Join the Institute for Women’s Leadership Consortium, Rutgers Global, and the Innovation, Design, and Entrepreneurship Academy (IDEA) for a lecture by Dr. Radhika Coomaraswamy. Following the lecture, Dr. Coomaraswamy, Professor Charlotte Bunch, and Professor Radhika Balakrishnan will engage in a roundtable conversation to consider progress towards women’s full inclusion in the human rights agenda and the challenges that remain. Reception immediately following.

Radhika Coomaraswamy, a Sri Lankan lawyer, diplomat, and human rights advocate, served as the Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations (UN) and The Special Representative on Children and Armed Conflict. She was appointed the first Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women in 1994, a position she held until 2003. In Sri Lanka, she was Director of the International Centre for Ethnic Studies for over twenty years and served as the Chairperson of the Sri Lankan Human Rights Commission from 2003 to 2006.

In her reports to the UN Commission on Human Rights, she has written on violence in the family, violence in the community, violence against women during armed conflict, and the problem of international trafficking. In 2014, the UN Secretary-General asked Coomaraswamy to lead the Global Study to review the fifteen-year implementation of Security Council Resolution 1325 on Women, Peace, and Security.

Her leadership in this area continued with her appointment to the UN Fact-Finding Mission in Myanmar in 2017. Most recently, in June 2022, she was appointed as a Member of the International Commission of Human Rights Experts on Ethiopia.

She has received numerous prizes, awards, and honors both nationally and internationally as well as honorary doctorates from the University of Edinburg, Amherst College, and the Katholieke Universiteit of Leuven in Belgium. In 2005, The Sri Lankan government conferred on her the honor of Deshamanya. She received her BA from Yale University, her J.D. from Columbia University, and her LLM from Harvard University.

Vienna 1993: An Unfinished Call to Action

Roundtable Conversation inspired by the 30th anniversary of the World Conference on Human Rights and the Vienna Tribunal coordinated by the Rutgers Center for Women’s Global Leadership.

Dr. Radhika Coomaraswamy, Professor Charlotte Bunch, and Professor Radhika Balakrishnan

Charlotte Bunch, Founding Director and Senior Scholar, at the Center for Women’s Global Leadership, Rutgers University, has been an activist, author, and organizer in the women’s, civil, LGBTQ, and human rights movements for over five decades. A Board of Governor’s Distinguished Service Professor in Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, Bunch was previously a Fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies, a founder of Washington D.C. Women’s Liberation and of Quest: A Feminist Quarterly. Her books include two classics: Passionate Politics: Feminist Theory in Action and Demanding Accountability: The Global Campaign and Vienna Tribunal for Women’s Human Rights.

Radhika Balakrishnan is the former director of the Center for Women’s Global Leadership, and a Professor, in the Department of Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Rutgers University- New Brunswick. She has a Ph.D. in Economics from Rutgers University. Formerly she chaired the Board of the US Human Rights Network and served on the Board of the Center for Constitutional Rights and the International Association for Feminist Economics. Professor Balakrishnan’s work focuses on gender and development, gender and the global economy, human rights, and economic and social rights.

Additional Details

SPECIAL EVENT PARKING: Visitors may park in Lots 70 & Douglass Deck. Guests must use this link to register for parking in advance to avoid any citation. Special event parking and special event permits are only for visitors to the University and do not include free metered parking. Faculty, Staff, and Students must park in authorized parking locations according to their parking permit and should not register under the special event parking link.

SUBMIT QUESTIONS: We invite you to submit questions for the conversation in advance. If you would like to share a question, please email [email protected].

PLEASE NOTE: By registering for this event, you are also agreeing to give Rutgers University permission to record you and your registered guests’ (including minors under the age of 18) image and/or voice and grant Rutgers all rights to use these sound, still, or moving images in any medium for educational, promotional, advertising, or other purposes that support the mission of the university. You agree that all rights to the sound, still, or moving images belong to Rutgers.

Honoring Anita Ashok Datar

The Anita Ashok Datar Lecture on Women’s Global Health draws to campus groundbreaking pioneers, researchers, field workers, and activists to explore growing international health challenges and the vital role that the United States and leaders from across the globe must continue to play in addressing them.

Anita Ashok Datar, a graduate of Rutgers University (’95), dedicated her career to public health issues, especially those concerning women and children. While working on a mission for USAID in the African country of Mali, Anita’s life was tragically cut short when she was the lone American killed on November 20, 2015, in a terrorist attack that claimed twenty other lives. Rutgers University is proud to join Anita’s family and friends to create a lasting tribute to her remarkable life of service.

Institute for Women’s Leadership Consortium

The Institute for Women’s Leadership consortium is dedicated to the study of women and gender, to advocacy on behalf of gender equity, and to the promotion of women’s leadership locally, nationally, and globally. Our programs, research, and collective work position Rutgers University-New Brunswick as a premier place for deepening research and expanding opportunities to develop women’s leadership for social change.

The Institute for Women’s Leadership consortium includes Douglass Residential College, the Department of Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, Center for American Women and Politics, Institute for Research on Women, Center for Women and Work, Center for Women in the Arts and Humanities, Center for Research on Ending Violence, and the Center for Women in Business.

Time: 4:30 pm EDT

Free!

Registration