The rapid evolution of agentic artificial intelligence—AI systems that operate autonomously with minimal human oversight—demands urgent attention from policymakers, according to experts at the Special Competitive Studies Project (SCSP). Unlike current AI models that merely respond to prompts, agentic AI can independently set goals, create plans, and execute multi-step tasks. As SCSP president Ylli Bajraktari notes in a recent newsletter, "AI is beginning to help build better AI," potentially creating a self-accelerating loop that could outpace current capability projections.
The national security implications are stark. Bajraktari warns that "an agent that can navigate complex bureaucratic systems, identify exploitable vulnerabilities, and act without leaving a clear attribution trail represents a qualitative expansion of adversarial capability." The United States must anticipate that adversaries will deploy agentic AI systems in areas where governance is weakest, using them for coercion, espionage, and influence operations.
Effective governance, however, focuses not on the AI model itself but on what SCSP experts call the "scaffolding" built around it. This scaffolding includes connectors that bridge the model to real-world infrastructure like email and financial platforms, memory systems that allow the AI to learn across interactions, planning capabilities that break objectives into tasks, permission structures defining access, and guardrails that determine what the system will refuse to do—such as spending limits or human sign-offs.
Current governance frameworks fall short in three critical ways, SCSP asserts. First, responsibility becomes untraceable; there is no way to determine who authorized an action when an AI agent acts on behalf of a user. Second, existing frameworks only assess whether a task was completed, not whether it was performed safely or caused harm. Third, agentic AI builds personal profiles by accumulating sensitive data on behavior patterns, preferences, and inferences, potentially exceeding what individuals wish to share.
Despite these challenges, SCSP emphasizes that agentic AI is not a technology to be feared or deferred. Institutions that prioritize understanding, shaping, and governing this technology will determine their competitive position and influence the global environment in which agentic AI operates. For more insights on how the United States can pursue effective governance, visit scsp.ai.
