Verity Harding

Verity Harding is a globally recognized British technology policy expert, author, and academic director whose seminal work at the intersection of geopolitics and machine learning advocates for democratic control and public sovereignty over emerging artificial intelligence landscapes. Graduating with a degree in Modern History from the University of Oxford, she forged a distinguished career spanning the highest echelons of government, industry, and academia. She spent her early career in public service as a senior political special adviser to the former Deputy Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Nick Clegg, before executing a foundational ten-year tenure at Alphabet. There, she served as Head of Security Policy for Google in Europe and subsequently became Google DeepMind’s very first Global Head of Public Policy, a pioneering role in which she co-founded the company's research, ethics, and socio-technical teams while co-establishing the international multi-stakeholder non-profit, the Partnership on AI. Leveraging her historical training to dismantle catastrophic narratives, Harding achieved widespread literary acclaim with her debut book, AI Needs You: How We Can Change AI’s Future and Save Our Own. Published by Princeton University Press and named one of McKinsey's Best Books of 2024, the humanist manifesto draws structural lessons from previous tech revolutions—such as the space race, IVF, and the internet—to demonstrate how civil participation can steer machine learning toward public good rather than unchecked profit. Honored by TIME magazine as one of the 100 Most Influential People in AI, Harding directs the AI & Geopolitics Project at the University of Cambridge’s Bennett Institute for Public Policy while advising senior global executives as the founder of the boutique consultancy Formation Advisory Ltd. Moving through 2025 and into 2026, Harding has aggressively driven international governance framework transformations. Throughout 2026, she has dominated global policy summits following the blockbuster release of her curated essay collection and policy manifesto, Reframing the AI Arms Race, a high-stakes collaborative volume featuring international statespeople and historians that actively counsels global powers against nationalistic tech rivalries to preserve peaceful democratic sovereignty.