Panelists and Moderators
Christine Ahn
Christine Ahn is the Founder and Executive Director of Women Cross DMZ, a movement of women mobilizing to end the Korean War and ensure women’s leadership in peacebuilding. In 2015, she led 30 international women peacemakers across the De-Militarized Zone (DMZ) from North Korea to South Korea and marched with 10,000 Korean women on both sides of the DMZ. Ahn helped launch the Korea Peace Now! Campaign in 2019 with four feminist peace organizations and also the Feminist Peace Initiative. She has addressed the UN, US Congress, Canadian Parliament, and ROK National Human Rights Commission. Her op-eds have appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, San Francisco Chronicle, Forbes, and USA Today, and she is a regular contributor on MSNBC, Democracy Now!, Al-Jazeera, and CNN. She is the recipient of multiple awards, including the 2022 Social Activist Award from the Nobel Peace Laureates at the 18th Annual Summit in Pyeongchang, South Korea, the 2020 Rotary International Peace Award, and the 2020 US Peace Prize from the US Peace Memorial Foundation for her bold activism to end the Korean War, heal the wounds from the war, and women’s leadership in peacebuilding.
Marie Berry
Dr. Marie Berry (she/her) is the Director of the Sié Chéou-Kang Center for International Security and Diplomacy and an Associate Professor at the Josef Korbel School at the University of Denver. She is also the co-founder and convener of the Inclusive Global Leadership Initiative (IGLI), an effort to elevate and amplify the work that women activists are doing at the grassroots to advance peace, justice, and human rights across the world.
Linda Burnham
Linda Burnham has been an activist, writer and strategist, focused on women’s rights and racial justice, since the 1960s. She is a co-editor and contributor to the 2022 book Power Concedes Nothing: How Grassroots Organizing Wins Elections and the lead author of Project2050, an inquiry into long-term strategic thinking on the left. Burnham served as National Research Director and Senior Advisor at the National Domestic Workers Alliance for nearly a decade. She co-authored Home Economics: The Invisible and Unregulated World of Domestic Work, the first national, empirically grounded study of domestic workers in the U.S., and Living in the Shadows: Lana Domestic Workers in the Texas-Mexico Border Region. Burnham was the Co-producer of a seven-session online curriculum, Fascism101.
Burnham edited the anthology Changing the Race, a collection of essays about how race played out in the election of Barack Obama, to which she contributed the article “Obama’s Candidacy: The Advent of Post-Racial America and the End of Black Politics?” Within weeks of Trump’s 2016 inauguration, Burnham wrote the widely circulated “No Plans to Abandon Our Freedom Dreams,” an exploration of the role of white identity formation in U.S. nation building and Trump’s electoral victory. Burnham co-founded the Women of Color Resource Center and served as the organization’s Executive Director for 18 years. In the 1970s, she was a leader in the Third World Women’s Alliance.
Burnham has published numerous articles on African-American women, African-American politics, and feminist theory in a wide range of periodicals and anthologies. For the past few decades, Burnham has been a mentor to leading social justice organizers and advocates. Burnham’s writing and organizing are part of a lifelong inquiry into the dynamic, often perilous intersections of race, class and gender.
Diana Duarte
Diana Duarte is the Director of Policy and Strategic Engagement at MADRE, leading the organization's work to advance a more feminist, care-based and just US foreign policy. She directs the organization’s Feminist Policy Jumpstart program, which uses advocacy and public education to shape progressive US policymaking spaces with the perspectives and analysis of global grassroots feminist partners and with a particular focus on anti-militarist peacebuilding and just climate policy. The work of the Jumpstart program includes: forging ties between progressive policymakers and women peace activists from Yemen, Afghanistan and Colombia; helping to launch a coalition for a global Feminist Green New Deal; and convening Indigenous women leaders to define a just recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic. Her writing has explored how feminism can transform US foreign policy, just US policy towards Afghanistan, the impact of US sanctions under pandemic, and more. She was part of a working group that contributed to a 2021 discussion paper on “Dismantling Racism and Militarism in US Foreign Policy.”
Cynthia Enloe
Cynthia Enloe’s career has included Fulbrights in Malaysia and Guyana, guest professorships in Japan, Canada, UK, Australia, New Zealand, and Iceland, as well as The Middlebrook/Djerassi Visiting Professor of Gender Studies at University of Cambridge, UK. She has presented lectures in Sweden, Norway, Germany, Portugal, Spain, Chile, Vietnam, Korea, Cambodia, Colombia, Bosnia, Turkey, Brazil, the Czech Republic, Austria, Finland, Ukraine and at universities around the U.S. Her writings have been translated into Ukrainian, Spanish, Turkish, French, Portuguese, Japanese, Korean, Swedish, Czech, Icelandic, Finnish, German and Chinese. She has published in Ms. Magazine and The Village Voice, and appeared on National Public Radio, Al Jazeera, C-Span and the BBC. Her fifteen books on feminism, militarism, war, and patriarchy are published in numerous languages. Her most recent book is "Twelve Feminist Lessons of War."
Kitzia Esteva
Kitzia (they/theirs) is originally from Mexico. Their family migrated to the U.S. due to environmental racism in their home town that devastated their nephews’ health. They come from a movement family that has supported movement building both in Mexico and in the California Bay Area. They have been involved in the immigrant rights and anti-criminalization movements for the last decade. And have a trajectory of 17 years of involvement in social justice movements in the U.S. since their arrival from Mexico as a youth. They are the former Community Rights Director for Causa Justa:Just Cause, a member organization of GGJ.
Nana Gyamfi
Nana Gyamfi is the Executive Director of Black Alliance for Just Immigration (BAJI), a Black national organization that fights for the rights of Black migrants and African Americans through organizing, legal advocacy, research, policy, and narrative building to improve the conditions of Black communities by advancing racial justice and migrant rights. A Movement attorney for over 25 years, Nana is co-founder of Justice Warriors 4 Black Lives and Human Rights Advocacy, organizations dedicated to fighting for human rights and Black liberation. She is a former professor in the Pan African Studies Department at California State University Los Angeles and the former President of the National Conference of Black Lawyers (NCBL).
Sara Haghdoosti
Sara Haghdoosti (she/her) is the Executive Director of Win Without War and Win Without War Education Fund, a diverse network of activists and organizations working for a more peaceful, progressive U.S. foreign policy. She previously worked at the Mozilla Foundation, Change.org, and GetUp Australia. Sara brings a unique voice to foreign policy discourse as a Muslim woman who navigates the halls of power in Washington, works with grassroots organizations around the country, and has personally felt the impacts of harmful foreign policy, including the Trump administration’s Muslim Ban policy. Her debut novel is Sunburnt Veils, the story of a young Muslim woman activist in Australia.
Toni Haastrup
Toni Haastrup is Professor and Chair in Global Politics at the University of Manchester. She earned her PhD in Politics from the University of Edinburgh. With a keen focus on interdisciplinary approaches, Haastrup's research often engages the complexities of global politics, with particular attention to the intersections of gender, race, and power. Her work has not only advanced academic understanding but has also contributed to shaping policy and practice in addressing global challenges. Beyond her academic work, she is also deeply committed to supporting the next generation of scholars, fostering a diverse and inclusive academic community.
Lara Kiswani
Lara Kiswani has worked as a youth and adult educator, is a lecturer at San Francisco State University, advisory board member of Critical Resistance, and executive director of the Arab Resource and Organizing Center. AROC is a grassroots organization that builds power in the Arab and Muslim community in the San Francisco Bay Area. They organize against war, repression and militarism. AROC is also a member of Bay Resistance, a network of faith, union, and community organizations that work to advance racial, economic, climate, & gender justice by activating individuals and families to defend against racist and white supremacist attacks.
Xochitl Larios
Xochtil Larios is the Youth Justice Coordinator at Communities United for Restorative Youth Justice, where she cut her teeth in community organizing, youth leadership, and activism as a program participant while incarcerated in juvenile hall. At CURYJ, Xochtil brought her innovative Youth Transformation Curriculum to detained youth and led participatory research, culminating in the 2019 report “Dream Beyond Bars: A Youth Vision for Alameda County’s Juvenile Justice System.” Xochtil received her Associate in Social Science from Laney College, where she was honored as a Chicana graduate of Restoring Our Communities and Raíces student networks. She is a 2018 recipient of the California Endowment Community Champion Youth Award. She also serves as a Commissioner on the Alameda County Juvenile Justice Delinquency Prevention Commission, ensuring youth voices are heard in policymaking. Xochtil works in the trenches of grassroots mobilizing and relentlessly advocates for youth representation at local and state policy initiatives.
Diana Lopez
Diana Lopez is a Xicana born and raised in San Antonio, TX with deep ties with the Rio Bravo border. Her work with Southwest Workers Union (Centro por la Justicia) involves linking issues around environmental justice, living wage and accountable governance. Centro SWU works to re-frame public policy to protect the community and include the voices of local residents. It has led to successful strategic campaigns targeting wages, military environmental clean-up, economic revitalization, healthcare and energy policy. Lopez is currently in her 8th year as Executive Director. Under her direction, the organization has grown in impact, fundraising and membership base and features a femme of color leadership body. Lopez has worked to transition the 35+ year organization, utilizing civic engagement techniques for issue-based organizing to scale our impact and direct reach community residents. She is most excited about the community development project renovating the property into a movement center and resilience hub. She is mother of two wild wolves, loves to read, is a sticker fanatic, and has a deep appreciation for being in the outdoors.
Margo Okazawa-Rey
Margo Okazawa-Rey, Professor Emerita San Francisco State University, is an activist and educator working on issues of militarism, armed conflict, and violence against women examined intersectionally. She has long-standing activist commitments in South Korea and Palestine, working closely with Du Re Bang/My Sisters Place and Women’s Centre for Legal Aid and Counseling, respectively. She also is a founding member of the International Women’s Network against Militarism and Women for Genuine Security and is President of the Board of Directors of Association for Women’s Rights in Development (AWID). Her recent publications include “Building a Culture of Life: A Conversation on Abolition, Feminism, and Asian American Politics.” P. Kandaswamy, M. Okazawa-Rey, & S. Shigematsu. (2023). Frontiers: A Journal of Women’s Studies; “Two Decades of Feminist Organising for Genuine Security: Understandings from the International Women’s Network Against Militarism” with Akibayashi, Fabros, Kirk, et al. Feminist Conversations on Peace. S. Smith & K. Yoshida (Eds.) (2022). Bristol, UK: Bristol University Press; “Nation-izing” Coalition and Solidarity Politics for US Anti-militarist Feminists, Social Justice (2020); Gendered Lives: Intersectional Perspectives, Oxford University Press (2020); “No Freedom without Connections: Envisioning Sustainable Feminist Solidarities” (2018) in Feminist Freedom Warriors: Genealogies, Justice, Politics, and Hope, Chandra Talpade Mohanty and Linda Carty (eds.). She was a founding member of the Combahee River Collective.
Yoon Ra
Yoon is a trans, non-binary grassroots documentary filmmaker and cultural organizer creating counter-narrative media with sex worker mutual aid groups: Red Canary Song (New York, Turtle Island) and Scarlet Cha Cha (Paju, Korea). Red Canary Song centers base-building with migrant massage workers and Asian sex workers through a labor rights, migrant justice, and PIC abolitionist framework. Red Canary Song believes that the full decriminalization of sex work is necessary for the safety and survival of massage workers and trafficking survivors. carlet Cha Cha has been organizing direct actions to protect the livelihoods and workplaces in Yongjugol, a red light district village first created to service an American military base in Paju, South Korea. Yoon is currently a campaign fellow with U.S. Campaign for Palestinian Rights (USCPR), collaborating with BDS Korea to build international pressure against HD Hyundai’s selling of bulldozers and excavators to Israel. They plan on creating the media strategies for the campaign to reach a wider U.S. and English speaking audience.
Kavita Ramdas
Kavita N. Ramdas is a globally recognized advocate for gender equity and justice. She currently serves as the Activist in Residence at the Global Fund for Women. In 2023, she served as a visiting professor at Princeton University’s School of Public and International Affairs. Kavita is a speaker and thought commentator on the challenges facing philanthropy and civil society as we strive for equitable and sustainable development and gender and racial equity. She provides high-level consulting advice and guidance on initiatives to defend democracy and protect human rights both within the US and across the globe. In 2023, Kavita completed an independent assessment of the United Nations ability to deliver on Gender Equality as part of the Sustainable Development Goals. Previously, as Director of the Women’s Rights Program at the Open Society Foundations, she led the foundation to make its largest ever investment in gender justice with a $100 million commitment to the Generation Equality Forum in July 2021. She is the founder of KNR Sisters, a consulting venture for social justice movements and philanthropy; served briefly as the President and CEO of the Nathan Cummings Foundation; as Strategy Advisor for MADRE, an international women’s rights organization; at the Ford Foundation as both Senior Advisor on Global Strategy and Representative for South Asia; and as President and CEO of the Global Fund for Women.
Sandy Shan
Sandy Shan is the Executive Director of Justice is Global (JIG), a grassroots movement that mobilizes everyday people for structural changes to the global economy. In this role, she develops JIG’s organizational strategy, focusing on harnessing the strength of new immigrant and diaspora communities to advance a progressive internationalist agenda. She also aids in molding and coordinating a progressive cross-sector approach to US foreign policy, particularly concerning US-China great power competition. Outside of her professional role, Sandy is organizing in Chinese and pan-Asian diaspora spaces. Her work revolves around relationship building, healing, and politicizing diaspora members that sets the stage for building and exercising power in public space. Before coming to JIG, Sandy conducted research into the roots of inequality in the political process. She holds a Ph.D. in Political Science from Northwestern University.
Halema Wali
Halema Wali is a community organizer, digital strategist, tech professional, and a passionate advocate for social justice and community empowerment. She co-founded Afghans For A Better Tomorrow (AFBT) in 2021 to spearhead rapid-response actions throughout the United States after a botched military withdrawal, including support on military bases receiving newly arrived Afghans. AFBT focuses on transformative change for Afghan communities in the U.S. and beyond. She currently serves as the Director of Community Engagement, working to ensure safety, affordable housing, and a life of dignity for the growing community of recently arrived Afghan immigrants in New York City and surrounding areas. Her advocacy, grounded in equity and progressive values, aims to create a more inclusive and supportive environment for especially vulnerable members of society impacted by conflict and state-sponsored violence. AFBT’s efforts have been featured in prominent media outlets such as the NYTimes, LA Times, BBC, NowThis, Al-Jazeera, and the Wall Street Journal. Halema holds a Bachelor's degree in Political Science and Biology from Rutgers University-Newark.
Janene Yazzie
Janene Yazzie (She/Her), is an enrolled member of the Navajo Nation. She has over 12 years of experience as a community organizer and human rights advocate deeply rooted in local community issues. She is the Director of Policy and Advocacy at NDN Collective. Beginning from her community Tsé si’ áni, in Diné Bikéyah, she has worked on the intersections of climate change, water security, food security, energy development, and nation-building with indigenous communities and indigenous-led organizations in the US, Canada, and Latin America.
Working at the local, national, and international levels of governance, she has built expertise in advancing Indigenous Peoples rights through policy and facilitating rights-based approaches to development through holistic, place-based solutions. She has a background in International Policy and Human Rights.