability, and ecological care, deepening AI’s harm to marginalized communities.

Rather than accepting this trajectory as inevitable, this course explores alternative ownership models for AI. We examine how cooperative principles and solidarity economy values can disrupt AI’s extractive model, envisioning alternatives like shared data, public digital infrastructure—including cooperative data centers—and democratic oversight.

This course runs alongside the Solidarity AI Conference in Bangkok November 12-15, 2026, co-convened by the instructor, with cooperative leaders, AI scholars, and technologists from the event appearing as guest speakers. Participants will carry forward these ideas—sparking conversations and envisioning bold, cooperative futures.