The Lavin Agency Speakers Bureau

A speakers bureau that represents the best original thinkers,
writers, and doers for speaking engagements.

Kate Crawford

We’re at a critical crossroads in the spread of AI. We can use it to oppress and exploit, or we can chart a course towards a more just and sustainable future.

Professor | Author of Atlas of AI | Leading scholar of AI and society

Now Playing

The Real AI Crisis Is Not What You Think (3:11)

Now Playing

We Can Build a More Equitable AI Landscape (3:27)

Now Playing

AI Is a Democracy Problem. What Can We Do About It? (4:21)

Now Playing

Mapping Empires (1:18:03)

Now Playing

AI and the Human Spirit (57:03)

Lavin Exclusive Speaker

Artificial intelligence may seem abstract, but it’s urgent that we understand how it’s working—and failing—in everyday life. Kate Crawford, a world-leading scholar in the field, says that although AI can be used to exploit people and resources, we can still regain control and lay the foundation for a better, more equitable world. Kate has advised policymakers from the White House to the United Nations and was named one of the inaugural TIME100 AI: the 100 most influential people in the field. Drawing on her award-winning book Atlas of AI, she maps out the landscape and future of AI to help us see the full impacts of this fast-developing field. In her new talks, she breaks down the AI tools we use every day, and what they mean for our future.

“One of the world’s most thoughtful researchers on the impact of AI delivers a sobering, but essential, read.”

— Financial Times

Kate Crawford is one of the world’s most influential scholars of the impacts of artificial intelligence. Her work brings together computer science, social sciences, and cultural studies. In her research, she examines how digital technologies transform power relations, social inequalities, and the material environment. Her work expands the perspective beyond technology itself to explore the far-reaching political, economic, and societal consequences of AI systems.

She has appointments at top research institutions around the world, has spoken at the TIME100 Summit, and is a Professor at the University of Southern California in LA, a Senior Principal Researcher at Microsoft Research in New York, and the inaugural Visiting Chair for AI and Justice at the École Normale Supérieure in Paris. Kate has seen firsthand how technology can be used to exploit people and resources, but her work shows that we are at a crucial turning point for rethinking how these technologies are used for a more just and democratic society. If we understand what’s at stake, we can lay the foundation today for a better tomorrow.

Kate is the author of the award-winning book, Atlas of AI, a unique and grounded behind-the-scenes look at the complex topic of artificial intelligence. It has won three international prizes and has been translated into fourteen languages. It was also named a best book of the year by Financial Times. She takes us into locations like lithium mines to Amazon warehouses to Jeff Bezos’ rocket base. Like a physical atlas, the book helps us understand the landscape of AI, the pathways that connect it, and where we fit into this vast technological world. Kate shows us a new way to understand and relate to AI, one that centers the stories and people behind the technology, and shows that these systems are neither artificial nor intelligent.

Beyond her scholarly work, she is an award-winning artist whose work explores the themes of technology, history, and power. Her artworks have been shown in over 100 museums worldwide, including MoMA, KW Institute, Je de Paume, Fondazione Prada, and Mori Museum, and are in the permanent collections of MoMA, the V&A, and Rijksmuseum Twenthe, among others. Her Anatomy of an AI System (2018) with Vladan Joler depicted everything that goes into making a single Amazon Echo, and it won the Beazley Design of the Year Award. Her latest work with Vladan Joler, Calculating Empires, won the Silver Lion at the Venice Architecture Biennale 2025, the Grand Prize of the European Commission for art and technology, and the Boghossian Art Prize.

Kate has co-founded multiple research centers around the world, including the interdisciplinary lab Knowing Machines. She has advised policymakers in the White House, the European Parliament, and the United Nations, and is currently on the AI Council of President Sanchez of Spain. Over her twenty-year research career, she has produced widely-cited research in publications such as Nature, Science, Technology & Human Values, and AI and Society. TIME named Kate to their inaugural TIME100 AI: one of the world’s most influential people in AI.

Testimonials

Your talk was a fantastic success! I am still receiving raving comments that you are one of our audience's favorite presenters ever at this five-year-old event (and we have had some amazing speakers over the years). You have lit a fire in all of us.

ADP

Lavin Exclusive Speakers

Angela Duckworth

#1 New York Times Bestselling Author of Grit and Situated | Pioneering Researcher on Grit, Perseverance, and the Power of Situation

Daron Acemoglu

Nobel Prize Winner | 3rd Most Cited Economist in the World | Author, What Happened to Liberal Democracy? | Bestselling Co-Author, Why Nations Fail

Clint Smith

#1 New York Times Bestselling Author of How the Word Is Passed and Above Ground | The Atlantic Staff Writer

Chrystia Freeland

Former Deputy Prime Minister of Canada | Bestselling Author, Unreliable Boyfriend and Plutocrats | CEO of the Rhodes Trust

Derek Thompson

#1 New York Times Bestselling Co-Author of Abundance | Host of thePlain English Podcast | CBS News Contributor

Speech Topics

Artificial Intelligence

Demystifying AIHow It Works and What’s at Stake

Artificial intelligence systems are already playing a powerful role in our everyday lives—whether that’s the devices we use every day or facial-recognition software trained on Internet databases—but they can often seem abstract and opaque. In this talk, AI expert and award-winning author Kate Crawford demystifies AI to show us how it’s “made” in the fullest sense: from data, human labor, and environmental resources. She draws from her 20 years of AI research around the world, as well as her journeys to field sites—from lithium mines to Amazon warehouses to Jeff Bezos’ rocket base.

Kate maps the costs of AI that are usually hidden from public view. She reveals how AI is amplifying discrimination and inequality, and offers paths forward for research and policy that address the political, social, and economic effects of AI. As one of the foremost researchers on the impact of artificial intelligence, Kate helps us understand how AI works, what’s at stake for us and our democracy, and how we can carve a fairer way forward.

Creativity

The Art of AIUnderstanding Complex Technology Through Creativity

How do we begin to understand complex AI systems and their impacts, and how can art help? Leading researcher and author Kate Crawford has been at the forefront of revealing how AI and large-scale data systems work. In addition to her books and talks, she has created award-winning collaborative projects with major artists around the world. She will share insights from her project Anatomy of an AI System with Vladan Joler, which visualized everything that goes into making a single Amazon Echo. This project won the Beazley Design of the Year Award and is in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the V&A in London.

She also discusses how to “excavate AI”—to dig into how these systems work, a technique she developed in her collaboration with MacArthur Fellow and artist Trevor Paglen, Excavating AI. Their app ImageNet Roulette became a viral sensation when it showed people how AI classifies them, and the project won the Ayrton Prize from the British Society for the History of Science. This inspiring talk reveals what can happen when scientists and artists work together, and how they can help us see our world differently.