Speakers who are currently on tour addressing a variety of topics include:
Area of Expertise/Specialties:
Armed conflict affecting indigenous communities, the impact of erosion of indigenous peoples' autonomous systems of resource management and governance, critiques of literary works as instruments of change, responses to and critiques of policy initiatives by the Government of India and international agencies such as World Bank impacting indigenous peoples; issues relating to land and knowledge rights.
Anna is part of the New Voices on Climate Change, Climate Justice Tour presented by:
If you would like to plan a speaking event with Anna, please contact Hallie Boas at 415-336-6590 or newvoices@globaljusticeecology.org!
- Women's Rights, Indigenous Sovereignty and Climate Change
- Indigenous Peoples and International Agencies
- Armed Conflict and Indigenous Rights
New Voices on Climate Change, Climate Justice Tour
The goal of the Climate Justice tour is to broaden the climate debate by amplifying the voices of peoples around the world who are already being impacted by climate change. In doing so, the initiative will:
1) Empower peoples and communities already being impacted by climate change by promoting their stories throughout the world.
2) Empower people to become active in the climate movement by humanizing and personalizing climate change, which is otherwise an often daunting, disempowering and abstract problem.
Building the movement against global warming in the United States plays a pivotal role in the global effort to stop climate change. This is because:
* With 6% of the world's population, the U.S. emits 25% of the world's carbon emissions. (this, however, does not include the emissions from countries like China and India that directly result from the manufacture of goods for export to the U.S.)
* The U.S. military is the largest single emitter of carbon on the planet.
* The U.S. and the World Bank (in which the U.S. has de-facto veto decision-making power) dominate the discussion of what to do about global warming with market-based false solutions.
* The historic role of the U.S. in the international climate negotiations has been to obstruct any forward progress.
The New Voices on Climate Change, Climate Justice Tour is presented by:
If you would like to plan a speaking event with one of our Climate Justice speakers, please contact Hallie Boas at 415-336-6590 or newvoices@globaljusticeecology.org!
- Indigenous Community Organizing for Energy and Climate Justice
- Women's Rights, Indigenous Sovereignty and Climate Change
- Resisting Environmental Destruction on Indigenous Lands
- Biotechnology and GMO impacts on Peasant Agriculture
Area of Expertise/Specialties: Agrofuels, peasant movements, agribusiness expansion in Brazil, biotechnology and GMO impacts on peasant and family farm agriculture, amazon deforestation dynamics, territorial conflicts in the amazon region, political ecology/emerging environmental social movements
Camila is part of the New Voices on Climate Change, Climate Justice Tour presented by:
If you would like to plan a speaking event with Camila, please contact Hallie Boas at 415-336-6590 or newvoices@globaljusticeecology.org!
- Biotechnology and GMO impacts on Peasant Agriculture
- Agribusiness Expansion in Brazil
- Agrofuels
Carlos Martinez is the co-author of Venezuela Speaks!: Voices from the Grassroots.
He recently served in Venezuela as the Venezuela Program Director for Global Exchange, where he coordinated dozens of delegations to Venezuela. His articles have been published in Common Dreams, Monthly Review Zine, and on www.venezuelanalysis.com. Carlos lived in Venezuela for two years and now resides in San Francisco, California.
If you would like to plan a speaking event with Carlos, please email him at carlos@globalexchange.orgcarlos@globalexchange.org!
- Venezuela
- Voices from the Bolivarian Revolution
- Building Popular Power in Venezuela
- Latin American Social Movements & Progressive Governments
Antonia Juhasz is a policy-analyst, author and activist living in San Francisco.
She is a Fellow at Oil Change International and Visiting Scholar at the Institute for Policy Studies. Juhasz is author of The Bu$h Agenda: Invading the World, One Economy at a Time. Juhasz's new book, The Tyranny of Oil: the World's Most Powerful Industry, and What we Must do to Stop It, will be released by HarperCollins Publishers in September 2008. Juhasz is an expert on all aspects of international trade and finance policy with a Masters Degree in Public Policy from Georgetown University, a Bachelors Degree in Public Policy from Brown University, experience as a Legislative Assistant to two United States Members of Congress, and over ten years of work in the field. She is a passionate writer and speaker who conveys complex information in a manner that is both accessible and motivational to others.
If you would like to plan a speaking event with Antonia, please email her at antonia[at]globalexchange.org!
- Oil and Energy Policy
- The Chevron Corporation and the Chevron Program at Global Exchange
- The Iraq Oil Law
- The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, especially the role of corporations in the wars
- The Anti-War/Peace Movement, the Anti-Corporate Globalization/Global Justice Movement
- International rade and finance policy
Mary Anne Hitt is the executive director of Appalachian Voices, a nonprofit organization that brings people together to solve the environmental problems having the greatest impact on the central and southern Appalachian Mountains. The organization works with communities across Appalachia to tackle two major causes of climate change: mountaintop removal coal mining and the construction of new coal-fired power plants. She grew up in the mountains of east Tennessee, just outside Gatlinburg and the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.
If you would like to plan a speaking event with Mary Anne, please email her at maryanne.hitt@sierraclub.org!
- Climate Change
- Mountain Top Removal and Coal-fired Fuel Plants in the Appalachian Mountains
Zakiya Harris is a California native, who has been working as an artist, educator and activist for the past 10 years. Currently she is the Regional Director of the San Francisco Green Festival. In 2003, she became the lead trainer at the DJ Project. In 2007, she co-founded "Grind for the Green," which engages youth of color in the burgeoning green economy. The program was heralded for its innovation and produced the 1st Solar Powered Hip-Hop Music Concert in San Francisco. Some of her recent achievements include receiving the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights Future Leaders award and becoming a Fellow in the Green For All Academy.
If you would like to plan a speaking event with Zakiya, please email her at zakiya@globalexchange.org!
Faith Gemmill, a Pit River/ Wintu and Neets’aii Gwich’in Athabascan from Arctic Village, Alaska, is the current outreach coordinator for REDOIL (Resisting Environmental Destruction on Indigenous Lands).
Faith previously worked on behalf of the Gwich’in Nation for over ten years as a representative, public spokesperson and Gwich’in Steering Committee staff to address the potential human health and cultural impacts of proposed oil development and production of the birthplace and nursery of the Porcupine Caribou Herd which is located within the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Faith continues as a public spokesperson, press and tribal liaison and human rights advocate. Faith is a current field representative of the International Indian Treaty Council (IITC). In this capacity Faith has represented the Gwich’in Nation within appropriate mechanisms of the United Nations to advocate for the recognition of Gwich’in human rights as well as work for the rights and recognition of Indigenous Peoples. Faith also serves on the advisory board of Honor the Earth.
Faith is part of the New Voices on Climate Change, Climate Justice Tour presented by:
If you would like to plan a speaking event with Faith, please contact Hallie Boas at 415-336-6590 or newvoices@globaljusticeecology.org!
- Resisting Environmental Destruction on Indigenous Lands
- Human Rights and Oil
- The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge
Biographical Information:
Jihan Gearon is Diné (Navajo) and African American. She is Tódích'ií'nii (Bitter Water) clan, and her maternal grandfather is Tl'ashchí'í (Red Bottom People) clan. Jihan's family is from the community of Old Sawmill and she grew up and went to high school close by in Fort Defiance, located on the eastern part of the Navajo reservation in Arizona. She is a graduate of Stanford University with a Bachelors of Science in Earth Systems and a focus in Energy Science and Technology. In her position as Native Energy Organizer at the Indigenous Environmental Network, Jihan works to build the capacity of communities throughout the U.S. and Canada who are impacted by energy development and climate change. Jihan is a member of the Steering Committee of the Environmental Justice and Climate Change Initiative and the Coordinating Committee of the Grassroots Global Justice Alliance.
Jihan is part of the New Voices on Climate Change, Climate Justice Tour presented by:
If you would like to plan a speaking event with Jihan, please contact Hallie Boas at 415-336-6590 or newvoices@globaljusticeecology.org!
- Indigenous Community Organizing for Energy and Climate Justice
- Impact of Climate Change on Indigenous Peoples and people of color
- Environmental Justice and Climate Justice
Fox and Sílvia Leindecker, Mike
Sílvia Leindecker is a Brazilian documentary film maker, a philosopher and independent photographer who has shot for the Spanish news agency EFE, Germany's Politik magazine, and numerous independent projects, advertisement and film productions.
Michael Fox is a freelance journalist, translator, reporter and documentary film maker based in South America. He is a former staff reporter for Venezuelanlaysis, a radio correspondant for Free Speech Radio News, and his articles have been published with Yes Magazine, Earth Island Journal, NACLA and The Nation online.
Last year, Michael and Sílvia helped to co-found the internet Radio Venezuela en Vivo, which broadcasted live coverage from Venezuela's Constitutional Reform Referendum. Based in between Venezuela and Brazil, Michael and Sílvia have for many years been researching and covering the growth in the region's participatory democracy- cooperatives, Brazil's participatory budgeting and Venezuela's communal councils. Michael's and Sílvia's first full length documentary film "Beyond Elections: Redefining Democracy in the Americas" is set to be released in September 2008. It takes viewers across the Americas to attempt to answer one of the most important questions of our time: What is Democracy?
If you would like to plan a speaking event with Mike Fox or Silvia Leindecker, please email them at estretiomeio@gmail.com,
mike@beyondelections.com or call at 415-508-5732!
- Grassroots Voices from the Bolivarian Revolution
- Participatory Democracy and Cooperatives in Venezuela and Brazil
- Brazil's participatory budgeting and Venezuela's communal councils
- Beyond Elections: Redefining Democracy in the Americas
- Latin American Social Movements & Progressive Governments
- Building Popular Power in Venezuela
Described by The New York Times as the "Paul Revere of globalization's woes," Dr. Kevin Danaher's analytical expertise, sense of humor and blunt eloquence make him an exceptionally dynamic speaker. Dr. Kevin Danaher is a co-founder of Global Exchange (1988), founder and Executive Co-Producer of the Green Festivals (2001), and Executive Director of the Global Citizen Center (2004). Dr. Danaher has spoken at universities and for community organizations throughout the U.S. He conducts workshops on issues ranging from the dynamics of the global economy to how we can replace the power of transnational corporations with local green economy networks. A longtime critic of the so-called "free trade" agenda, Dr. Danaher explains how we must work with other countries to reduce poverty and inequality if we want the cooperation of the world's people in ending terrorism. Dr. Danaher has published numerous articles and is the author and/or editor of thirteen books, including his two latest: “The Green Festival Reader: Fresh ideas from Agents of Change” (2008); "Building the Green Economy: Success Stories from the Grass Roots" (2007).
If you would like to plan a speaking event with Kevin, please contact speakers[at]globalexchange.org or call Marcia at (415)255-7296
- Building the Green Economy
- People's Globalization vs. Elite Globalization
- The case against the World Bank and the IMF
- Corporate Accountability and Local Green Economy
- Grassroots Movements for Peace, Justice and International Cooperation
Carmencita "Chie" Abad speaks from personal experience about the hardships endured by millions of workers in sweatshops around the world. Chie spent six years as a garment worker on the Pacific island of Saipan, a U.S. territory. She endured wretched conditions, frequently working 14-hour shifts in order to meet arbitrary production quotas for her employer, the Sako Corporation, which made clothes for the Gap and other retailers. When she tried to organize a union, Chie was met by fierce resistance from management and eventually lost her job. She now lives in the U.S., where she educates Americans about the inhumane factory conditions occurring worldwide, including on U.S. soil. Chie was instrumental in forcing 26 major retailers to settle a lawsuit in September 2002 to improve conditions in Saipan. Her story is an inspiring example of how people can win if they stand up for their rights and the leadership she offers from her years as of organizing within the anti-sweatshop is empowering.
If you would like to plan a speaking event with Chie, please contact her by email at: chie [at] globalexchange.org or by phone at: (415)575-5550
- Sweatshops and the Global Economy
- Sweatshop Labor in the Garment Industry
- Tour of Sweatshops in San Francisco's Mission District
Venezuela Speaks! Voices from the Grassroots, Book Tour
Venezuela Speaks! Voices from the Grassroots, published by PM Press with the support of Global Exchange, is a collection of interviews with activists and participants from across Venezuela’s social movements. From community media to land reform; cooperatives to communal councils, from the labor movement to the Afro-Venezuelan network, Venezuela Speaks! sheds light on the complex realities within the Bolivarian Revolution. These interviews offer a compelling oral history of Venezuela's democratic revolution, from the bottom up.
Co-authors Carlos Martinez, Michael Fox, and JoJo Farrell will be touring in California and the East Coast between January 10, 2010 and February 10, 2010. If you would like to organize an event with them, please contact Carlos Martinez at carlos@globalexchange.org or 415-260-8566.
- Grassroots Voices from the Bolivarian Revolution
- Building Popular Power in Venezuela
- Latin American Social Movements & Progressive Governments