How do the AI regulatory models of the EU, China, and the United States differ in terms of values and governance?

The EU model is risk-based and compliance-oriented, prioritizing transparency, human rights, and trustworthiness while using legislation to export its standards. China's model is state-centric and top-down, channeling AI toward national security, collective priorities, and industrial strategy. The US model is decentralized, emphasizing market freedom and private-sector leadership, with targeted rather than comprehensive regulation, making its norms less uniform and less easily exportable as a coherent standard.

According to the source, the EU's regulatory approach proposes extensive AI legislation that categorizes systems by risk level and imposes clear compliance requirements. Its values are ethical principles such as transparency, human rights protection, and trustworthiness, and it aims to set a global reference point through the 'Brussels effect,' potentially universalizing European norms across markets. China's regulatory strategy combines technological ambition with state-centric governance: rules are streamlined to direct innovation toward collective priorities, national security objectives, and long-term industrial strategies, reflecting a top-down model where the state orchestrates development. The United States, by contrast, follows a decentralized model grounded in market freedom, private-sector leadership, and targeted rather than comprehensive regulation; this encourages rapid commercialization but leaves ethical and safety matters to industry consortia, civil society, or state-level initiatives, yielding less uniformity and predictability in its norms, even though the dominance of US tech firms spreads many practices globally.