Events

12:15 | 1:00        Welcome and Keynote Speech

Welcome

Gerald L. Neuman, J. Sinclair Armstrong Professor of International, Foreign, and Comparative Law, Director of the Human Rights Program, Harvard Law School

John C.P. Goldberg, Interim Dean, Carter Professor of General Jurisprudence, Harvard Law School

James Ross, Legal and Policy Director, Human Rights Watch

Keynote Address

Kathryn Sikkink, Ryan Family Professor of Human Rights Policy, Harvard Kennedy School

1:00 | 1:30        Coffee & refreshments

1:30 | 3:00        Panel 1: Human Rights and Equality

Moderator: Tyler Giannini, Clinical Professor of Law, Director of Human Rights Entrepreneurs Clinic at Harvard Law School

Victor Madrigal-Borloz, Eleanor Roosevelt Senior Visiting Researcher and Lecturer on Law, Harvard Law School

Jessica Neuwirth, Distinguished Lecturer and Rita E. Hauser Director, Human Rights Program, Roosevelt House Public Policy Institute at Hunter College

Martha Minow, 300th Anniversary University Professor at Harvard University

Karima Bennoune, Lewis M. Simes Professor of Law at the University of Michigan

Gerald L. Neuman, J. Sinclair Armstrong Professor of International, Foreign, and Comparative Law at Harvard Law School and Director of the School’s Human Rights Program

3:00 | 3:30        Coffee & refreshments

3:30 | 5:00     Panel 2: Investing in a Just Future: (Re)Imagining the Field

Moderator: Alicia Ely Yamin, Lecturer on Law; Senior Fellow on Global Health and Rights at the Petrie-Flom Center for Health Law Policy, Biotechnology and Bioethics at Harvard Law School

Ryan Goodman, Anne and Joel Ehrenkranz Professor of Law at New York University School of Law

Benyam Dawit Mezmur, Professor of Law and Deputy Dean for Research and Post-Graduate Studies at the Law Faculty at the University of the Western Cape, member of the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child

Kristen Stilt, Professor of Law, Faculty Director of the Animal Law and Policy Program, and Director of the Program on Law and Society in the Muslim World at Harvard Law School

Makau Mutua, SUNY Distinguished Professor, Margaret W. Wong Professor, University at Buffalo School of Law

5:15 | 6:15     Reception

Karima E. Bennoune is the Lewis M. Simes Professor of Law at the University of Michigan. She specializes in public international law and international human rights law, including issues related to culture, extremism and terrorism, and women’s human rights. Bennoune served as the UN special rapporteur in the field of cultural rights from 2015 to 2021. She also was appointed as an expert for the International Criminal Court in 2017 during the reparations phase of the groundbreaking case The Prosecutor v. Ahmad Al Faqi Al Mahdi, which concerned intentional destruction of cultural heritage sites in Mali. Bennoune holds an MA and JD from the University of Michigan.

Tyler Giannini was Co-Director of the HLS Human Rights Program from 2012 to 2021. Currently, Giannini is Clinical Professor of Law and Director of the Human Rights Entrepreneurs Clinic at HLS. Giannini’s work focuses on international accountability litigation, business and human rights as well as climate change and human rights. Prior to joining HLS, he was a founder and director of EarthRights International, an organization at the forefront of efforts to link human rights and environmental protection. Giannini holds an MA and JD from the University of Virginia.

Ryan Goodman is a former Director of the Human Rights Program and Rita E. Hauser Professor of Human Rights and Humanitarian Law at HLS. Currently, he is the Anne and Joel Ehrenkranz Professor of Law at New York University School of Law and the founding co-editor-in-chief of Just Security. He served as special counsel to the general counsel of the Department of Defense (2015-16). In addition to his posts at NYU School of Law, Goodman is an associated member of the Department of Sociology, an affiliated member of the Department of Politics at NYU, and a Distinguished Fellow at the National Institute of Military Justice. He earned his JD from Yale Law School and a PhD in sociology from Yale University.

Victor Madrigal-Borloz is a Senior Visiting Researcher with the Human Rights Program and Lecturer on Law at HLS. From 2018 to 2023, Mr. Madrigal-Borloz was the UN Independent Expert on Protection against violence and discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity appointed by the United Nations Human Rights Council. Until June 2019, he served as the Secretary-General of the International Rehabilitation Council for Torture Victims (IRCT). A member of the UN Subcommittee on the Prevention of Torture from 2013 to 2016, Mr. Madrigal-Borloz was Rapporteur on Reprisals and oversaw a draft policy on the torture and ill-treatment of LGBTI persons. He earned a degree in law from the University of Costa Rica.

Benyam Dawit Mezmur was a Visiting Fellow at the HLS Human Rights Program from 2022-2023. He is a Professor of Law and Deputy Dean for Research and Post-Graduate Studies at the Law Faculty of the University of the Western Cap (UWC). He is also Coordinator of the Children’s Rights Project at the Dullah Omar Institute for Constitutional Law, Governance, and Human Rights, at UWC. Since 2012, he has served on the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child, and served as its Chairperson. In 2018, Pope Francis appointed him to serve on the Pontifical Commission on the Protection of Minors. Professor Mezmur obtained an LLM from the University of Pretoria, and a Doctor of Laws degree from the University of the Western Cape.

Martha Minow holds the 300th Anniversary University Professorship at Harvard University and is one of 25 professors accorded this highest academic post at the university. She has taught at HLS since 1981 and served as dean for eight years (2009-2017). An expert in constitutional law and human rights, her work has focused on issues confronting historically marginalized individuals and groups, legal responses to social, political, and religious conflict, and legal treatments of digital communications and technologies. Minow holds a JD from Yale Law School.

Makau W. Mutua was the Associate Director of the Human Rights Program at HLS between 1991 and 1996. He is a SUNY Distinguished Professor and the Margaret W. Wong Professor at the University at Buffalo School of Law, where he served as dean for seven years, 2008-2014. He teaches international human rights, international business transactions and international law. Mutua is a vice president of the American Society of International Law and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. He was educated at the University of Nairobi, the University of Dar-es-Salaam and HLS.

Gerald L. Neuman is the Director of the School’s Human Rights Program, and the J. Sinclair Armstrong Professor of International, Foreign, and Comparative Law at HLS. Neuman teaches courses in international human rights law, immigration and nationality law, and U.S. constitutional law. From 2011 to 2014, he served as a Member of the UN Human Rights Committee. Neuman holds a JD from HLS and a PhD from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Jessica Neuwirth was part of the core group of HLS students advocating for the creation of the Human Rights Program. She is a Distinguished Lecturer and Rita E. Hauser Director of the Human Rights Program at the Roosevelt House Public Policy Institute at Hunter College. She is one of the founders of Equality Now, an international women’s rights organization established in 1992, and is the founder and Director of Frontline Women’s Fund. Neuwirth is also a founder and President Emerita of the ERA Coalition. She has served as Director of the New York Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights. Moreover, Neuwirth was a special consultant on sexual violence to the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda for its landmark Akayesu judgment holding that rape is a form of genocide, and again worked for the ICTR on the Media judgment holding print and radio media accountable for their role in the Rwandan genocide. Following her work with the ICTR, she directed the legal team that drafted the judgment of the Special Court for Sierra Leone convicting former Liberian President Charles Taylor of war crimes and crimes against humanity. She earned a JD from HLS in 1985. 

James Ross was among the student founders of the HLS Human Rights Program and later was a Visiting Fellow at the Program from 1997-1998. Ross is Legal and Policy Director at Human Rights Watch, where he has worked since 2001.  He previously worked in the Humanitarian Affairs office of Médecins sans Frontières in the Netherlands, in Bosnia for the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, in Cambodia for the International Human Rights Law Group, and in the Philippines for the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights. He graduated with a JD from HLS in 1985.

Kathryn Sikkink is the Ryan Family Professor of Human Rights Policy at Harvard Kennedy School and an affiliated faculty member at HLS and Government Department. Sikkink works on international norms and institutions, transnational advocacy networks, the impact of human rights law and policies, and transitional justice. She is a Principal Investigator of the Transitional Justice Evaluation Team based at Harvard Kennedy School. Sikkink holds an MA and PhD from Columbia University. 

Kristen A. Stilt is Professor of Law, Faculty Director of the Brooks McCormick Jr. Animal Law & Policy Program, and Faculty Director of the Program on Law and Society in the Muslim World at HLS. Prior to coming to HLS, Stilt was Harry R. Horrow Professor in International Law at Northwestern Law School and Professor of History at Northwestern University. Stilt’s research focuses on Islamic law and society in both historical and contemporary contexts.  She also writes in the area of Animal Law, and the intersection of animal law and religion and culture in particular.  Stilt received a JD from The University of Texas School of Law and holds a PhD in History and Middle Eastern Studies from Harvard University.

Alicia Ely Yamin was a Joseph H. Flom Fellow on Global Health and Human Rights at Harvard Law School’s Human Rights Program from 2010-2011. She currently is a Lecturer on Law and a Senior Fellow on Global Health and Rights at the Petrie-Flom Center for Health Law Policy, Biotechnology and Bioethics at Harvard Law School; Adjunct Senior Lecturer on Health Policy and Management at the Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health; and Senior Advisor on Human Rights and Health Policy at the global health justice organization, Partners In Health. Dr. Yamin has served on numerous other UN, WHO and other global expert committees. Known globally for her trans-disciplinary work in relation to economic and social rights, sexual and reproductive health and rights, the right to health, and the intersections between development paradigms and human rights, Dr. Yamin’s career has bridged academia and activism. She has published multiple books and over 160 articles in law and policy journals, as well as peer-reviewed public health journals, in both English and Spanish. Yamin holds Juris Doctor and Master’s in Public Health degrees from Harvard University, and a Doctorate in Law from the University of Buenos Aires in Argentina.