Hilton Simmet is a Ph.D. candidate in Public Policy and Research Associate in the Program on Science, Technology and Society (STS) at Harvard Kennedy School. His dissertation work compares efforts to study global inequality in three national contexts: the U.S., France and India. By looking at research adopting, respectively, medicalized, data-driven and politically-participatory approaches to solving inequality, Hilton hopes to understand how the tacit social compact—unquestioned assumptions about political order—gets made in each of these countries. In examining these assumptions, he asks how inequality research can develop a more robust, and ethical, understanding of the public good. Prior to his dissertation work Hilton examined “Silicon Valley”-style development projects in global cities including Dakar (Senegal), Berlin (Germany) and Bangalore (India). He has also studied ideas of global energy transition through rural electrification projects in Senegal and India. 

Hilton holds an A.B. from Harvard College with Highest Honors in Social Studies, an M.A. in Political Science from Yale University, and was a Fulbright student fellow in Senegal.