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Podcast Episode

Artificial Intelligence as an Organizing Capability

Cognitive Moats··5 August 2026·24 min

About this episode

This academic article proposes a significant ontological shift in how we understand artificial intelligence, moving away from viewing it as a standalone entity or autonomous agent. The authors argue that AI is more accurately defined as an organizing capability that is fundamentally connective, codependent, and emergent. Rather than residing solely within software, this capability arises through the complex system of relations between human participants and learning algorithms. By focusing on these human-algorithm relations, the research highlights how organizational tasks like analysing, learning, and acting are collectively produced rather than pre-programmed. Ultimately, this perspective suggests that AI is a doing and becoming process that reconfigures organizational structures, power dynamics, and intelligence.