AI责任缺失是系统性困境,非靠改进就能解决。
No One to Blame: A Framework of Constitutive AI Unaccountability
- 提出'构成性责任缺失'概念,揭示某些系统配置下责任根本无法实现。
- 通过27位专家访谈与开源系统案例分析,识别出20个责任缺失主题。
- 提供20问诊断工具,可定位具体AI部署中的责任空白。
自主、代理型AI系统的广泛应用挑战了传统问责机制。现有研究多将问责缺口视为可通过更好标准、透明度和制度改革克服的障碍。本文认为此框架不足:某些行动者、系统与制度的组合配置,使AI问责在概念上不可实现,无论投入多少努力。为此引入“构成性AI责任缺失”概念。通过三阶段定性研究——文献中心分析、27位技术、法律与社会技术背景专家的二次访谈,以及对开源代理系统OpenClaw的框架应用——识别出9类20个构成性责任缺失主题。这些主题分布在结构、技术和规范集群中,并通过8种定向互依关系相互强化。框架被操作化为一套20个问题的诊断工具,应用于OpenClaw时检测出17个条件,包括一种倒置拟人化配置,其中AI代理是唯一可识别的行动者。本文贡献在于重新定义AI责任缺失为社会技术系统的构成属性,拓展了问责四重障碍理论,并提供识别特定AI部署责任真空的实际工具。
原文摘要 · Abstract (English)
The increasing deployment of autonomous, agentic AI systems challenges traditional accountability mechanisms. Existing research predominantly frames AI accountability gaps as barriers that can be overcome through better standards, transparency, and institutional reform. We argue that this framing is insufficient: certain configurations of actors, systems, and institutions render AI accountability conceptually unachievable regardless of effort. We introduce the concept of constitutive AI unaccountability to capture these configurations. Through a three-stage qualitative study comprising a concept-centric literature analysis, a secondary analysis of 27 expert interviews with AI professionals from technical, legal, and sociotechnical backgrounds, and an illustrative framework application to the open-source agentic AI system OpenClaw, we identify nine categories and 20 themes of constitutive AI unaccountability. These are organized across structural, technological, and normative clusters and reinforce one another through eight directed interdependencies. Our framework is operationalized as a diagnostic instrument of 20 questions, which detected 17 of 20 conditions when applied to OpenClaw, including an inverted anthropomorphism configuration in which the AI agent was the only identifiable actor. We contribute a reframing of AI unaccountability as a constitutive property of sociotechnical systems, an extension of the four barriers to accountability, and a practical instrument for identifying accountability voids in specific AI deployments.
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