G7 Summit Set to Kick Off Amidst Allies' Widening Rift Over AI Sovereignty

Mark Scott is a contributing editor at Tech Policy Press.

When politicians from the G7 countries of leading industrial nations gather in the French Alps next week, they have a lot to talk about.

The ongoing wars in Iran and Ukraine. The global cost-of-living crisis. A generational shift in the once-stable Western alliance.

But simmering just under the surface during the upcoming G7 Summit, which will be hosted by French president Emmanuel Macron in the city of Évian between June 15-17, are growing tensions about artificial intelligence — the emerging technology expected to reshape daily life over the next decade.

Ahead of the G7 gathering, the European Union, United States and Canada all outlined competing visions in early June for how these countries can harness AI and the digital infrastructure that powers it for domestic economic gain and geopolitical position.

In a sign of how AI will dominate the June 15-17 summit, Macron also personally invited OpenAI’s chief executive Sam Altman to the global gathering as France attempts to present itself as first among European countries when it comes to the emerging technology.

The White House’s executive order, published on June 2, laid out a series of national security efforts to ward off harm from the most advanced large language models without passing mandatory rules for the likes of Google, OpenAI and Anthropic. The goal: maintaining American dominance over the emerging technology.

The European Commission published its long-awaited European Tech Sovereignty package a day later on June 3. That included proposals aimed at boosting EU-owned chip manufacturing and cloud computing infrastructure, as well as a commitment to open-source technologies to reduce dependencies on mostly US tech giants.

Canada, whose prime minister Mark Carney has become the poster child for the so-called “Middle Powers” movement, unveiled a national AI strategy on June 4 whose focus included public investment in nationwide AI infrastructure and a doubling-down on international alliances to gain a greater say over the upcoming AI revolution.

“AI is here,” said Carney. “AI that builds Canada strong for all: that is our mission.”

These competing AI announcements — which blended industrial policy with national security concerns and governance initiatives — come as countries worldwide want to stamp their claim over a technology currently concentrated within the US and China, according to Stanford University’s AI Index report.

At a time of growing geopolitical wariness between long-time Western allies, countries from France to Canada to South Korea are trying to reduce their dependencies on just a few Silicon Valley heavy-hitters, while ensuring that their use of Chinese technologies does not create similar reliances on the world’s second largest economy.

That shift is now epitomized by so-called digital sovereignty initiatives that have popped up globally. The likes of the EU and Canada are willing to invest billions of dollars in public money to support domestic data centers, semiconductor manufacturing and local alternatives to Anthropic’s Claude or Google’s Gemini services.

Political leaders in these countries are wary of relying on such American companies. They are fearful their countries or regions will become increasingly dependent on already-dominant US tech giants that have shown a willingness to bend to the White House’s political objectives over those of long-time allies.

“We can not afford to depend on others for the technologies that keep our hospitals running, our energy grids stable and our services secure,” said European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen when announcing the bloc’s recent European Tech Sovereignty proposals. “This is about protecting our citizens, defending our interests and making our own choices.”

French officials are expected to paper over such growing differences around AI during the upcoming G7 summit.

Where two years ago these annual gatherings of many of the world’s largest economies led to relatively hard commitments around the potential harms of generative AI, the 2026 edition is likely to focus on the economic benefits of the emerging technology. Any references to AI governance are expected to be watered down, and the US has made clear its opposition to multilateral agreements that could potentially undermine the country’s ongoing industrial advantage.

Washington also has its own AI agenda associated with the so-called “American AI technology stack.” That refers to the exporting of US hardware and software — often with the support of public financing via the US Commerce Department — so that other countries, most notably those from the Global Majority, use American AI infrastructure compared to rival products provided by Chinese firms.

At the G7 summit, that strategy will stand in stark contrast with other industrialized nations that are looking to reduce, not strengthen, their ties to US tech companies. Many are teaming up to create a potential counter-weight to both the US and China.

Earlier this year, Canada created a so-called “Sovereign Tech Alliance” with Germany to boost ties between the countries. That led to Canada’s AI company Cohere announcing its acquisition of Germany’s Aleph Alpha in April. On June 10, the EU similarly announced greater collaboration on AI with South Korea, while the European Commission’s digital czar, Henna Virkkunen, traveled to Brazil on June 11 to sign a digital partnership with Latin America’s most populous country.

“Brazil is a country which shares very much the same values as the European Union,” the Finnish politician told reporters in Rio de Janeiro, according to Reuters. “Brazil is committed to open markets, to secure technologies, also to a rules-based order.”