By
Tuhu Nugraha
Africa-Press – Mozambique. AI Is Speaking. But Few Understand It.
Across the world, governments are racing to publish AI ethics guidelines, build regulatory sandboxes, and draft national AI strategies. These are necessary and well-intentioned efforts. But they often miss a crucial step—especially in the Global South.
Why? Because many policymakers, understandably under pressure to catch up with global standards, focus first on compliance and control. It’s easier to talk about frameworks than feelings, about models than meaning. But here’s the paradox: even as AI policies are rolled out, the very people these systems are meant to serve often don’t understand them—or worse, mistrust them.
This is not a failure of technology. It’s a failure of translation.
The irony is profound: AI adoption is actually growing fastest in the Global South. A 2024 BCG report found that countries like Indonesia, India, Nigeria, and Brazil are among the top adopters of generative AI tools in everyday life—surpassing many developed countries. But what happens when this rapid uptake is paired with shallow understanding?
A communication gap emerges. People use AI—but don’t always trust it. Governments deploy AI—but struggle to explain it. The result is confusion, resistance, or blind dependency. None of which builds the kind of informed public discourse we need.
This article argues that before we talk about AI alignment or safety, we need to talk about AI relevance. That means making AI:
Understandable by ordinary citizens
Contextualized in local values
Aligned with the emotional and political realities of each society
Because if AI can’t speak our language—not just grammatically, but culturally and emotionally—then all the regulation in the world won’t build trust.
Indonesia’s Lesson: Empathetic Framing for AI-assisted Messaging
Indonesia offers a revealing case. In our recent public communication training involving government PR officers, we tested a model called CLEAR:
Concise, Logical, Empathic, Active, Realistic.
Instead of using AI to replace human judgment, we used it to support clarity. Here’s how:
Drafting empathetic talking points for spokespeople during crises
Filtering misinformation during hoax surges (especially around subsidies or food price hikes)
Designing media briefings that maintained narrative discipline while adapting to shifting sentiment
Case in point (hypothetical for learning purposes): Imagine a misinformation crisis about fuel subsidy cuts under Indonesia’s five-year national development plan, known as RPJMN (Rencana Pembangunan Jangka Menengah Nasional). A surge of misleading WhatsApp forwards claims that fuel prices will skyrocket overnight. In response, a public communication task force uses AI-assisted tools to:
Monitor dominant narratives on social media
Simulate how different demographic groups (urban poor, farmers, students) might interpret the news
Generate tailored counter-messages using CLEAR principles
This simulated case illustrates how AI can help reduce panic and de-escalate conflict. Crucially, it highlights a function of AI that remains underutilized: its role as a simulation and risk mitigation tool. In a world where decision-making is increasingly complex and fast-paced, this is arguably AI’s most valuable contribution. AI wasn’t the hero—it was the co-pilot. The real impact came from how communicators used it to center empathy, anticipate misunderstanding, and proactively shape public perception before misinformation takes hold.
A Playbook Approach: Practical, Adaptive, Localized
We need more than universal ethics—we need usable playbooks.
When AI is reframed as a filter for understanding, not a mouthpiece of authority, we unlock new kinds of trust. Suddenly, the algorithm isn’t telling you what to think—it’s helping you feel seen.
Visual Metaphor: AI as a Radio, Not a Megaphone
Imagine AI not as a megaphone that amplifies what it’s told, but as a radio receiver that must first be tuned to the right frequency.
In the Global South, where context is everything, AI needs human hands to adjust the dials—toward clarity, emotional resonance, and relevance. And here’s the critical shift: rather than expecting citizens to “understand AI” through rigid literacy programs, we should be using AI to simulate how different groups might respond to specific issues, narratives, and emotions.
Public communication in the South isn’t built on structured systems—it’s built on storytelling, relational trust, and lived context. AI can help us map that terrain, if we ask the right questions. Too often, we forget that most AI models were trained with Northern assumptions: high literacy, formal logic, individualist values. When we export that model wholesale, we risk communication breakdowns.
The best communication strategy isn’t about louder messages. It’s about relevant responses. And just like a radio, the clearer the frequency, the less noise. The better the signal, the more trust you earn.
Why the Global South Should Lead This Shift
This isn’t just about Indonesia. Many Global South nations share a similar terrain:
Uneven access to education and digital tools
Highly emotional or politicized public discourse
A history of top-down communication that erodes trust
That’s why frameworks like CLEAR matter. They’re not just technical guidelines—they’re cultural scaffolds. They help local leaders speak clearly without condescension. And they give AI a role that is both strategic and humble.
Because sometimes, what matters most is not what AI says—but what it learns to hold back.
Conclusion: Let the Global South Teach AI Empathy
The Global South must not remain a passive consumer of AI narratives. We have something to offer—not in competing datasets, but in alternative values.
Let us teach AI how to speak not just with accuracy, but with dignity.
Let us shape tools that don’t just optimize for clicks, but for context.
And let’s begin where it matters most: by crafting messages that are clear, honest, and human—because trust is the bridge, and language is the path.
“We don’t need AI to sound smarter. We need it to sound more human—especially when trust is fragile, and meaning is the bridge.”
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