Analysis of: Pope Leo denounces ‘culture of power’ driving rise of AI
The Guardian | May 25, 2026
TL;DR
Pope Leo XIV denounces tech oligarchs' AI power grab while sitting beside an AI executive, exposing the Church's inability to challenge capitalism's structures. The Vatican's 'dialogue' approach legitimizes the very concentration of power it claims to critique.
Analytical Focus:Class Analysis Contradictions Historical Context
Pope Leo XIV's encyclical *Magnifica Humanitas* represents a significant moment in institutional religion's engagement with technological capitalism, yet its critique remains fundamentally constrained by the Church's historical role as a legitimizing institution for ruling class interests. While the Pope correctly identifies that power over digital systems 'does not rest with states but with major economic and technological actors,' his response—dialogue and ethical guidelines—leaves the ownership structures that generate this concentration entirely intact. The spectacle of Anthropic co-founder Christopher Olah seated alongside the Pope perfectly encapsulates this contradiction. Olah's candid admission that AI companies operate 'inside a set of incentives and constraints' that conflict with 'doing the right thing' is remarkable precisely because it acknowledges capitalism's structural imperatives while simultaneously naturalizing them as mere 'pressures' requiring moral guidance rather than systemic transformation. The proposed solution—'oversight from religious leaders, governments and civil society'—positions these institutions as external moderators of capitalism rather than participants in class struggle. The encyclical's belated apology for the Church's role in slavery, while historically significant, illuminates the Vatican's pattern of moral reckoning arriving centuries after material conditions have shifted. The Church condemned slavery only after abolition movements had already transformed economic relations. Similarly, its AI critique emerges not as a challenge to technological capitalism but as an accommodation to it—an attempt to secure the Church's relevance in the superstructure of a new phase of accumulation while leaving the base relations of ownership and exploitation untouched.
Class Dynamics
Actors: Technology capitalist class (AI company executives, shareholders), Vatican institutional hierarchy, Global working class (those facing displacement), State actors (mentioned as lacking power over digital systems), Theologians and academics (legitimizing intellectuals)
Beneficiaries: AI capital owners who gain legitimacy through Vatican dialogue, Tech executives who can present themselves as ethically concerned, Church hierarchy maintaining institutional relevance, Professional-managerial class of ethicists and consultants
Harmed Parties: Workers facing AI displacement, Global South populations excluded from 'accessible to all' promises, Those subjected to autonomous weapons systems, Populations already experiencing 'new forms of slavery' in digital economy
The event itself demonstrates power relations: an AI executive sits beside the Pope as an equal dialogue partner, not as a subject of critique. The framing positions capital and Church as collaborative stewards of humanity's future, erasing the antagonistic relationship between technology owners and displaced workers. Olah's presence transforms what could be prophetic critique into legitimizing partnership. The 'regular dialogues with Microsoft, Google and other big technology firms' reveal whose voices shape Vatican AI policy.
Material Conditions
Economic Factors: Massive capital concentration in AI development, Impending large-scale labor displacement, Military applications expanding AI markets, Data extraction as new form of primitive accumulation, Digital platform monopolization
The encyclical identifies but does not challenge the fundamental production relation: private ownership of AI systems that will increasingly control the means of production across all sectors. Olah's admission that AI may displace labor 'at very large scale' acknowledges that the value produced by these systems will be privately appropriated while the social costs—unemployment, deskilling, surveillance—will be socialized. The call for supporting 'those displaced' as a 'moral imperative' substitutes charity for structural change.
Resources at Stake: Control over AI infrastructure and training data, Future labor markets across all sectors, Military technological advantage, Surveillance and social control capabilities, The ideological framing of AI's social role
Historical Context
Precedents: Church's belated condemnation of slavery (centuries after economic conditions changed), Papal social encyclicals (*Rerum Novarum* 1891) positioning Church as mediator between capital and labor, Vatican II's accommodation to liberal capitalism, Historical papal bulls authorizing colonial conquest and enslavement
The Vatican's engagement with AI follows its historical pattern of adapting to new phases of capitalist development while preserving its institutional position. Just as *Rerum Novarum* responded to industrial capitalism and socialist movements by offering a 'third way' that ultimately legitimized capitalist social relations with moral caveats, *Magnifica Humanitas* responds to platform capitalism and automation anxieties. The Church positions itself as ethical moderator precisely when systemic contradictions threaten social stability—not to challenge capital but to help manage its contradictions. This represents the superstructure adjusting to changes in the economic base while reinforcing rather than transforming underlying relations.
Contradictions
Primary: The encyclical denounces power concentration 'in the hands of the few' while the Vatican's chosen method—dialogue with tech executives—reinforces that concentration by treating capital owners as legitimate partners in determining AI's future rather than as a class whose interests fundamentally oppose workers.
Secondary: The Pope criticizes AI's role in 'normalising war' while the Church maintains relations with states actively using such weapons, Calling for AI to be 'accessible to all' while accepting private ownership structures that guarantee unequal access, Apologizing for historical slavery while ignoring how current Vatican investments participate in exploitative global supply chains, Olah admitting commercial pressures conflict with 'doing the right thing' while his presence legitimizes continued private AI development
These contradictions are likely to deepen as AI displacement accelerates. The Vatican's 'dialogue' approach will prove increasingly inadequate as material conditions deteriorate for workers. Two trajectories emerge: either the Church's critique will be absorbed into corporate 'AI ethics' frameworks that change nothing fundamental, or mass displacement will generate class struggles that force more radical positions. The encyclical's emphasis on 'human dignity' contains latent possibilities that could be mobilized by liberation theology currents, but the institutional Church's alignment with capital makes this unlikely without pressure from below.
Global Interconnections
The Vatican's AI intervention must be understood within global imperialist dynamics. AI development is concentrated in the imperial core—primarily the US and China—while the Global South faces the consequences: job displacement without the promised 'support,' resource extraction for hardware manufacturing, and subjection to algorithmic management without participation in governance. The Pope's call for AI to be 'accessible to all' ignores how intellectual property regimes, enforced through trade agreements, ensure technology transfer occurs on terms favorable to core capital. The encyclical's reference to 'new forms of slavery' in the digital economy gestures toward this reality without analyzing it. Platform capitalism extracts value from Global South workers through gig economy arrangements that evade labor protections, while AI development relies on low-wage data labeling performed largely in Africa and Southeast Asia. The Vatican's dialogue partners—Anthropic, Microsoft, Google—are the very firms profiting from these arrangements. The Church's 'humility' about policy solutions conveniently avoids challenging the international economic order that its dialogue partners depend upon.
Conclusion
Pope Leo XIV's encyclical reveals both the possibilities and limits of institutional critique under capitalism. Its accurate diagnosis—that unaccountable tech oligarchs are concentrating unprecedented power—demonstrates that capitalist contradictions have become undeniable even to institutions historically aligned with ruling classes. Yet the prescribed remedy—ethical dialogue, moral guidelines, appeals to human dignity—cannot address what the Pope himself identifies as a structural problem of ownership and power. For workers facing AI displacement, the path forward lies not in waiting for moral arbitration between capital and Church, but in organizing to assert collective power over technological development. The question is not whether AI will be 'human-friendly' according to corporate ethics boards, but who will own and control these productive forces. Until that question is posed, Vatican interventions will serve to legitimate what they claim to critique.
Suggested Reading
- The Age of Surveillance Capitalism by Shoshana Zuboff (2019) Zuboff's analysis of how tech companies extract behavioral surplus for profit directly illuminates the power concentration Pope Leo critiques, showing why 'dialogue' cannot address structural extraction.
- Prison Notebooks (Selections) by Antonio Gramsci (1935) Gramsci's concept of hegemony explains how institutions like the Church function to legitimate ruling class power while appearing to offer independent moral critique—essential for understanding the Vatican's role here.
- Capitalism and Slavery by Eric Williams (1944) Williams demonstrates how moral and religious critiques of slavery followed rather than preceded economic shifts—a pattern directly relevant to the Church's belated AI ethics intervention.