Council

The Council of advisors is responsible for setting the strategic direction of the Progressive International.

Read more about the members of the Council below.

Current

Julian Aguon

Micronesia

Julian Aguon is a human rights lawyer and founder of Blue Ocean Law, a progressive firm working across Oceania at the intersection of indigenous rights and environmental justice.

@julian_aguon

Nazma Akter

Bangladesh

Nazma Akter is President of the Sommilito Garments Sramik Federation, one of the largest union federations in Bangladesh. She is the founder and Executive Director of the Awaj Foundation and co-chair of Asia Pacific Women’s Committee of IndustriALL Global Union. A former child-garment worker herself, Nazma has been fighting to improve the rights of workers, especially female workers, in the garment sector in Bangladesh.

Andrés Arauz

Ecuador

Andres Arauz is a former Minister of Knowledge of Ecuador and a former Central Bank General Director. He is a founding member of the Dollarization Observatory and a former board member of the nascent Bank of the South. He is currently based in Mexico City as a Doctoral Fellow at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, UNAM.

Renata Ávila

Guatemala

Renata Ávila is an international human rights lawyer. She is a 2020 Stanford Race and Technology Fellow at the Center for Comparative Studies in Race and Ethnicity. She is a Board member for Creative Commons, the Common Action Forum, Cities for Digital Rights, and a Global Trustee of Digital Future Society. She also serves as a member of the Coordinating Collective of DiEM25.

Baba Aye

Nigeria

Baba Aye is Co-Convener of the Coalition for Revolution (CORE), Nigeria. He is a trade unionist and socialist with a rich history in radical social movements.

Deyvid Bacelar

Brazil

Deyvid Bacelar is General Coordinator of FUP - Unified Federation of Oil Workers, Member of the Conselhão - Council for Social and Sustainable Economic Development (CDESS) and of the Council for Social Participation (CPS) of the Lula Government.

He is an oil worker, with a degree in Administration from UEFS, specializations in Personnel Management from UFBA and HSE from IFBA, a former coordinator of Sindipetro-BA, a human rights activist and was also the workers' representative on the Petrobrás Board of Directors (2015-2016).

Walden Bello

Philippines

Walden Bello is a scholar, dissident, and internationalist. He is also the founder and chairperson of the left-wing alliance Laban ng Masa and served as a member of the House of Representatives of the Philippines. He co-founded Focus on the Global South, and led critical mobilizations against the WTO and G8 in the 1990s.

Rita Berlofa

Brazil

Rita Berlofa is the International Relations Secretary of Contraf-CUT, which represents over 450,000 bank workers in Brazil. She is also the first non-European woman to hold the presidency of UNI Financas Global, the global union representing around three million workers.

Guilherme Boulos

Brazil

Guilherme Castro Boulos is a Brazilian politician, activist and writer. He coordinates the Homeless Workers' Movement (MTST), leading land occupations, resisting evictions, and organizing solidarity kitchens across the country. Boulos joined the Socialism and Liberty Party in 2018, and is PSOL's candidate for the presidency of Brazil in the 2022 elections.

Karol Cariola

Chile

Karol Cariola is a member of Chile’s Chamber of Deputies. She was General Secretary of the Communist Youth and President of the Student Federation of the University of Concepción (2009-2010). She is a founding member of the Puebla Group, a political and academic forum made up of representatives of the Ibero-American political left.

Mariela Castro Espín

Cuba

Mariela Castro Espín is a Deputy of the National Assembly of People's Power and Director of CENESEX. She is a full member of the Cuban Academy of Sciences. She is committed to the development of policies, sexuality education, health and sexual rights, with a gender and human rights approach from emancipatory paradigms.

Aya Chebbi

Tunisia

Aya Chebbi is a Pan-African feminist and diplomat. She rose to prominence as a voice for democracy during 2010/2011 Tunisia’s Revolution. She served as the first ever African Union Special Envoy on Youth and the youngest diplomat at the African Union Commission Chairperson’s Cabinet (2018 – 2021). She is currently Executive Director of Afresist and founding chair of Nala Feminist Collective.

Jeremy Corbyn

United Kingdom (UK)

Jeremy Corbyn is a member of Parliament in the UK and a former leader of the Labour Party. He is also founder of the Peace and Justice Project.

Jodi Dean

United States of America (USA)

Jodi Dean teaches, writes, and organizes in Geneva, NY. Her books include "The Communist Horizon," "Crowds and Party," and "Comrade: An Essay on Political Belonging." She's involved in anti-capitalist grassroots and international struggles around climate, gender, and racial justice.

Nikhil Dey

India

Nikhil Dey is one of the founding members of the Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan (MKSS). He has helped to lead campaigns for the people’s Right to Information (RTI) and the Right to Work (MGNREGA), served as a member of the Open Government Partnership (OGP), and organized for the Jan Sarokar, a network of Indian social movements.

Nick Estes

Lower Brule Sioux Tribe

Nick Estes is a citizen of the Lower Brule Sioux Tribe. He is an Assistant Professor in the American Studies Department at the University of New Mexico. In 2014, he co- founded The Red Nation, an Indigenous resistance organization. For 2017-2018, Estes was the American Democracy Fellow at the Charles Warren Center for Studies in American History at Harvard University. Estes is a member of the Oak Lake Writers Society, a network of Indigenous writers committed to defend and advance Oceti Sakowin (Dakota, Nakota, and Lakota) sovereignty, cultures, and histories.

Silvia Federici

Italy

Silvia Federici is a feminist activist, writer, and teacher. She is a cofounder of the International Feminist Collective, the organization that launched the Wages For Housework campaign internationally. In the 1990s, she was active in the anti-globalization movement and the U.S. anti–death penalty movement. She is a professor emerita and teaching fellow at Hofstra University in New York.

Gacheke Gachihi

Kenya

Gacheke Gachihi is the coordinator of Mathare Social Justice Centre and a member of the Social Justice Centres Working Group Steering Committee in Nairobi, Kenya.

Alberto Garzón

Spain

Alberto Garzón is an ecosocialist economist. Since 2020, he has been serving as coordinator of Izquierda Unida and Minister of the Government of Spain. Committed to ecological transition from a class perspective, he has written several books and regularly participates in ecosocialist debates.

Selay Ghaffar

Afghanistan

Selay Ghaffar is a prominent activist for political and women’s rights in Afghanistan. She is also spokesperson for the Solidarity Party of Afghanistan. Selay was the Director of Humanitarian Assistance for the Women and Children of Afghanistan (HAWCA).

Jayati Ghosh

India

Jayati Ghosh taught economics for more than three decades at Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India, and is currently Professor at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, USA. She is involved in efforts to reform the international economic architecture, and works closely with trade unions and social movements in India and elsewhere.

Yara Hawari

Palestine

Yara Hawari is a Palestinian activist, academic and political analyst. She received her PhD in Middle East Politics from the University of Exeter in 2018. She currently works as the Senior Analyst for Al Shabaka, a Palestinian transnational think tank and is a frequent political commentator for many mainstream outlets. Yara is also an activist and has been and continues to be involved in various movements in Palestine.

Srećko Horvat

Croatia

Srećko Horvat is a philosopher. He has been active in various movements for the past two decades. He co-founded the Subversive Festival in Zagreb and, together with Yanis Varoufakis, founded DiEM25. He published more than a dozen books translated into 15 languages, most recently Poetry from the Future, Subversion!, The Radicality of Love and What Does Europe Want?.

Wang Hui

China

Wang Hui, the founding Director of the Tsinghua Institute for Advanced Study in Humanities and Social Sciences, Beijing. He teaches at Tsinghua University, Beijing as Distinguished Professor of Literature and History. One of the esteemed scholars in fields of intellectual history, social theory and modern literature, and a leading figure of the “Chinese New Left”, Wang Hui’s work has attempted to chart the intellectual and political conditions of contemporary China and has remained committed to the project of deep engagement with both the history and the consequences of Chinese modernity.

Vashna Jagarnath

South Africa

Dr Vashna Jagarnath is a historian and labour activist and director of Friends of the Workers, a non-profit that supports the work of trade unions and social movements across South Africa. As well as her role as deputy general secretary of the Socialist Revolutionary Workers's Party she also works in the office of the the General Secretary of the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (Numsa).

Ammar Ali Jan

Pakistan

Ammar Ali Jan is a historian who works on Communist thought in the non-European world. He is a member of Haqooq-e-khalq Movement, an anti-capitalist organization that is working among workers, farmers, students and women to build an alternative political project. He is also a regular contributor to a number of publications, including The News International, Al Jazeera and Jacobin.

Abirami Jotheeswaran

India

Abirami Jotheeswaran is the General Secretary of the All India Dalit Women's Rights Forum-NCDHR (AIDMAM-NCDHR), a prominent platform amplifying the voices of Dalit women in India. As a passionate Dalit Women Activist, Abirami is dedicated to empowering young Dalit women, enabling them to assume leadership roles in combating caste and gender-based violence against Dalit women and girls across India.

Zitto Kabwe

Tanzania

Zitto Zuberi Ruyagwa Kabwe is a Tanzanian politician who served as a two term Member of Parliament for the Kigoma North constituency from 2005 to 2015. As the Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee, Kabwe campaigned for a strong conflict of interest code as a measure to fight corruption by public officeholders. He currently serves as the leader of the Alliance for Change and Transparency, the third largest political party in Tanzania.

Hasina Khan

India

Hasina Khan is recognized as one of India's most visible, courageous and effective activists raising issues and questions of women's rights in general and Muslim women’s rights in particular. Hasina Khan is now the founding member of Bebaak Collective (Voice of Fearless). Bebaak Collective (Voices of the Fearless) is a campaign group primarily functioning from Mumbai and fighting against fundamentalism and repressive forces from an intersectional feminist perspective.

Łukasz Kozak

Poland

Łukasz Kozak is a member of the board of Akcja Socjalistyczna, a political organization in Poland.

Nilüfer Koç

Kurdistan

Nilüfer Koç is a member of the Executive Council and spokesperson for the Commission on Foreign Relations of the Kurdistan National Congress (KNK), the largest umbrella organization of political parties and civil society organisations in Kurdistan. She is also active in the Kurdish Women's Movement, engaged in the active and autonomous participation of women in all fields of society and politics.

Milena Ochoa Larrotta

Colombia

Milena Ochoa Larrotta is the director of the National Trade Union Institute's Center for Popular Education and Research (Instituto Nacional Sindical CED - INS). Educator and researcher of the National Agrarian Coordinator, the peasant movement of the Congress of the Peoples, on issues related to political training within social movements, rural education and struggles for land and territory in Colombia — especially in the regions of Catatumbo and Sur de Bolivar. She is a community educator with emphasis on human rights, member of the research group Polyphonies of Community and Popular Education of the Universidad Pedagógica Nacional.

Antonio de Lisboa

Brazil

Antonio Lisboa is CUT's Secretary of International Relations. A professor of geography and history, he participated in the reorganization of the student movement in the final years of the Brazilian dictatorship. He was a member of the Federal District Teachers Union board between 1989 and 1995, returning to the command of the entity from 2001 to 2009, when he directed the most significant strikes in the history of the category. He was Finance Secretary of the National Confederation of Workers in Education (CNTE) between 2011 and 2017. In 2014, he was elected representative member of Workers on the Board of Directors of the International Labor Organization (ILO), being re-elected in 2018.

Scott Ludlam

Australia

Scott Ludlam is a writer, activist and former Australian Greens Senator. He served in Parliament from 2008 - 2017, and as Co-Deputy Leader of his party from 2015 - 2017. Currently working as a freelance researcher and troublemaker, while writing occasional pieces for Meanjin, the Monthly, Junkee and the Guardian.

Clara López Obregón

Colombia

Clara López Obregón is a Colombian Senator, representing the Historic Pact. She has served as Comptroller of Bogotá, Auditor General of the Republic, Mayor of Bogotá, Minister of Labor and been a candidate for President.

Esperanza Martínez

Paraguay

Esperanza Martínez is a Paraguayan physician and politician. She was Minister of Public Health from 2008 to 2012. She is currently Senator for the Partido de la Participación Ciudadana, a member of the Frente Guasú - Ñemongeta coalition.

Clarissa Mendoza

Philippines

Clarissa Mendoza served as a legislative researcher in the House of Representatives of the Philippines and is currently the Head of the Secretariat of the Movement for Agrarian Reform and Social Justice, a mass movement of agrarian reform beneficiaries, landless farmers, indigenous peoples, and other people working in rural areas. Coming from a family of coconut farmers herself, Mendoza is a youth activist and socialist, focusing her work on farmers' rights and welfare, social justice, food sovereignty, and greater youth engagement in agriculture.

Luka Mesec

Slovenia

Luka Mesec is a MP, a founding member and coordinator of Slovenian parliamentary party Levica (The Left), an eco-socialist party that was the first in post-socialist Europe to enter the national parliament. He devoted most of his adult life to left-wing activism, before entering professional politics in 2014, he was a coordinator of Workers and Punks' University and director of Institute for Labour Studies.

Tom Morello

United States of America (USA)

Tom Morello is a musician, actor and political activist. He has been part of a number of era-defining rock bands, including Rage Against the Machine, Audioslave and the supergroup Prophets of Rage. Morello co-founded Axis of Justice, to bring together musicians, fans of music, and grassroots political organizations to fight for social justice.

Demba Moussa Dembele

Senegal

Demba Moussa Dembele is an economist and researcher from Senegal. A member of the Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA), Dembele is engaged in research against neoliberal policies and to promote alternative development policies in Africa. He is a founding-member of the African Social Forum and a former member of the World Social Forum Council.

Lidy Nacpil

Philippines

Lidy Nacpil is a Filipino and national and international campaigning for economic, gender and climate justice. She is the Coordinator of the Asian Peoples’ Movement on Debt and Development, co-Coordinator of the Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice, and member of the Coordinating Committee of the Global Alliance on Tax Justice. She is also on the Steering Committee of the Fight Inequality Alliance.

Anyang’ Nyong’o

Kenya

Anyang’ Nyong’o is Governor of Kisumu County, Kenya. He was member of Kenyan Parliament, Minister for Planning and National Development (2003-2005) and the Minister for Medical Services (2008-2013).

Lyn Ossome

South Africa

Lyn Ossome is Senior Research Fellow at the Makerere Institute of Social Research, where she teaches politics and political economy. She is the author most recently of Gender, Ethnicity and Violence in Kenya’s Transitions to Democracy: States of Violence and co-editor of the forthcoming volume Labour Questions in the Global South. She serves on several boards, including the International Association for Feminist Economics (IAFFE) and the Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA), and organizes on several fronts with feminist and agrarian movements.

Romenio Pereira

Brazil

Romenio Pereira is a political activist and trade unionist. He is the Secretary of International Relations of the Worker's Party of Brazil (PT).

Gustavo Petro

Colombia

Gustavo Petro is the President of the Republic of Colombia. As leader of the Pacto Histórico (Historic Pact) coalition, President Petro led his coalition to historic congressional gains and the first popular, progressive government the modern history of Colombia. He is an economist, former Senator of the Republic, and the former mayor of Colombia’s capital city of Bogotá.

Gerardo Pisarello

Spain

Gerardo Pisarello is a member of the Spanish Congress of Deputies for Barcelona en Comú. He was previously Professor of constitutional law at the University of Barcelona, and was elected to the Barcelona City Hall as part of the Barcelona en Comú municipal platform. He is the author of numerous books on constitutionalism, human rights and the right to the city. Gerardo was Vice President of the DESC Observatory for over ten years and was one of the founding members of Procés Constituent.

Tara Raghuveer

United States of America (USA)

Tara Raghuveer is the director of KC Tenants. She is also the director of the campaign for a national Homes Guarantee, based at People’s Action, a national network of grassroots organizations committed to economic and racial justice.

Annie Raja

India

Annie Raja is an Indian politician and leader of Communist Party of India. She is the General Secretary of National Federation of Indian Women (NFIW).

Ismat Raza Shahjahan

Pakistan

Ismat Raza Shahjahan is the founding President of the Pakistan-based Women Democratic Front (WDF) - an autonomous socialist-feminist political collective of women and khwaja siras. WDF stands against capitalism, all forms of imperialism, patriarchy, national oppression, war, and religious fundamentalism.

Juan Nicolás Agustín Richards

Argentina

Juan Nicolás Richards is a lifelong trade unionist active in teaching unions. Richards was an active member and part of the electoral committee of Confederation of Education Workers of the Argentine Republic (CTERA). Richards also served as Coordinator of International Cooperation of Education International, the global union federation for educators. He is currently part of the CTA-T International Relations team.

Stephen Ruvuga

Tanzania

Stephen Ruvuga is executive director of The Network of Farmers Groups in Tanzania (MVIWATA).

Kohei Saito

Japan

Kohei Saito is Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of Tokyo. He works on Ecology and Political Economy from a Marxist perspective. His latest book is 'Capital in the Anthropocene'.

Alexey Sakhnin

Russia

Alexey Sakhnin is a Russian activist and a member of the Left Front. He was one of the leaders of the anti-Putin protest movement from 2011 to 2013, and was later exiled to Sweden.

Pierre Sané

Senegal

Pierre Sané is the Founder & President of Imagine Africa Institute was UNESCO’s Assistant Director-General for Social and Human Sciences from May 2001 - June 2010. He was Secretary General of Amnesty International from October 1992 to April 2001.

Henry Saragih

Indonesia

Henry Saragih is the General Chair of the SPI Central Management Board (DPP) of the Indonesian Farmers Union. He served as General Coordinator of La Via Campesina, an international movement of small farmers and farm workers for two periods (2004-2008 and 2008-2013).

Nardi Suxo

Bolivia

Nardi Suxo is a Bolivian lawyer, sociologist and diplomat. She served as Bolivia's Minister of Institutional Transparency and Fight Against Corruption, during the first and second governments of Evo Morales. She served as the country's ambassador to Austria, Croatia, Hungary and Slovakia.

Astra Taylor

Canada

Astra Taylor is a political organizer, writer and documentary filmmaker. She is co-founder of the Debt Collective. Her latest book is The Age of Insecurity: Coming Together as Things Fall Apart

Monica Valente

Brazil

Monica Valente is a Brazilian psychologist and former Vice President of CUT Brazil. She is on the National Executive Board of PT Brazil and is Executive Secretary of the São Paulo Forum, a Latin American and Caribbean body of left-wing and progressive political parties.

Carina Vance Mafla

Ecuador

Carina Vance Mafla is the Secretary of Territorial Coordination and Social Participation in the Metropolitan District of Quito. She is a founding member of the National Front for Health and Social Protection of Ecuador, a former Executive Director of the South American Institute of Government in Health of UNASUR (ISAGS) and a former Minister of Public Health of Ecuador.

Yanis Varoufakis

Greece

Yanis Varoufakis is a member of the Hellenic Parliament and the Secretary-General of MeRA25. He is the co-founder of DiEM25, and the former finance minister of Greece. He is the author of several books, including Adults in the Room and And The Weak Suffer What They Must?.

Eyal Weizman

Israel

Eyal Weizman is the founding director of Forensic Architecture and Professor of Spatial and Visual Cultures at Goldsmiths, University of London. The author of over 15 books, he has held positions in many universities worldwide including Princeton, ETH Zurich and the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna. He is a member of the Technology Advisory Board of the International Criminal Court and the Centre for Investigative Journalism. In 2019 he was elected life fellow of the British Academy and appointed Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in the 2020 New Year Honours for services to architecture. In 2020 he was elected the Richard von Weizsäcker fellow at the Bosch Academy.

Célia Xakriabá

Brazil

Célia Xakriabá is a member of Brazil’s Chamber of Deputies. She is an indigenous educator and activist of the Xakriabá people and is the first indigenous woman from Minas Gerais to be elected to Congress.

Hilary Zhou

Zimbabwe

Hilary Zhou is the National Coordinator of the Zimbabwe People’s Land Rights Movement.

Emeritus

Kali Akuno

United States of America (USA)

Kali Akuno is a co-founder and co-director of Cooperation Jackson. He served as the Director of Special Projects and External Funding in the Mayoral Administration of the late Chokwe Lumumba of Jackson, MS.

Slim Amamou

Tunisia

Slim Amamou is a blogger, activist, and a former Secretary of State for Sport and Youth in the transitional Tunisian government. He resigned from the role in 2011 — protesting the transitional government’s censorship of a number of websites.

Celso Amorim

Brazil

Celso Amorim is the longest serving foreign minister of Brazil to date (1993-1994 and 2003-2010). He also served as Minister of Defense (2011-2014). Amorim remains active in academic life and as a public figure, having written a number of books and articles on matters ranging from foreign policy to culture.

Niki Ashton

Canada

Niki Ashton is a Member of Parliament for Churchill–Keewatinook Aski. She serves as the NDP’s Critic for Democratic Reform and Transport, and Deputy Critic for Women and Gender Equality.

Lina Attalah

Egypt

Lina Attalah is an award-winning journalist and campaigner for freedom of speech based in Egypt. She is co-founder and Chief Editor of Mada Masr, an independent online Egyptian newspaper. Previously she was the managing editor of the Egypt Independent. Time magazine recognized Lina as one of the “100 Most Influential People of 2020”. She is the recipient of the Knight International Journalism Award from the International Center for Journalists.

Edil Baisalov

Kyrgyzstan

Edil Baisalov is the current ambassador of Kyrgyzstan in London. A renowned human rights defender and civic activist, Edil played a key role in bringing down authoritarian and corrupt governments in 2005 and 2010. His voice was persistent in the fight against corruption and organised crime, often at great risk to his safety. In 2008-2010 he lived in Sweden as a UNHCR refugee after facing a jail term for his opposition work as executive secretary of the Social Democratic Party of Kyrgyzstan.

Nnimmo Bassey

Nigeria

Nnimmo Bassey is the director of the Health of Mother Earth Foundation (HOMEF). He is a member of the steering committee of Oilwatch International, and was the chair of Friends of the Earth International (2008-2012) and Executive Director of Nigeria’s Environmental Rights Action (1993-2013). He is also a Member of the Action Research Network for a Wellbeing Economy in Africa (WE-Africa).

Prashant Bhushan

India

Prashant Bhushan is a senior public interest lawyer and human rights activist. He has been a relentless crusader for the rights of the poor and the marginalised. He has been a fearless voice against injustice and is known for his use of public interest litigation to support a number of causes related to corruption in high places, environmental protection and human rights. He is also the convenor of the Campaign for Judicial Accountability and Reforms.

Natália Bonavides

Brazil

Natália Bonavides is a human rights lawyer and a congresswoman in the Worker’s Party of Brazil. As a lawyer, she has defended social movements for landless workers and popular homeless movements. She was elected to City Hall in the city of Natal in 2016, before winning a seat as Federal Deputy two years later, where she defends the rights of the working class.

Áurea Carolina

Brazil

Áurea Carolina is a federal deputy for Minas Gerais state (BR), affiliated with the Socialism and Liberty Party (PSOL). Áurea is part of the Muitas municipalist movement, of #partidA (an informal party composed dedicated to electing women into office), and of the Ocupa Política network (devoted to boosting the occupation of the institutional politics by progressive activists). Together with Andréia de Jesus, Bella Gonçalves, and Cida Falabella, she takes part in the “Gabinetona”, a forum where four parliamentary mandates work collectively.

Alicia Castro

Argentina

Alicia Castro is a political and union activist. She was the General Secretary of the Union of Aeronavegantes, the founder of the Argentine Workers Movement (MTA), and a member of the ITF Council. She served as the Argentine ambassador to the United Kingdom from 2012 to 2016. Before that, she served in ambassadorial posts in Venezuela and as the National Deputy for the Province of Buenos Aires.

Leïla Chaibi

France

Leïla Chaibi is a member of the European Parliament La France insoumise - The Left. She initiated several associations (Génération précaire and Jeudi noir) to fight against precariousness through offbeat and media actions. Today, she continues her engagement in the European Parliament by defending the rights of digital platform workers and fighting against the expansion and ravages of Amazon.

Walter Chambati

Zimbabwe

Walter Chambati (PhD) is Executive Director of The Sam Moyo African Institute for Agrarian Studies (SMAIAS), Harare, Zimbabwe and Associate Editor of the Agrarian South: Journal of Political Economy. He has written extensively on land, labour and agrarian relations in Zimbabwe and Southern Africa. Some of his recent published works include Labour Questions in the Global South (2021) (co-edited with Praveen Jha & Lyn Ossome) Land and Agrarian Reform in Zimbabwe: Beyond White Settler Capitalism (2013) (co-edited with Sam Moyo) and Rethinking Social Sciences with Sam Moyo (2020) (co-edited with Praveen Jha and Paris Yeros).

Noam Chomsky

United States of America (USA)

Noam Chomsky is considered the founder of modern linguistics. He has received numerous awards, including the Kyoto Prize in Basic Sciences, the Helmholtz Medal and the Ben Franklin Medal in Computer and Cognitive Science. Chomsky joined the UA in fall 2017, coming from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he worked since 1955 and was Institute Professor, later Institute Professor emeritus.

Suzanne Coleman-Haseldine

Sue Coleman-Haseldine is an activist and organizer from the Kokatha-Mula nation. Born on the Aboriginal mission of Koonibba, she is a survivor of British nuclear weapon testing, and the Australia ambassador of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), awarded the Peace Nobel Prize in 2017.

Rafael Correa

Ecuador

Rafael Correa is former Constitutional President of the Republic of Ecuador, 2007- 2017, and Chairman of the Eloy Alfaro Political and Economic Thought Institute (IPPE). Rafael holds a Ph.D. and MSc. in Economics from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a MA in Economics from the Catholic University of Louvain- la-Neuve, Belgium. He obtained his first economics degree from the Catholic University of Santiago de Guayaquil, Guayaquil, Ecuador.

John Cusack

United States of America (USA)

John Cusack is a director, producer, actor, and activist from the US. He is a founding board member of the Freedom of the Press Foundation. He was a vocal opponent of the Iraq war and the use of drone warfare by the administration of US President Barack Obama. He has also been an active supporter of the Palestinian struggle for liberation.

Fatima Diallo

Senegal

Fatima Diallo is a Senegalese constitutional lawyer with more than eight years of experience in the fields of justice, governance, human rights, transparency and accountability. She was the Deputy General Secretary of the African Network of Constitutional Lawyers.

Jean Drèze

India

Jean Drèze is a development economist and Visiting Professor at Ranchi University in India. His recent books include An Uncertain Glory: India and Its Contradictions (with Amartya Sen) and Sense and Solidarity: Jholawala Economics for Everyone. Jean is also active in various campaigns for social and economic rights as well as in the worldwide movement for peace and disarmament.

Gael García Bernal

Mexico

Gael García Bernal is an actor. He began performing in stage productions with his parents in Mexico, and later studied at the Central School for Speech and Drama in London. He is a founder and the president of Ambulante, an itinerant not-for-profit documentary film festival promoting documentaries within Mexico and abroad. He has recently opened his new production company, La Corriente del Golfo, together with Diego Luna.

Álvaro García-Linera

Bolivia

Alvaro Garcia-Linera is a Bolivian politician from Cochabamba. He led the indigenist Tupac Katari Guerrilla Army rebel group during the early 1990s, and he was imprisoned from 1992 to 1997. In 2005, he was elected Vice President of Bolivia, serving until his resignation in November 2019.

Baltasar Garzón Real

Spain

Baltasar Garzón is an international lawyer and former judge. He served on the Audiencia Nacional, Spain’s main criminal court and has been active in seeking to bring legal cases against war criminals, including Augusto Pinochet, Henry Kissinger, senior officials in the George W. Bush administration, as well as Argentinian military officers operating during the country’s dictatorship. He also headed the legal team of Australian activist Julian Assange.

Elizabeth Gómez Alcorta

Argentina

Elizabeth Gómez Alcorta is the Minister of Women, Genders and Diversity of Argentina. Previously, she practiced law from more than twenty years, representing victims of state terrorism and political prisoners. She is also Professor at the University of Buenos Aires, where she teaches criminal law. She has published numerous articles on criminal law, human rights law and gender. She holds a law degree from the University of Buenos Aires and has completed postgraduate studies in law, sociology and political sciences.

Fernando Haddad

Brazil

Fernando Haddad is a Brazilian politician and academic who served as Minister of Education (2005-2012) in the cabinets of both Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Dilma Rousseff, served as Mayor of São Paulo (2013- 2017), and was the Worker’s Party (PT) candidate in the 2018 presidential elections in Brazil. Haddad holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Law, a Master’s Degree in Economics and a Doctorate in Philosophy from the University of São Paulo (USP). He is a professor of Contemporary Political Theory at USP and of Public Administration at Insper.

Harry Halpin

United States of America (USA)

Harry Halpin is the CEO of Nym Technologies SA, a Swiss privacy company that produces mixnet technology that can even resist NSA-level surveillance. Previously, he led research projects at Inria, W3C/MIT, and received his Ph.D. from University of Edinburgh in Informatics. He is currently active in the global movement for democratic confederalism as inspired by Rojava.

Hilda Heine

Marshall Islands

Hilda Heine is Senator for Aur Atoll, Republic of the Marshall Islands. She served as President of the RMI from 2016 to 2020, and the Minister of Education before that. As RMI President, Heine took the issue of climate change, an existential threat for the peoples of the Marshall Islands and others in similar situations, to the international stage to share the story and to increase others’ awareness of RMI and the difficulties it faces due to climate change.

Rachmi Hertanti

Indonesia

Rachmi Hertanti is Executive Director of Indonesia for Global Justice. She has led IGJ’s policy advocacy process related to the alternative system on globalization and free trade agenda, including patents on seeds and medicines, Investor-State Dispute Settlement Mechanisms on the mining sector in Indonesia, digitalization and its impact to workers in Indonesia.

Giorgio Jackson

Chile

Giorgio Jackson is a politician and activist. He started as an activist by being a national leader in the student mobilizations of 2011. He is founder and first congressman of the political party Democratic Revolution and the coalition “Frente Amplio” (Broad Front), achieving the highest number of votes in the last national elections. His main concerns in politics are the disputes on knowledge and technologies, and how international trade agreements contribute to global inequality, injustice and unsustainability. He is the co- author of Copia o Muerte (Copy or Death).

Vicenta Jerónimo Jiménez

Guatemala

Vicenta Jerónimo Jiménez is deputy to the Congress of the Republic of Guatemala for the Movement for the Liberation of Peoples (MLP). She is the founder of Mujeres Madre Tierra México in Guatemala, with years in the struggle for indigenous rights and social justice in Guatemala.

Joacine Katar Moreira

Portugal

Joacine Katar Moreira is a historian, feminist and anti-racist activist, and an elected Member of Parliament. She is part of the Constitutional Affairs, Rights, Freedoms and Guarantees Committee and of the Environment, Energy and Territorial Planning Committee. She holds a Ph.D. in African Studies, a master’s degree in Development Studies and a BA in Modern and Contemporary History at ISCTE — University Institute of Lisbon. Katar Moreira is also the founder of INMUNE — Black Woman Institute and has been an active participant in public and academic debates on gender, colonialism, slavery, and racism.

Burcu Kilic

United States of America (USA)

Dr. Burcu Kilic directs the Digital Rights Program at Public Citizen and serves as the US Chair of the Digital Policy Committee at the Trans-Atlantic Consumer Dialogue. She was listed among the “300 Women Leaders in Global Health” by the Graduate Institute in Geneva in 2015 and currently leads a project on the intersection of health policy and digital rights. She completed her Ph.D. at Queen Mary, University of London, holds L.L.M. degrees in Intellectual Property Law from Queen Mary, University of London and Information Technology Law from Stockholm University. She obtained her law degree with distinction from Ankara University.

Naomi Klein

Canada

Naomi Klein is an award-winning journalist and New York Times bestselling author of No Logo, The Shock Doctrine, This Changes Everything, No is Not Enough and On Fire: The Burning Case for a Green New Deal. She is Senior Correspondent for The Intercept, a Puffin Writing Fellow at Type Media Center and is the inaugural Gloria Steinem Chair in Media, Culture and Feminist Studies at Rutgers University.

Ertuğrul Kürkçü

Turkey

Ertuğrul Kürkçü is the current Honorary President of the Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) and Honorary Associate of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE). He was the co-chair of the HDP in 2013-14 and the member of parliament for three successive terms between 2011-2018. He spent 14 years as a prisoner between 1972-1986 for his political activism in Turkey, after which he helped found the Freedom and Solidarity Party (ÖDP). After its disintegration, he joined the united block of ‘Labor, Democracy and Freedom’ in 2011 what successfully transformed into the HDP.

Avi Lewis

Canada

Avi Lewis is an award-winning documentary filmmaker, journalist, and lecturer in Journalism and Media Studies at Rutgers University. His 25-year journalism career has spanned local news reporting to hosting and producing a variety of current affairs shows for television networks worldwide, to directing theatrically released documentaries that premiered in festivals like TIFF and the Venice Biennale. In 2017, he co-founded and is now Strategic Director of The Leap — an organization launched to upend our collective response to the crises of climate, inequality and racism.

Sacha Llorenti

Bolivia

Sacha Llorenti is the Excecutive Secretary of ALBA–TCP. Previously he was Ambassador to the United Nations for the Plurinational State of Bolivia and President of the UN Security Council. He is a published author and former Minister and Vice minister.

Harsh Mander

India

Harsh Mander is human rights and peace worker, writer, columnist, researcher, and teacher. He works with survivors of mass violence, hunger, homeless persons and street children.

Achille Mbembe

Cameroon

Achille Mbembe is a philosopher and political scientist. Mbembe is a Research Professor of History and Politics at the Wits Institute for Social and Economic Research in Johannesburg, South Africa and a Visiting Professor in the Department of Romance Studies at the Franklin Humanities Institute, Duke University.

Kavita Naidu

Fiji

Kavita Naidu is Climate Justice Programme Officer at Asia Pacific Forum on Women, Law and Development (APWLD) based in Thailand. She specializes in the area of international climate law and human rights, working with grassroots women in the Asia Pacific region.

Vanessa Nakate

Uganda

Vanessa Nakate is a climate activist. She was the first Fridays For Future activist in Uganda and founded the Rise up Climate Movement, which seeks to amplify the voices of activists from across Africa. She also spearheaded a campaign to save Congo’s rainforest, which is facing rapid deforestation. She is currently working on a project to install solar panels and stoves in schools.

Leah Namugerwa

Uganda

Leah Namugerwa is a 15-year-old climate activist from Uganda. She's the Team Leader of Fridays for Future Uganda and the Founder of Birthday Trees Project.

Nanjala Nyabola

Kenya

Nanjala Nyabola is a writer, independent researcher, and political analyst. Her work focuses on conflict and post-conflict transitions, with a focus on refugees and migration, as well as East African politics generally. She is the author of Digital Democracy, Analogue Politics and the co-editor of Where Women Are. Nanjala holds a BA in African Studies and Political Science from the University of Birmingham, an MSc in Forced Migration, and an MSc in African Studies, both from the University of Oxford, which she attended as a Rhodes Scholar, and a J.D. from Harvard Law School.

Varshini Prakash

United States of America (USA)

Varshini Prakash is the Executive Director and co-founder of Sunrise, a movement of young people working to stop climate change, build economic prosperity for all through a Green New Deal, and elect a new generation of politicians to office. Varshini has been a leading voice for young Americans, inspiring thousands of young people to fight for the Green New Deal alongside the likes of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Bernie Sanders and helped put the climate crisis at the top of the political agenda in the states.

Vijay Prashad

India

Vijay Prashad is the Director of Tricontinental: Institute for Social Research, Chief Editor of LeftWord Books, and Chief Correspondent of Globetrotter. He is the author of thirty books, most recently Washington Bullets with a preface by Evo Morales Ayma.

Trusha Reddy

South Africa

Trusha Reddy is Head of the Energy & Climate Justice Program at the WoMin African Alliance. She has more than 15 years of experience in the fight for a just transition in the Global South and around the world.

Asad Rehman

United Kingdom (UK)

Asad Rehman is the Executive Director of the radical anti-poverty and social justice charity War on Want. He was a founder of the Stop the War Coalition and the Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice, amongst other initiatives. He has also served on boards of Amnesty International UK, Friends of the Earth International, Global Justice Now, and Newham Monitoring Project.

Aruna Roy

India

Aruna Roy is a Founder-Member of Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan (MKSS), the National Campaign to People’s Right to Information (NCPRI) and the School for Democracy (SFD). She was with the IAS from 1968-1975. In 1975 she came to the Ajmer District in Rajasthan to work with the SWRC and the rural poor. In 1987 she moved to live with the poor in a village called Devdungri, Rajsamand District in Rajasthan. In 1990 she was part of the group that set up the MKSS. She has worked for accessing constitutional rights for the poor - Right to Information, Employment, Food Security etc. She was a member of the National Advisory Council (NAC) from 2004-06 and 2010-13. She is also President of the National Federation of Indian Women (NFIW).

Mona Seif

Egypt

Mona Seif is an Egyptian human rights activist and struggling scientist. She is co-founder of the No Military Trials for Civilians movement, and the sister of software developer and political activist Alaa Abdel Fattah.

Céline Semaan

Lebanon

Céline Semaan is a Lebanese-Canadian researcher and designer, and the founder of Slow Factory. With a background in digital literacy, transparency, and open data, Céline has worked at the intersection of fashion, politics, and climate since 2003. In 2013, she launched Slow Factory, a non-profit that works with companies to develop actionable and tailored solutions for a wide range of climate-related issues, with science and post-colonial theory at the forefront.

Sarika Sinha

India

Sarika is a part of the autonomous women’s movement in India and works with caste based sex workers, manual scavengers, Dalit, tribal, and Muslim women. She was instrumental in setting up the first one-stop crisis center in India for women survivors of violence. Sarika works closely with progressive social movements across India.

Ahdaf Soueif

Egypt

Ahdaf Soueif is the author of the bestselling novel The Map of Love. Her account of the Egyptian revolution of 2011, Cairo: Memoir of a City Transformed, came out in 2014. She is the Founder and Chair of the Palestine Festival of Literature (PalFest) and a widely published political and cultural commentator.

Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor

United States of America (USA)

Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor is an author and professor of African American Studies at Princeton University. Her books include From #BlackLives Matter to Black Liberation, How We Get Free: Black Feminism and the Combahee River Collective and Race for Profit: How Banks and the Real Estate Industry Undermined Black Homeownership. She is also a contributing writer to The New York Times and The New Yorker.

Ece Temelkuran

Turkey

Ece Temelkuran is one of Turkey’s best- known novelists and political commentators, appearing in the Guardian, New York Times, New Statesman, and Der Spiegel. Her recent novel Women Who Blow on Knots won the 2017 Edinburgh International Book Festival First Book Award. She is the recipient of the PEN Translate Award, the New Ambassador of Europe Prize, and “Honorary Citizenship” from the city of Palermo for her work on behalf of oppressed voices.

Fawwaz Traboulsi

Lebanon

Fawwaz Traboulsi teaches Political Science, History and Middle Eastern Studies at the American University of Beirut. He has been a visiting professor at New York University, the University of Michigan, Columbia University, and Vienna University. He is a fellow of St. Antony’s College, University of Oxford, and the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin.

Paola Vega

Costa Rica

Paola Vega is a Costa Rican congresswoman. She is the chair of the Environmental Committee and a member of the Economic and Women's Committees. Her main goals in environmental matters are to change plastic consumption, pass a new and modern water law, ban gas and oil exploration and exploitation, evolve to sustainable fishing practices, and to promote green businesses and circular economies.

Paola Villarreal

Mexico

Paola is a systems programmer who, since 1998, has worked and played with all things ‘open’ in governments, NGOs, and the private sector. She is the Coordinator of Data Science for the National Advisory Board for Science and Technology in Mexico’s government. In 2018, she was awarded the MIT Innovators Under 35 LATAM and the Visionary of the Year 2018 awards for her work at the intersection of data science and justice. She was also a 2016-2017 fellow at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society at Harvard University.

Cornel West

United States of America (USA)

Cornel West is a philosopher, writer, activist, and public intellectual. He is Professor of the Practice of Public Philosophy at Harvard University and holds the title of Professor Emeritus at Princeton University. He has written 20 books, and is a leading social critic on issues of race, class, and political change in the US.

Solomon Yeo

Solomon Islands

Solomon Yeo is the co-founder of the Pacific Islands Students Fighting Climate Change and the World’s Youth for Climate Justice, both organizations dedicated to address the climate crisis and inequality through a human rights-based approaches.

Slavoj Žižek

Slovenia

Slavoj Žižek (1949) is a philosopher, political theorist, and a moderately-conservative Communist. He is the international director at the Birkbeck Institute of Humanities, London University. His latest publications include HEGEL IN A WIRED BRAIN (Bloomsbury Press, London 2020), CHRONICLES OF A TIME LOST (Pandemic 2), Polity Press 2020.

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