Human Rights: Conversations Across Generations

Human rights defenders are essential to every movement for justice. They expose abuses, defend their communities, challenge those in power, and help advance the rights many of us rely on every day. Yet across the globe, the space for this work is rapidly shrinking, making the defense of human rights itself an increasingly dangerous act. Our guest is Guadalupe Marengo, Head of Amnesty International...

Professor Terry Coonan is the Founder and Executive Director of the Florida State University Center for the Advancement of Human Rights and Associate Professor of Criminology at Florida State University. Terry has created an interdisciplinary home for students and faculty working across law, film, social work, religion, and public service. Before he founded the FSU Center, Terry was one of Profess...

Professor Manfred Nowak has helped shape international human rights law for more than four decades. An Austrian human rights lawyer, academic, and former United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture, Manfred has spent his career investigating some of the world's most hidden human rights violations. His work has taken him into prisons, detention centers, and conflict zones across the globe. Along t...

We are so lucky to welcome Brian Derrick, Founder of Oath, to the show. Oath is a data-driven political giving platform designed to help donors make more strategic decisions about where to direct their contributions. By analyzing thousands of races across the country, Oath helps donors identify candidates and campaigns to support. Brian is one of Meredith's favorite go-to political strategists, he...

Today we are joined by Professor Tara Van Ho, a leading scholar in the field of business and human rights whose work examines the growing intersection of corporate power, economic inequality, international law, and human dignity. Tara is a Professor of Law and Director of the International Legal Studies Program at St. Mary’s University School of Law. Prior to joining St. Mary’s, she taught at the...

Iain Guest is a journalist, human rights advocate, founder of The Advocacy Project, and former adjunct professor at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service, where he taught human rights after decades of work across international media, the United Nations, and grassroots advocacy movements around the world. From documenting disappearances in Argentina and producing BBC documentaries, to w...

Professor Richard Ashby Wilson joins us for a timely and important conversation on human rights, hate crime enforcement, authoritarianism, and the widening gap between laws written on paper and justice experienced in everyday life. A longtime colleague and friend of Professor Bert B. Lockwood, Richard is currently Professor of Anthropology and Co-Director of the Princeton University Human Rights I...

We are thrilled to welcome Professor Dina Francesca Haynes, Executive Director of the Schell Center for International Human Rights at Yale Law School, and a nationally recognized expert in immigration and refugee law, human trafficking, and gender and conflict. Her work has taken her to some of the world’s most challenging environments, including Rwanda, Bosnia, and Afghanistan, where she worked a...

In this episode of Human Rights: Conversations Across Generations, we welcome Professor Joe Tomain, former Dean of the University of Cincinnati College of Law and the Wilbert and Helen Ziegler Professor of Law, a distinguished scholar in energy law and policy and a longtime colleague and supporter of the Urban Morgan Institute for Human Rights. Drawing on decades of leadership in higher education...

This week, we welcome Professor Mark Gibney to the show. Mark Gibney is the Carol G. Belk Distinguished Professor at UNC Asheville, longtime director of the Political Terror Scale, and one of the leading voices in international human rights scholarship. He is a longtime friend and colleague of Professor Bert Lockwood, marking more than 40 years of friendship this year. Meredith’s own friendship wi...

"The theater places stories in front of hearts and minds as an experience that is living and transforming." These words from award-winning playwright and librettist Catherine Filloux capture the visceral power of the arts in the pursuit of human rights. For over 30 years, Catherine has used her creative compass to navigate the complexities of genocide, displacement, and environmental justice. An a...

We are honored to welcome Lacey Stone to Human Rights: Conversations Across Generations. As the Chief Development Officer at USA for UNHCR , the U.S. partner of the United Nations Refugee Agency, she works at the intersection of philanthropy, partnerships, and global humanitarian impact. With more than two decades of experience across organizations, including UNICEF USA, PATH, and St. Jude Childre...

This week, we welcome Dr. Xanthe Scharff to the show. She is the Managing Director for External Affairs and Editor-at-Large at the Freedom Fund , where she works to strengthen global efforts to end modern slavery by supporting and investing in frontline partners who are closest to the problem and best positioned to drive lasting change within their own communities. With more than 20 years of exper...

In this episode of Human Rights: Conversations Across Generations, we are joined by Julie Leftwich, founder of the International Peace and Security Initiative at the University of Cincinnati College of Law and a deeply respected voice in peacebuilding, international law, and human rights. Julie brings to this conversation a remarkable body of work shaped by years of engagement with conflict, diplo...

Professor Mark Godsey has spent his career confronting one of the most profound human rights failures within the legal system: the incarceration of innocent people. A former federal prosecutor and longtime professor at the University of Cincinnati College of Law, Mark is the co-founder and director of the Ohio Innocence Project, one of the nation’s leading innocence organizations. Through his work...

In this powerful multigenerational conversation, we are honored to welcome our dear friend and civil rights attorney Leah Watson , whose work at the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) places her at the forefront of defending constitutional rights and advancing racial justice across the United States. Leah’s advocacy focuses on protecting freedom in education, challenging classroom censorship, a...

Today, we welcome Professor Bill Schabas, one of the world's foremost scholars of international criminal law and genocide, joining us from his farmhouse in France. Bill has devoted his career to defining, investigating, and prosecuting mass atrocity crimes. He served with the tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda, advised the International Criminal Court, and chaired the United Nations Co...

Jewher Ilham joins us for a powerful conversation about family, justice, and the cost of repression. She is a Uyghur human rights advocate and the daughter of Ilham Tohti, an economist and professor who dedicated his life to peaceful dialogue and advocacy for the Uyghur community and was later unjustly sentenced to life in prison by the Chinese government. As a father-daughter podcast, this conver...

In this first episode of 2026, Human Rights: Conversations Across Generations, we welcome Professor Roger Clark, one of the world’s leading figures in international criminal law and human rights. Over a distinguished career that included more than four decades teaching at Rutgers University Law School, Professor Clark educated generations of lawyers while contributing directly to the development o...

In this episode of Human Rights: Conversations Across Generations, we are honored to welcome Professor Cees Flinterman, one of the most respected figures in international human rights law and one of Professor Bert Lockwood’s oldest friends and collaborators. Their friendship began in 1970 while studying in the graduate law program at the University of Virginia, an experience that helped shape para...

We are honored to welcome Professor Rebecca J. Cook, a pioneering scholar whose work has transformed women’s human rights and reproductive justice around the world. Rebecca has also been a close friend of our family for more than thirty years, first connecting with my father, Professor Bert B. Lockwood, through her contributions to Human Rights Quarterly and the University of Pennsylvania Press hu...

Today’s episode is a very special tribute to the life and legacy of our dear friend, and a true leader in international law, the late Sir Nigel Rodley. It is our privilege to be joined by his wife, and our close friend, Lyn Rodley. Nigel’s remarkable journey began at New York University in the International Studies Department, where he studied alongside both of my parents. He went on to become a f...

This week, we sit down with Sister Helen Prejean, one of the most influential moral leaders of our time and a guiding force in the movement to end the death penalty. For more than three decades, she has accompanied people on death row with dignity, supported families affected by violence, and challenged the nation to confront the human cost of state killing with honesty and compassion. She joins u...

In this episode of Human Rights: Conversations Across Generations, we are honored to welcome The Honorable Unity Dow, a trailblazing jurist, author, and human rights advocate from Botswana. Unity is also a cherished friend of the Institute and a long-standing partner of the Urban Morgan Institute for Human Rights. The Institute’s inaugural founder and director, Professor Bert Lockwood, supports th...

This week, we welcome Eric Stover, an esteemed colleague and pioneer in human rights investigations. As a Research Professor and Co-Faculty Director of the Human Rights Center at the University of California, Berkeley School of Law, Eric has spent decades at the forefront of applying science to pursue justice. He is a recipient of the 2024 American Association for the Advancement of Science Award....