In February 2015, a group of like-minded individuals came together to launch a campaign to elect a woman as the next UN Secretary-General when Ban Ki-moon steps down at the end of 2016. There have been eight male Secretaries-General but never a female even though women represent half the world’s population. The group represents women from academia and civil society with a long record of engagement with the United Nations. Through an initial series of discussions, we decided that the time had come for a woman to lead the Organization and we formed a core planning group to enact a plan of action. We welcome others to join the campaign, both men and women, individuals and organizations alike. It’s time!
Dr. Jean Krasno
Jean Krasno is a member of the faculty in the Department of Political Science at the City College of New York's Colin Powell School for Civic and Global Leadership. She is also a Lecturer and Associate Research Scientist at Yale University where she has taught courses on the United Nations, UN peacekeeping, and International Organization since 1995. She was Executive Director of the Academic Council on the United Nations System from 1998 to 2003 when the organization was housed at Yale. Dr. Krasno was authorized by former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan to organize his papers for publication, a five volume set, published by Lynne Rienner Publishers in March 2012. Dr. Krasno received her Ph.D. from the City University of New York Graduate Center in 1994, where she wrote her doctoral dissertation on Brazilian politics. Some of her other publications include The United Nations: Confronting the Challenges of a Global Society, editor, (2004), Lynne Rienner Publisher; Leveraging for Success in UN Peace Operations, editor with Don Daniel and Bradd Hayes, (2003) Greenwood/Praeger Publishers; The United Nations and Iraq: Defanging the Viper, co-authored with James Sutterlin (2003), Greenwood/Praeger Publishers; and forthcoming in July 2015, Personality, Political Leadership, and Decision Making: A Global Perspective, Jean Krasno (author/editor) with Sean LaPides, Praeger Publishers, 2015.
Shazia Z. Rafi
Shazia Z. Rafi is former Secretary-General of Parliamentarians for Global Action (PGA) from 1996-2013; the first woman heading a parliamentary body. She was also the first woman on the ballot and runner-up finalist for the Inter-Parliamentary Union Secretary-General election. Born in Lahore, Pakistan, she graduated from Bryn Mawr College and the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy. She lives in New York City and her website is www.gpsdiplomacy.com.
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Shazia Rafi is a WMC SheSource expert on international security, arms control, international law, international treaties, international women’s rights, international human rights policy and violations, political Islam, Africa, Asia, diplomacy, environment, international issues, Middle East and North Africa, politics and religion.
Patricia Ackerman
Patricia Ackerman is Director of the Women’s Studies Program at the City College of New York. She also directs the Together for Transformation Project, a global interreligious collaboration focusing on ending violence against women, supporting sex worker and LGBTQI human rights, transforming masculinities, and addressing fundamentalisms, which is based in NYC and Cape Town. Professor Ackerman is also an Episcopal Priest and psychotherapist resident in New York. She is a UN representative for the Fellowship of Reconciliation and serves on the International Advisory Board of the Women Peacemakers Program, The Hague, Netherlands.
Charlotte Bunch
Charlotte Bunch, Founding Director and Senior Scholar at the Center for Women’s Global Leadership, Rutgers University, has been an activist, writer and organizer in the feminist, LGBT, and human rights movements for over four decades. A Distinguished Professor in Women’s and Gender Studies, Bunch was previously a Fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies in DC and a founder of Washington DC Women’s Liberation, The Furies and of Quest: A Feminist Quarterly.
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Charlotte, has served on the Board of Directors of many organizations, including the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, the MS Foundation for Women, the Global Fund for Women and the Women’s Human Rights Defenders International Coalition. She is currently on the Board of AWID (Association for Women’s Rights in Development), CHANGE: Center for Health and Gender Equity, and the Advisory Committee for the Women’s Rights Division of Human Rights Watch.
She has worked to bring women and particularly issues of gender based violence and sexual rights onto national and international feminist and human rights agendas. Bunch’s contributions to conceptualizing and organizing for women’s human rights have been recognized by many including the National Women’s Hall of Fame, the White House Eleanor Roosevelt Award for Human Rights, being one of the “1000 Women Peace Makers” nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, and an Honorary Doctor of Laws Degree from the University of Connecticut.
She was actively involved in feminist organizing for the 1980 Copenhagen, 1985 Nairobi, and the 1995 Beijing World Conferences on Women and was the coordinator for the CWGL led Global Campaign for Women’s Human Rights at the World Conference on Human Rights in Vienna in 1993. She has been involved in numerous other civil society efforts at the United Nations, including advocating for the creation of UN Women where she serves on the Global Civil Society Advisory Board.
She has written numerous influential essays, edited nine anthologies and authored Passionate Politics: Feminist Theory in Action and Demanding Accountability: The Global Campaign and Vienna Tribunal for Women’s Human Rights.
Melissa Labonte is Associate Professor and Associate Chair for Undergraduate Studies in the Department of Political Science at Fordham University. She received her B.A. in Internaional Relations from Syracuse University and her M.A. and Ph.D. in Political Science from Brown University.
Her research and teaching interests include the United Nations system, humanitarian politics, peacebuilding, multilateral peace operations, conflict resolution, human rights, and West African politics. She is the author of Human Rights and Humanitarian Norms, Strategic Framing, and Intervention: Lessons for the Responsibility to Protect (London: Routledge, 2013), and her research has appeared in leading journals in international research, including African Affairs; Disasters; Global Governance; the International Journal of Human Rights; International Studies Perspectives; and Third World Quarterly.
Dr. Labonte is Vice Chair of the Academic Council on the United Nations System (ACUNS); and sub-Saharan Africa academic advisor for Freedom House. She has conducted research with the Office of the President of the UN General Assembly on issues including Security Council reform, the Global Financial Crisis, and the Responsibility to Protect; and has also carried out field work analyzing ongoing peacebuilding in Sierra Leone, which forms the basis for her current book project.
In 2013 Dr. Labonte was the recipient of the Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching in the Social Sciences, and the Fordham Undergraduate Research Journal’s Faculty Mentor Award in the Social Sciences.
Melissa Labonte
Anne Marie Goetz
Dr. Goetz, who joined the Center for Global Affairs (CGA) as a Clinical Professor in January 2014, is on sabbatical from UN Women, where she served since 2011 as the Chief Advisor for UN Women, Peace and Security. She worked at the United Nations since 2005 as Chief Advisor on Governance, Peace and Security, for UNIFEM. Prior to joining UNIFEM in 2005, she was a Professor of Political Science at the Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex where she worked since 1991. She also served the United Nations Development Programme in Chad and Guinea in the mid-1980s. While at the UN over the past decade Dr. Goetz spearheaded initiative to promote women’s empowerment in the UN’s peace building work in post-conflict situations, to build peacekeepers’ capacities to detect and prevent sexual violence in conflict, and to support women’s organizations’ efforts to participate in peace talks and post-conflict decision-making.
Dr. Goetz is a political scientist who specializes in research on development policies in fragile states to promote the interests of marginalized social groups, particularly poor women. She also researches conditions for democratization and good governance in South Asia and East Africa. This has included research on pro-poor and gender-sensitive approaches to public sector reforms, anti-corruption initiatives, decentralization, and state building in fragile states and post-conflict situations.
Professor Goetz is the author of eight books on the subjects of gender, politics and policy in developing countries, and on accountability reforms – the latest is a 2009 edited volume: Governing Women: Women in Politics and Governance in Developing Countries (Routledge).
Gillian Sorensen
Gillian Sorensen has served the United Nations as Assistant Secretary-General; Senior Advisor at the United Nations Foundation; and New York City Commissioner for the United Nations and Consular Corps. She is a graduate of Smith College and studied at the Sorbonne. She has twice been a Fellow at Harvard – in 2002 at the Kennedy School Institute of Politics and in 2014 as an Advanced Leadership Initiative Fellow. She is an experienced public speaker and advocate, mediator and bridge builder. Ms. Sorensen serves on the Board of the International Rescue Committee and is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, the International Women’s Forum and the Women’s Foreign Policy Group. She has been active in politics and was a delegate to three national Presidential conventions.
Dorota Piotrowska
Sandra Barron
Alan Castillo
Esther Perez Quesada
Dorota Piotrowska earned her Master's Degree in International Relations at the Colin Powell School for Civic and Global Leadership at City College of New York in 2015. In 2012 Piotrowska earned a B.A. in Jazz Performance with a concentration in drums at the New School for Jazz and Contemporary Music. She also attended the University of Wroclaw, Poland, where she received a B.A. in French Philology in 2006. She has served as an intern at Polish Cultural Institute and at the United Nations Department of Peacekeeping Operations, Africa II Division.
Arielle Hernandez Lavadenz
Arielle Hernandez is currently completing a Master's Degree in International Relations at City College of New York's Colin Powell School for Civic and Global Leadership. While in the MA program, Ms. Hernandez helped lead a service learning project in Kobina Ansa, Ghana, which worked to promote sustainable building methods in the region. Ms. Hernandez graduated magna cum laude from Emerson College in 2007 with a double major in Media Studies and Writing, Literature, and Publishing. Born in Washington, D.C., and raised in Northern Virginia, she has been living in New York City since 2009. Her family has operated an immigration law firm in the Washington metro area for more than 30 years, primarily serving the Latino community.
Kristen Aston Cruzata
Kristen Kristen Miller recently worked at the Council on Foreign Relations as the Program Associate, Education Marketing in the New York office. Prior to that she worked as an intern in the Organizational Learning and Evaluation department of International Planned Parenthood Federation/Western Hemisphere Region. She moved to New York from Madrid, Spain in 2013 to serve as an AmeriCorps VISTA at Up2Us Sports, an organization working in the field of sports-based youth development. Kristen has her master’s degree in Economic Development and Public Policy from La Universidad Autónoma de Madrid and two undergraduate degrees from Indiana University; a BS in Public Affairs – Policy Analysis and a BA in Spanish Language and Literature. Kristen is originally from Bloomington, IN.
Karen Gaucher
Karen A. Gaucher has provided competitive analysis, strategic consulting, marketing and sales, and recruiting globally to clients in financial services, private equity, venture capital, consumer products, healthcare, industrial, technology, non-profit and real estate.
She is a former Senior Director at Ferguson Partners Ltd., where she managed the execution of searches in design/construction/development, property/asset/portfolio management, capital raising/investor relations and pension fund/fund-of-fund/REIT securities in the U.S. and abroad. She has successfully executed Chief Executive Officer searches for both affordable housing and student housing non-profit companies. One of her specialties includes New York City owner/operators and developers, where she was privileged to place executives in key positions for the rebuilding of the World Trade Center.
Previously, Ms. Gaucher served as a Consultant and integral member of the Financial Services, International Technology and Industrial Practices of Heidrick & Struggles in New York. Her experience included business development, search strategy and executive recruitment for senior management positions across a variety of functions and industries worldwide.
Earlier she was a Research and Marketing Consultant to Coopers & Lybrand, marketing the services of the firm through industry analysis and competitive intelligence to Fortune 500, middle market and emerging companies. Focus areas included Coopers & Lybrand’s consulting services in manufacturing, information technology, actuarial, benefits and compensation, tax, venture capital and high tech.
Ms. Gaucher received a B.A. degree (Phi Beta Kappa) from Colorado College and a M.A. degree from Middlebury College, at which time she also worked for the U.S. Olympic Committee and World Figure Skating Championships. She was a Teaching Fellow in Rice University's Doctoral Program and has lived and traveled in Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia, South America and the Middle East.
Rosann Mariappuram
Communications Coordinator
Strategy Coordinator
Content & Design Coordinator
Campaign Chair
Andrès Gallo
Chelsea Franklin
Juan Celis
Jenny Perdomo
Andy Shakur
Andrew Wagner
Luc Kordas
Ourania S. Yancopoulos
Anwarul K. Chowdhury
Ambassador Anwarul K. Chowdhury has devoted many years to the goals of the United Nations as an inspirational champion for sustainable peace and development. He has served as a career diplomat of Bangladesh, Permanent Representative to United Nations, President of the UN Security Council, President of the UNICEF Board, UN Under-Secretary-General, and Senior Special Advisor to the UN General Assembly President. Ambassador Chowdhury’s legacy and leadership in advancing the best interests of the global community are boldly imprinted in his pioneering initiative in March 2000 as the President of the Security Council when this core UN body achieved the political and conceptual breakthrough leading to the adoption of the groundbreaking UN Security Council Resolution 1325. This pivotal resolution recognized for the first time the role and contribution of women in the area of peace and security and tasked the UN with achieving gender parity in all high-level positions throughout the UN system.
Equally pioneering are his initiatives at the United Nations General Assembly. In 1999, he was a key figure in the adoption of the landmark Declaration and Programme of Action on a Culture of Peace; and in 1998, he was instrumental in creating the “International Decade for Culture of Peace and Nonviolence for the Children of the World (2001-2010).” Ambassador Chowdhury is a member of the Advisory Council of IMPACT Leadership 21 and in 2013, he was the first recipient of the IMPACT Leadership 21’s Global Summit Frederick Douglass Award Honoring Men Who Are Champions For Women's Advancement. He is a member of the UN High Level Advisory Group for the Global Study of the 15-year implementation of Security Council resolution 1325 (2000) and also one of the 12-member Asia-Pacific Regional Advisory Group on Women, Peace and Security hosted in Bangkok.
Dr. Chowdhury has structured curricula and taught courses on “The Culture of Peace” at the Soka University of America and the City University of New York in 2008 and 2009. He also served as an Adjunct Professor at the School of Diplomacy, Seton Hall University.
John Tumminia
John earned a Bachelor of Arts, Summa Cum Laude, in History from Hunter College/CUNY and a Master of Arts in International Relations from the City College of New York/CUNY. Upon receiving his Master’s Degree, he was awarded the John Hertz Award for the Best Master’s Thesis in International Relations by the City College Master’s Program in International Relations and the Department of Political Science.
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He wrote the chapter “Silvio Berlusconi: I am the Jesus Christ of Politics” for the book Personality, Political Leadership and Decision Making, A Global Perspective, J. Krasno & S. LaPides, Eds., published in 2015 by Praeger.
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Working with the Campaign to Elect a Woman UN Secretary-General, he has interviewed all six women Secretary-General candidates as part of a video series featured on the campaign’s website, www.womansg.org.
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A dual citizen of the United States and Italy, he has traveled to all seven continents and over 100 countries writing and creating video content for the website www.flyingnorth.net.
John is also the Document Services and Records Director at the law firm Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, LLP, where he has worked for 17 years. John is resident of New York City’s Greenwich Village.
