Sovereign AI and Epistemic Justice: Reclaiming Sustainable Computation

Following the foundational NetIAS debate in Hamburg on Computational Practices for Pluriversal AI, which challenged the universalist and extractive paradigms of dominant artificial intelligence, the dialogue now moves to the Global South. In Stellenbosch, we confront the next urgent frontier: the intersection of AI sovereignty, epistemic justice, and planetary survival. The current trajectory of AI is characterised by massive, energy-intensive models, data colonialism, and a logic of infinite scaling. But this trajectory is fundamentally at odds with the principles of sustainable and equitable development. This debate asks: What would it mean to reclaim computation as a sustainable, just, and sovereign practice? How do we move beyond AI that merely optimises within a broken system, towards computational paradigms that empower communities, honour diverse knowledge systems, and operate within ecological limits? "Sovereign AI" is not about nationalistic competition, but about self-determination in the digital age. It demands infrastructures, models, and practices that are locally governable, ecologically accountable, and epistemically just. "Epistemic Justice" compels us to ask whose knowledge counts in the design of these systems, confronting the active marginalisation of Indigenous, Southern, and situated ways of knowing. "Sustainable Computation" requires a radical re-imagining of our hardware, software, and priorities, away from extraction and towards regeneration. We invite scholars, practitioners, and students to join a critical conversation that connects the technical to the political, the ecological to the philosophical. We seek position papers that bridge theory and praxis, offering bold critiques and tangible pathways forward.