Students protesting for the climate

Photo Credit toVincent Ma Janssen/pexels

Our Team

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Nina Schlegel

Executive Director

Nina is a climate justice advocate, researcher, founder and Director of the Global Center for Climate Justice. Originally from Switzerland, she has worked for environmental nonprofits both large and small, local & state government, and international solidarity groups. Nina is active in numerous climate advocacy coalition spaces from the Coming Clean Network and Climate Advocacy Lab, to Declaration for American Democracy and others. Her research expertise includes: Green New Deal policy, the connection between democracy and climate justice, and urban climate justice.

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Nikki McCullough

Designer

Nikki is a freelance graphic designer and activist based in Boston with experience in everything from social media graphics and illustrations to brand design and animation. She chose graphic design as a career because it allows her to follow any passion and interest, from advocacy to sports branding.

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Melissa Sonntag

Energy Democracy Researcher

Melissa is Research Director at the Center, and specializes in energy justice policy and the law. She is the former Technology, Research, and Communications Coordinator for the Initiative for Energy Justice, which provides resources to advocates and policymakers to advance equitable state-level renewable energy transitions. Melissa is from Puerto Rico and speaks fluent Spanish.

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Laura Bernstein Torres

Pesticides & Food Systems Researcher

Laura serves as Associate Director at the Center, and West Coast Coordinator for the GND Resources Hub. She is current co-writing a major report on the global pesticide crisis and climate justice. She grew up in Chile and the United States, which has guided her devotion to globalization and environmental justice issues. She speaks fluent Spanish.

Tara Steckler

Researcher & Assistant Grantwriter

Tara is a Researcher at the Center, focusing on mapping out anti-environmental corporate power structures and using federal funds for climate justice initiatives. She received her B.A. in Environmental Studies and English from Tufts University. She grew up in Berkeley, California, and now lives in Brooklyn. In her free time, she enjoys reading, rock climbing, and knitting sweaters.

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Leann Jenks

Research Assistant

Leann is currently researching and writing a report on the issues surrounding fast fashion at the Center. Her role at the Center involves unraveling the complexities of fast fashion, aiming to explore new avenues for sustainability that align with her values. In her free time, Leann enjoys cooking, running, and climbing.

Kathia Teran

UX/UI Designer

Kathia is in charge of redesigning the Center's current main site. She is originally from Bolivia, and enjoys traveling and practicing photography.

Emily Wong

Summer Intern

Emily is a summer intern at the Center. She is interested in the intersection of economics, politics, and climate justice, especially environmental health. She studies Environmental Policy and Economics at Colby College. In her free time, she enjoys outdoor activities and gymnastics.

Fellows

Center Fellows come from all over the world, and have established a strong reputation for their achievements in working with policy makers, elected officials, environmental justice advocates, foundation officials, community activists, the media, and the general public. The Center also sponsors workshops, seminars, speaker series, and conferences. Center Fellows have been featured speakers at the National People of Color Environmental Leadership Summit II and many other national and international conferences, and often receive local and national media coverage for their efforts. Center Fellows are also affiliated with a number of scholarly journals and popular publications from around the world. Our reports, briefs, and other publications are contributing to the adoption of important government regulations and policies, as well as newly innovative programs and projects by foundations, non-profit organizations, and progressive social movements. We seek to provide intellectually rich and compelling analyses for those climate justice advocates wishing to turn knowledge into effective political action. If you are interested in becoming a Fellow with the Center, or would like the Center to help promote your works through our network, please get in touch.

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Samantha Agarwal

Fellow

Samantha has worked with numerous non-profit organizations on advancing the rights of indigenous people in India. Her current research and political work is focused on caste, class, and environmental justice politics in India. She is the author of the Center brief, India’s New Laws are Not Only Unjust, they Accelerate Climate Catastrophe.

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Alfred Brownell

Fellow

Alfred Brownell is an internationally recognized environmental rights activist. He is head of the environmental rights organization Green Advocates International and co-established the Alliance for Rural Democracy, the largest solidarity movement in Liberia. He received the Goldman Environmental Prize in 2019, which honors grassroots environmental activists who overcome repression to affect change.

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Daniel Aldana Cohen

Fellow

Daniel is is co-author of A Planet to Win: Why We Need a Green Deal. Daniel's current work on the politics of climate change investigates the intersections of climate change, housing, political economy, social movements, and inequalities of race and social class in the United States and Brazil. He is currently working on Green New Deal policy development with progressives in the United States and Brazil.

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Eve Croeser

Fellow

Eve is a long time activist and researcher going back to the anti-Apartheid struggles in South Africa. Her current work focuses on the geopolitics of climate change and climate justice, as well as on the implications that the advent of the Anthropocene has for global politics. These issues are discussed in her book, Ecosocialism and Climate Justice: An Ecological Neo-Gramscian Analysis.

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Nisrin Elamin

Fellow

Nisrin works on land rights, extractive industries, foreign land grabs, the climate crisis and the militarization of borders in East Africa and the Sahel. She spent over a decade working as an educator, organizer and advocate on issues related to migrant justice, de-militarization and resource rights through various organizations including Grassroots International, African Communities Together, the US Campaign for Palestinian Rights and the Malcolm X Grassroots Movement.

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Daniel Faber

Senior Fellow

Daniel Faber is a co-founder of the Center, and a Governing Board Member of Coming Clean and the Alliance for a Healthy Tomorrow. He also serves as Director of the Northeastern Environmental Justice Research Collaborative. He is the author of numerous works on environmental injustice, including Capitalizing on Environmental Injustice: The Polluter-Industrial Complex in the Age of Globalization. He has won numerous awards for his work on advancing the cause for environmental justice.

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Joan Fitzgerald

Fellow

Joan’s work focuses on urban climate action and strategies for linking it to equity, economic development, and innovation. In her fourth book, Greenovation: Urban Leadership on Climate Change, she argues that the climate strategies of too many cities represent random acts of greenness rather than integrated and aggressive action, and offers strategies for lagging cities to accelerate their action. Her ongoing Climate Just Cities Project examines strategies for post-Covid urban climate action to place equity at the forefront.

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Noel Healy

Fellow

Noel’s core is focused on the politics of fossil fuel extraction, divestment, and climate justice. He is also working on Green New Deal policy, and “just transition” strategies for fossil-fuel-rich countries in the global South. He is a contributing author for the IPCC’s 6th Assessment Report. Noel’s work has appeared in The Guardian, Scientific American, The Conversation, and Common Dreams. Colombian national radio Wradio, DeSmogBlog, The Times, and Gizmodo have reported on Noel’s research.

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Nahide Konak

Fellow

Nahide works on natural resource use controversies and environmental conflict in Turkey and the Middle East. She is especially interested in social movements and protests in the 21st century, climate change, climate migration and justice. She has currently researching the overdevelopment of water sources as a result of switching from fossil fuel energy sources to renewable energy. She is the co-author of Waves of Social Movement Mobilizations in the Twenty-First Century: Challenges to the Neo-Liberal World Order and Democracy.

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Laura Kuhl

Fellow

Laura is focused on climate adaptation and resilience in the global South. Her projects examine global adaptation finance, transformational adaptation, and resilience and transformation in Puerto Rico. She has studied innovation, technology transfer and adoption for adaptation as well as mainstreaming adaptation in development policy in East Africa and Central America. She is the co-author of “Evacuation as a Climate Adaptation Strategy for Environmental Justice Communities” in Climatic Change.

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Jonah Kurman-Faber

Fellow

Jonah is Research Director at Climate XChange. He is a climate and energy policy expert with a focus on decarbonization pathways, green stimulus, state policy, environmental justice, and public health. He serves as a technical resource for policymakers and leaders at the nexus of interdisciplinary economics and social movements. Jonah has authored multiple state climate bills and regularly advises campaigns on legislative design and governance.

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Ben Levy

Fellow

Ben is a researcher specializing in environmental justice movements; linkages between global capitalism and the fossil fuel industry; as well as corporate attempts to influence political processes at the local, state, and national levels. He is currently working on struggles against the siting of liquefied natural gas infrastructure in the Pacific Northwest and the attempts, on the part of regional utility companies, to frustrate the implementation of environmentalist policies in the cities of Seattle and Tacoma.

Michael Mikulewicz

Fellow

Michael is a critical geographer who studies the intersecting social, economic and political inequalities caused by the impacts of, and our responses to, climate change and other environmental issues in both the Majority World and the Minority World. Previously a Senior Fellow with the Glasgow Center for Climate Justice, he is currently a professor at SUNY.

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Sandra O'Neil

Fellow

Sandra’s work focuses on climate justice, studying specifically the unjust burden of climate crisis on the most vulnerable and least culpable populations. She has also worked on environmental justice, the unjust burden of hazardous waste, and in particular Superfund sites, on poor communities and communities of color. She is the author of Superfund Equity: Evaluating the Impact of Executive Order 12898.

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Omedi Ochieng

Fellow

Omedi work is focused on the search for justice, wisdom, ethics and beauty, and the constitution of “ecology,” “politics,” “economics” and “culture” through history. He is especially interested in understanding how human agency emerges from specific ecological and structural formations, and inflected by class, gender, race, sexuality, disability, Omedi is the author of Groundwork for the Practice of the Good Life and The Intellectual Imagination.

Dušan Pajović

Fellow

Dušan Pajović is the campaign coordinator of the pan-European movement DiEM25, where he is an ex officio member of the coordination collective, the organization's highest body. He is a regular columnist of the most read opposition media in Montenegro, Cafe del Montenegro (CdM). In the past, he has collaborated with many organizations including Humanity & Inclusion, Animal Save Movement, UNICEF and the United Nations (UN).

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David Pellow

Fellow

David’s work centers on social change movements, environmental justice, human-animal conflicts, sustainability, and social inequality. He has published a number of works on environmental justice issues in communities of color in the U.S. and globally. He has consulted for and served on the Boards of Directors of several community-based, national, and international organizations serving people of color, immigrants, Indigenous peoples, and working class communities.

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Juliet Schor

Fellow

Juliet research focuses on consumption, time use, and environmental sustainability. She is currently researching the relation between working hours, inequality and carbon emissions. Juliet is a recipient of the Herman Daly Award from the US Society for Ecological Economics, as well as the Leontief Prize. She has served as a consultant to the United Nations, at the World Institute for Development Economics Research, and to the United Nations Development Program.

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Jennie Stephens

Fellow

Jennie is focused on integrating social justice, feminist, and anti-racist perspectives into climate and energy resilience, social and political aspects of the renewable energy transition, reducing reliance on fossil fuels, energy democracy, gender in energy and climate, and climate and energy justice. Her book Diversifying Power: Why We Need Antiracist, Feminist Leadership on Climate and Energy argues that effectively addressing climate change requires diversifying leadership and redistributing wealth and power.

Advisory Board

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Isabelle Anguelovski

Isabelle is the Director of the Barcelona Lab for Urban Environmental Justice and Sustainability. Her research examines how urban plans and policy decisions contribute to more just, resilient, healthy, and sustainable cities all around the globe.

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James Boyce

Jim is an author, economist, and emeritus professor at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, where he is also a senior fellow at the Political Economy Research Institute.

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Tobita Chow

Tobita is the founding Director of Justice Is Global. A special project of People’s Action, Justice is Global works to build a just and sustainable global economy and defeat right-wing nationalism. Tobita is a leading progressive strategist regarding the US-China relationship.

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Gary Cohen

Gary Cohen has been a pioneer in the environmental health movement for more than 35 years. He has helped build coalitions and networks globally to address health impacts related to climate change and toxic chemical exposure.

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Chuck Collins

Chuck Collins is the Director of the Program on Inequality and the Common Good at the Institute for Policy Studies, where he co-edits Inequality.org.

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Noa Dalzell

Noa serves as the State Policy Director for Food Solutions Action, which works to shift food systems away from industrial animal agriculture. She is the former Director of the State Climate Policy Network at Climate XChange, a network of 15,000+ advocates and legislators working to advance state-level climate policies. She is the author of the our report on how factory farming fuels climate injustice.

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Phillip Ellis

Dr. Phillip Ellis is a distinguished practitioner-scholar and a recent fellow in democratic civic engagement at the University of Pennsylvania's prestigious Netter Center and Graduate School of Education. He brings over two decades of experience to the forefront of environmental and social justice movements, where his passion lies in crafting performance-driven teams and purpose-driven networks to tackle society's most wicked problems.

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Carolyn Fine Friedman

Carolyn Fine Friedman is a Board Member of Coming Clean, which is dedicated to the reform of the chemical and fossil fuel industries. She is also Chair of The Fine Fund.

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Ken Geiser

Kenneth Geiser is the former Director of the Lowell Center for Sustainable Production at the University of Massachusetts and the Massachusetts Toxics Use Reduction Institute. He is a founding Board member of the National Toxics Campaign, the Environmental Health Strategy Center, the Healthy Building Network, the Campaign for Responsible Technologies, and Story of Stuff. He is Chair of the Board of both Clean Production Action and Coming Clean.

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Dina Gilio-Whitaker

Dina (Colville Confederated Tribes descendant) is a lecturer of American Indian Studies at California State University San Marcos and independent educator/advisor on Indigenous environmental issues. Her most recent book is the critically acclaimed and award-winning "As Long as Grass Grows: The Indigenous Fight for Environmental Justice from Colonization to Standing Rock".

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Lisa Hoyos

Lisa is National Climate Strategy Director at the League of Conservation Voters. She is also Director of Climate Parents. Lisa formerly served as the National Director for Strategic Field Initiatives with the Blue Green Alliance, and engaged Labor and environmentalists in advocacy to scale up the clean energy economy and create jobs.

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Yumna Kamel

Yumna Kamel is the co-founder and Executive Director of Earth Refuge, a legal lifeline for climate migrants. Yumna is also the Legal Education Officer at Right to Remain, where she works to increase and improve public legal education about the UK asylum and immigration system.

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Josh Karliner

Josh Karliner is International Director of Program and Strategy for Health Care Without Harm (HCWH). In this capacity he directs HCWH’s International Climate Program and leads strategic development in other areas.

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Saul Levin

Saul Levin is a climate justice staff official who covers climate, labor, and transportation policy for Congresswoman Cori Bush. He was previously Senior Climate Advisor to Representative Deb Haaland before she was appointed Secretary of the Interior. Saul formerly headed the Harvard Climate Leadership Program.

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Raj Patel

Raj Patel is an award-winning author, film-maker and academic specializing on sustainable agriculture. He is a Research Professor in the Lyndon B Johnson School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas, Austin.

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Jamila Raqib

Jamila Raqib serves as the Executive Director of the Albert Einstein Institution and as a Research Affiliate of the Center for International Studies at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

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Annie Regan

Annie Regan is PennFuture's Senior Program Manager. She is also the Campaign Coordinator for ReImagine Appalachia, a GND-inspired regional coalition advocating for an economy that’s good for workers, communities, and the environment.

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Anthony Rogers-Wright

Anthony serves as the Director of Environmental Justice at New York Lawyers for the Public Interest. Prior to that, he was Policy Coordinator at the Climate Justice Alliance and Deputy Director at RegeNErate Nebraska.

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