Society of Authors Withdraws From the Ethical AI Charter

What did the Society of Authors announce on Wednesday? That it is pulling out of the charter it helped launch a week earlier. In a short update dated October 21, 2026, the UK writers' union thanked members for their feedback and said: "To allow time to listen to members' views and concerns, the Society of Authors will withdraw from the Charter." It said next steps will be discussed at its AGM on November 19, and it asked members to keep sending views on the charter through its survey.

The update does not say whether the charter itself will change, whether the Society might rejoin, or what the partner organizations will do. It names no other group leaving.

What the charter was

The Society announced the Charter of Ethical AI Use in the Creative Industries on October 14. It said it had written the document with the Creators' Rights Alliance in the UK, the Authors Guild in the United States, the Australian Society of Authors, the Writers' Union of Canada and the New Zealand Society of Authors. PT covered the launch in Authors' Groups Launch Global Ethical AI Charter.

The launch post said the charter "aims to define how generative AI services should be deployed to help protect and support human creators." Organizations such as agents, publishers and prize bodies could sign up and "pledge to only use generative AI in a transparent, responsible and ethical way, balancing the technological benefits with the potentially devastating impact on people and planet." The post said it builds on UNESCO's 10 core principles of responsible AI and includes a commitment to respect the CLEAR framework to protect creators' livelihoods.

Kazuo Ishiguro, Tracy Chevalier and Kester Brewin were quoted backing it. Chevalier said: "From authors using AI to write their books for them to publishers publishing AI generated works with no author involved, the book world has a big problem with our relationship to AI." Anna Ganley, the Society's chief executive and chair of the Creators' Rights Alliance, called it "a small step towards defining what ethical and responsible AI might look like in the creative industries."

Vanessa Fox O'Loughlin, who chairs the Society's board and writes as Sam Blake, said she would encourage all of her publishers to sign.

The objection, and the first response

The launch drew pushback from members. The Society's own posts show it, and show what the Society thought the problem was. On October 15, Ganley published a CEO blog that opened: "Yesterday, we shared our Charter of Ethical AI Use in the Creative Industries on social media, and I am sorry that we clearly failed to communicate its purpose."

She wrote that the Society's position "remains unchanged." "We understand generative AI to be harmful to the creative industries, to individual writers' livelihoods, and to the shared environment. We are not rolling back on our position, and we do not encourage generative AI use."

She went further: "We are clear that there can never be any truly ethical use of generative AI because of the way LLMs have been trained on copyright works without permission or payment; the detrimental environmental impacts; and the harmful effect it has on disempowered communities."

The blog explained the charter as a transparency tool. "An increasing number of organisations within the publishing industry are now using generative AI," Ganley wrote. "We are deeply concerned that people within the industry are using generative AI in the shadows, where it cannot be monitored or its use and impacts fully understood." The charter, she said, was meant to get "public, transparent commitments from all publishers about whether, how and where generative AI is being used," and, where organizations see a case for uses such as data analysis and summarization, to make sure that use is responsible.

That blog already promised a discussion of the charter at the November 19 AGM. Six days later, the Society withdrew before that meeting took place.

What is still open

Several questions are not answered by the Society's posts:

• Whether the Society wants the charter rewritten, or a different approach to publisher transparency.
• Whether the other founding groups, including the Authors Guild and the Australian Society of Authors, stay in. The Society's update speaks only for itself.
• What happens to any agents, publishers or prize bodies that had already signed.

The November 19 AGM is the next fixed date. Members who want a say can use the survey linked from the update.

Why it matters for authors

The fight was not over whether AI training without permission is acceptable. The Society says it is not, and that has not changed. The argument is over tactics: whether a writers' union should set public standards for how publishers use AI tools, or whether doing so looks like approval.

For authors, the practical question stays the same. Publishers and agents are using AI in some form, and the Society's own CEO says much of that is happening "in the shadows." Without a charter, the tools an author has are their contract and direct questions. Ask a publisher or agent in writing whether AI is used on your book, for what tasks (editing, translation, audio, cover art, marketing copy), and whether your text is shared with any AI vendor. Get the answer in writing, and check the AI clauses in any new contract before you sign.