With developments including a doubling in internet usage in low- and middle-income countries and breakthroughs in artificial intelligence, the last decade of technological progress reinforces hope that technology can improve our world: new innovations are bringing life-changing health services, knowledge, and economic opportunity to even the most remote and marginalized communities. However, rapid change comes with new risks, and gaps are growing between the digital haves and digital have-nots. Around the world authoritarian governments are arming themselves with powerful tools to monitor, manipulate, and even attack populations around the world.

The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) are pleased to invite you to join us for Development Is Digital: Harnessing Technology’s Potential for a Better World, the launch event of USAID’s first-ever Digital Policy, which offers a ten-year road map to adopting digital technologies responsibly, embracing democratic values, bolstering information integrity, and accelerating digital development. USAID Administrator Samantha Power, the nineteenth administrator of USAID, will deliver a keynote address on why technology is perhaps the single most decisive force shaping global development today—and outline choices we can make now to minimize the risks and maximize technology’s potential to improve people’s lives. Following her speech, Administrator Power will join Carnegie’s President Mariano-Florentino (Tino) Cuéllar for a fireside chat.