Who Governs Parliamentary AI? Accountability Gaps in the Institutional Use of AI

Abstract

The institutional use of artificial intelligence (AI) in parliamentary work is expanding from transcription, translation and document management to research assistance, amendment analysis and public input processing. Yet the accountability mechanisms governing such use remain underdeveloped. Existing responsible-AI frameworks emphasise transparency, human oversight and risk management, but they are largely designed for public administration, market actors or generic public-sector deployment and only partially address parliaments as autonomous legislative institutions. This article asks who governs AI use within parliaments and where democratic accountability gaps arise when algorithmic systems mediate legislative work. Using a conceptual-normative approach grounded in theories of democratic legitimacy, political accountability and algorithmic governance, the article argues that the central problem is not algorithmic autonomy but the displacement of politically relevant choices into infrastructural systems that shape information, options and procedural conditions before formal legislative decisions are made. The article develops a four-part typology: epistemic opacity, institutional attribution, procedural oversight and democratic-legal contestation gaps.