People

The people behind the Institute.

Roles are separated by responsibility. The Board governs; Executive Leadership runs the Institute; the Strategic Council advises without fiduciary authority; research staff and contributors produce credited work.

People index

Board of Directors

Governance and fiduciary responsibility for the Institute. The Founding Executive Director also serves on the Board.

Aurora Martinez Ramos

Founding Director

Served as Chief AI Officer at Keralty, where she built and led K-AI, the company’s enterprise AI governance platform deployed across ten countries, and as Board Director of Wiley Iberia. Her more than 20 years of leadership across AI, healthcare, and education include Pearson and McGraw-Hill. Holds an Executive MBA from ESADE, is DCRO-certified in Risk Governance and Cyber Risk Governance, and completed Women on Boards at Harvard Business School and AI in Healthcare at Harvard Medical School.

Jeff Sugar, MD

Founding Director

Distinguished Life Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association, board-certified in child and general psychiatry, and former faculty at USC’s Keck School of Medicine and UCLA. Former Chief of Psychiatry and Director of Research at Hathaway Children and Family Services and past president of the Southern California Society of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.

Executive Leadership

Responsible for the Institute’s research agenda, operations, and public work.

David Lovejoy

Founding Executive Director

Leads the Institute’s research agenda, publications, and international convenings across Responsible AI, Human Performance, Planetary Futures, and Governance & Diplomacy. His background spans entrepreneurship, advisory work, and operating leadership across North America and Asia. He brings that cross-border perspective to HSI’s work on how institutions adapt to technological, geopolitical, and social change.

Strategic Council

Senior experts providing advice, perspective, and institutional connections. The Council is non-fiduciary and has no governance, voting, or supervisory authority.

Isaac Dakota Casados

Sovereign Infrastructure & Resilience

Sovereign infrastructure and energy adviser with engagements across more than 100 Native Nations on self-determination, economic development, and resilience.

Ramu Damodaran

Multilateral Governance & Diplomacy

Architect of the United Nations Academic Impact initiative under Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. Advises on institutional design, multilateral governance, and Track II diplomacy.

Christopher A. Ford

Diplomacy & Security

Former U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for International Security and Nonproliferation, and founding Director of MITRE’s Center for Strategic Competition. Now a nonresident senior associate at CSIS and Director of Missouri State University’s School of Defense and Strategic Studies near Washington, D.C.

Susan Holliday

Governance & Institutional Risk

Financial-services leader and public and private company board director. Advises on governance, board readiness, and institutional risk.

Vivek Rao

Global Finance & Investment

Chief Investment Officer of Tempest Peak Management and Deputy Chairman of the New Silk Road Forum. Advises on capital markets, technology investment, and global finance.

Ratan P. Watal

Economic Policy & Digital Infrastructure

Former Finance Secretary of India and Member Secretary of the Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister; chaired the Government of India’s committee on digital payments. Advises on economic policy, digital public infrastructure, and state capacity.

Research staff and associates

Support research, editorial production, partnerships, and the Institute’s public work.

Gloria Chen

Associate

New York University, International Relations. Research and editorial at HSI, focused on AI governance, policy frameworks, and the gap between participation and decision-making authority. Leads HSI’s analytical contribution to its NYU PREP research collaboration on institutional governance.

Selected HSI work: Searchlight 028; Horizon Scan 001; Searchlight 017; Searchlight 013.

Ashwin Telang

Associate

Northwestern University, Journalism and Economics. Co-led HSI’s inaugural Governance Horizon Scan and authors research on AI governance and accountability in financial services. As Managing Editor of HSI Searchlight, he helps coordinate research and editorial production across the publication program. He will join McKinsey & Company in summer 2027.

Selected HSI work: Searchlight 027; Horizon Scan 001; Research Brief 002; Research Brief 001.

Research Contributors

Byline credit recognizes substantive research contributions.

Inaaya Firoz

Research Contributor

Northwestern University, Journalism and Data Science. Contributes reporting and analysis to HSI’s Responsible AI and policy research, with published work on the relationship between generative search and the news ecosystem.

Selected HSI work: Searchlight 021.

Gugulethu Khumalo

Research Contributor

Boston University Metropolitan College, MS Health Communication; NUST, BSc (Hons) Journalism and Media Studies. Contributes journalism, media analysis, editing, and multilingual research to HSI’s work on participatory AI governance, with particular attention to Southern African contexts.

Hernando Liu

Research Contributor

Northwestern University, Journalism. Research and communications at HSI, with a background in legislative and legal policy research and product operations at TikTok.

Selected HSI work: Horizon Scan 001; Searchlight 011.

Vivianne Manlai

Research Contributor

London School of Economics and Political Science, MSc Philosophy and Public Policy; Stockholm University, BA Philosophy, Politics and Economics. Contributes to HSI’s research on AI governance, strategic stability, and emerging-technology risk.

Selected HSI work: Searchlight 023.

Samuel Marson

Research Contributor

London School of Economics and Political Science, MSc Finance; University of Oxford, BA Philosophy, Politics and Economics. Contributes research and analysis to HSI at the intersection of artificial intelligence, geopolitics, and finance, with particular emphasis on economic and market implications through policy evidence and financial indicators.

Selected HSI work: Searchlight 022.

Avisikta Sinha

Research Contributor

Ashoka University, political science and international relations, magna cum laude. Researches AI governance and digital public infrastructure. Her thesis examined Aadhaar authentication failures among Scheduled Tribe communities using data from approximately 19,000 villages in Odisha. Research experience includes the Centre for Policy Research and PwC, where she compared AI governance frameworks across India, the European Union and the United States.

Selected HSI work: Research Brief 003; Searchlight 024.

Oscar Tirabassi

Research Contributor

London School of Economics and Political Science, MSc Philosophy and Public Policy; Wesleyan University, BA English. Contributes to HSI’s Human Performance research on authorship and accountability.

Selected HSI work: Searchlight 025.

Alumni

Former team members whose credited work remains part of HSI’s published record.

Ronan Amir

Alumnus

George Washington University, International Affairs and Mathematics. Editorial research at HSI focused on geopolitics and artificial intelligence, including data collection and visualization for comparative governance work. Author of HSI Searchlight analyses on emerging technology and institutional response.

Selected HSI work: Searchlight 019; Searchlight 016.

Cynthia Chen

Alumna

Georgetown University, Economics. Co-led HSI’s inaugural Governance Horizon Scan before joining Bain & Company.

Selected HSI work: Horizon Scan 001.

Mia McCauley

Alumna

University of Wisconsin–Madison, Journalism. Contributed to communications and editorial production.

Samantha Orradre

Alumna

California Polytechnic State University, Economics. Contributed to communications and editorial production.