Collaborative Problem-solving

Civic Technology Community Group,

New guidelines issued by a recent U.S. Senate memo says that aides can now use AI systems (ChatGPT, Copilot, Gemini) for official work including research, drafting and editing documents, and preparing briefings and talking points for lawmakers ( https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/10/us/politics/us-senate-chatgpt-ai-chatbots.html ).

Tasks that AI systems can perform, today, include: question-answering, fact-checking, automated research, and multimedia content generation (charts, figures, graphs, infographics, tables) and, imaginably, over the course of time, AI systems' capabilities will increase in complexity, intricacy, and sophistication.

When most people have thought about AI and the public sector, they have thought about equipping personnel in the Executive Branch. AI technologies can also benefit staffers, personnel, and officials in the Legislative Branch (at the city, county, state, and federal levels of government).

The Legislative Branch does more than deliberate and codify our laws and budgets. It serves the public as a collaborative problem-solving venue. The Legislative Branch has the political power to realize and implement the best solutions to society's most pressing challenges and problems.

Therefore, (man-machine) collaborative problem-solving technologies should be made available not only to our businesspeople, scholars, and scientists, but to our policy thinktanks, elected officials, legislative committees, and their staffs.


Best regards,
Adam Sobieski

[1] Adler, E. Scott, and John D. Wilkerson. Congress and the politics of problem solving. Cambridge University Press, 2013.

[2] Brandl, Laura, Constanze Richters, Nicola Kolb, and Matthias Stadler. "Can generative artificial intelligence ever be a true collaborator? Rethinking the nature of collaborative problem-solving." In 2nd Workshop on Generative AI for Learning Analytics (GenAI-LA), pp. 80-87. 2025.

[3] Cheruiyot, Langat Gilbert, and Gyöngyvér Molnár. "Technology-based assessment of collaborative problem-solving skills: A bibliometric analysis and review." Journal of Computers in Education (2025): 1-22.

[4] Graesser, Arthur C., Stephen M. Fiore, Samuel Greiff, Jessica Andrews-Todd, Peter W. Foltz, and Friedrich W. Hesse. "Advancing the science of collaborative problem solving." Psychological science in the public interest 19, no. 2 (2018): 59-92.

[5] Mayhew, David R. "Congress as problem solver." Promoting the general welfare: New perspectives on government performance (2006): 219-36.