Evaluating International AI Skills Policy: A Systematic Review of AI Skills Policy in Seven Countries
Open accessAbstract
Abstract As artificial intelligence (AI) is having an increasingly disruptive impact across industries, companies continue to report having difficulty when recruiting for AI roles, while new graduates find it difficult to find employment, indicating a skills gap or skills misalignment. International approaches to AI skills programmes can offer a guide to future policy development of a skilled workforce, best placed to harness the economic opportunities that AI may support. The authors performed a systematic literature review on AI skills in government policies and documents from seven countries: Australia, Canada, China, Singapore, Sweden, the United Kingom and the United States. We found a divide between countries which emphasised a broader, nationwide approach to upskill and educate all citizens at different levels, namely the United States and Singapore and those countries which emphasised a narrower focus on educating a smaller group of experts with advanced AI knowledge and skills, namely China, Sweden and Canada. We found that the former, broader approaches tended to correlate with higher AI readiness and index scores than the narrower, expert‐driven approach. Our findings indicate that, to match world‐leading AI readiness, future AI skills policy should follow these broad, nationwide approaches to upskill and educate all citizens at different levels of AI expertise.
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The geographic imbalance may stem from structural challenges, such as limited research funding, unequal access to AI tools, or publication barriers faced by scholars in the Global South.
“This imbalance may stem from structural challenges, such as limited research funding, unequal access to AI tools, or publication barriers faced by scholars in the Global South [45].”
From Systematic review of artificial intelligence in education: trends, benefits, and challenges (2025) · cites this paper as [45]
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Systematic review of artificial intelligence in education: trends, benefits, and challenges
Garzón, J., Patiño, E., & Marulanda, C. (2025) · Multimodal Technologies and Interaction · doi:10.3390/mti9080084 · Cited by 265 · see citing works
“This imbalance may stem from structural challenges, such as limited research funding, unequal access to AI tools, or publication barriers faced by scholars in the Global South [45].”
- Authors
- Rigley, E., Bentley, C., Krook, J., & Ramchurn, S. D.
- Affiliations
- University of Southampton (GB)
- King's College London (GB)
- Corresponding author
- Rigley, Eryn
- Venue
- Global Policy
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Published
- 2023-12-03
- Volume
- 15
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 204-217
- ISSN
- 1758-5880 (ISSN-L)
- 1758-5899
- OpenAlex
- W4389309465
- Cited by
- 31
- References
- 14
- Citations by year
- 2026: 14 · 2025: 13 · 2024: 4
- FWCI
- 1.87
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Global Policy (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- ePrints Soton (University of Southampton) (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Education › Education Systems and Policy
- Social Sciences › Safety Research › Ethics and Social Impacts of AI
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Information Systems › Information Systems Education and Curriculum Development
- Keywords
- AI workforce development, skills gap, AI readiness, upskilling, artificial intelligence in education, artificial intelligence in recruitment
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