Staff | Board
Staff
Yifat Susskind, Executive Director
Yifat Susskind works to make human rights a reality for all people. Before joining the staff of MADRE, she was part of a joint Israeli-Palestinian human rights organization in Jerusalem, using journalism, advocacy and political organizing in her work for peace.
At MADRE, Yifat has worked with women’s human rights activists from Latin America, Africa, and the Middle East to create programs in their communities to address violence against women, economic development, climate change, and armed conflict. Coupling this experience with her extensive writing on US foreign policy and international issues, Yifat enables audiences to grasp the real-life impacts of their government’s policies on women and families around the world, offering people concrete ways to take positive action.
Her critical analysis has appeared in online and print publications such as TomPaine.com, Foreign Policy in Focus, AlterNet, and The W Effect: Bush’s War on Women, published by the Feminist Press in 2004.
Lisa Davis, Esq., Human Rights Advocacy Director
Lisa Davis received her J.D. from CUNY Law School, where she was Editor-in-Chief of the New York City Law Review, and her M.A. in International Policy from American University. For over ten years she has worked as an advocate for human rights and has written extensively on international women's human rights issues, including on LGBTQ rights and sex workers' rights.
Natalia Caruso, Program Director
As Program Director, Natalia Caruso plays a key role overseeing MADRE’s work with sister organizations around the world. Natalia’s work includes coordinating humanitarian assistance, the provision of direct services, and human rights advocacy at the international arena. Originally from Argentina, she has a degree in sociology with research experience in Indigenous women’s rights.
Sunita Viswanath, Development Director
Diana Duarte, Communications Director
Stephanie Küng, Media Coordinator
Erica Hellerstein, Website & Online Membership Coordinator
Elizabeth Droggitis, Membership Coordinator
Elizabeth Fraser, Helping Hands Coordinator
Samantha Samuel, Program Coordinator
Roxana Diaz, Program Coordinator
Bradley Parker, Esq., Human Rights Advocacy Coordinator
Sandra Escauriaza, Grants Administrator
Vivian Stromberg, Senior Advisor
Vivian Stromberg has worked tirelessly for more than four decades to make human rights and social justice a reality for women and families. Her work is infused with a passion that has inspired thousands of women to stand up for their rights and demand change.
Vivian came of age in Brooklyn, New York during the Civil Rights Movement and played a key role in US-based organizing for nuclear disarmament, peace, and human rights-based foreign policy. In 1983, Vivian helped to found MADRE to bring attention to the US-sponsored wars in Central America.
Since co-founding MADRE, Vivian has worked extensively at the United Nations and with women in conflict zones on issues including: armed conflict, displacement, women's health, reproductive rights, economic justice, community development; Indigenous Peoples' rights, food security, sustainable development, and US foreign policy.
Board
Anne Hess is the co-Chair of MADRE's Board and as a founding board member since 1983, she has helped shape MADRE's vision and projects. In the early 1980s, Anne traveled to Nicaragua and met with mothers there. A mother of young children herself, Anne knew that other women in the U.S. would be as moved as she was by their stories and determination. Anne has spent the past 30 years working with a variety of non-profit organizations, whose missions of social justice she shares. Anne serves on the board of Community Resource Exchange, and Alliance For Justice. She is married, has two children, and lives in New York City.
Dr. Zala Highsmith-Taylor is the co-Chair of the Board of MADRE. She is retired from Medgar Evers College, City University of New York, where she was Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies and English. She currently resides in St. Petersburg, Florida, where she is a writer and visual artist whose paintings have been exhibited at several locations, including the Mahaffey Theater for the Performing Arts. She is currently revising a children's book, Timothy Chooses an African Name, which she wrote and illustrated. Dr. Highsmith-Taylor has been active in the African-American peace, justice, and women's communities throughout her adult life, and she has served on the boards and/or held membership in a number of community and national organizations. Her research and lectures have included the history, culture, and social and political struggles of African American people in general and women in particular, as well as the political economy of the United States. She has given a number of lectures and inspirational speeches at a variety of public schools, churches, colleges, and universities throughout the country, including Harvard, Colombia, Cornell, and the University of Maryland. Her awards include the Fannie Lou Hamer Award, Outstanding Faculty Award, Keeper of the Flame Award, and many service certificates awarded by community and student organizations.
Margaret Ratner-Kunstler, Vice-President, joined the board of MADRE in 1998. In 1968 She helped restart the Columbia Law School Chapter of the National Lawyers Guild (silenced by the Red scare), and worked at the newly created Mass Defense Committee to coordinate defense of those arrested during the Columbia University Protests. After a stint at legal Aid, Ms. Ratner became an expert on grand jury law, representing grand jury resisters nationwide and becoming the first director of the Grand Jury Project. Ms. Ratner worked at the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) as an attorney and educational director. At CCR, she she originated the Movement Support Network, work for which she was named ABC Person of the Week, and authored the now famous pamphlet , "If an Agent Knocks." Ms. Ratner is the President of the William Moses Kunstler Fund for Racial Justice, a foundation established in 1995 in the memory of her late husband to combat racism in the criminal justice system. With the Kunstler Fund, she has fought for the reform of New York State's Rockefeller Drug Laws and helped hundreds of nonviolent first-time drug offenders get out of prison. She has led fact finding visits to Palestine and refugee camps in Lebanon and worked with her daughter, the filmmaker Emily Kunstler, on video documentaries about the visits. She is an honorary board member of the Rebuilding Homes Campaign, dedicated to rebuilding Palestinian homes.
Linda Flores Rodriguez, Secretary, has been a social worker for thirty years. She completed her Bachelor's Degree at the University of Puerto Rico, and she received her Master's Degree from New York University. Most of her career has been devoted to human rights, with a focus on mental health and education. She has been a MADRE member since she first moved to New York in 1982, and she has been an active participant in community organizations in both Puerto Rico and New York since 1970. Currently, Linda advocates for social justice and human rights for communities that have been stripped of their basic human needs, both at home and internationally.
Laura Flanders is the host of "RadioNation" heard on Air America Radio and syndicated to non-commercial affiliates nationwide. She is the author most recently, of Blue Grit: True Democrats Take Back Politics from the Politicians (The Penguin Press, 2007) and also BUSHWOMEN: Tales of a Cynical Species (Verso, 2004), an investigation into the women in George W. Bush's Cabinet. "The W Effect: Sexual Politics in the Age of Bush", an essay collection compiled by Flanders, appeared in June, 2004 from the Feminist Press. Before joining Air America when it launched in March 2004, Laura hosted the award-winning "Your Call," Monday-Friday, on public radio, KALW, 91.7 fm in San Francisco. Her writing appears in The Nation, Alternet, Ms. Magazine, and elsewhere and her op-ed pieces have appeared in papers including The San Francisco Chronicle. Flanders was also founding director of the Women's Desk at the media watch group, FAIR and for more than ten years she produced and hosted CounterSpin, FAIR's nationally-syndicated radio program. Laura has also been a long-time supporter of MADRE and its programs.
Holly Maguigan teaches clinics in criminal defense and comparative criminal justice, a seminar in global public service lawyering, and a course in evidence as a professor at NYU's School of Law. She is an expert on the criminal trials of battered women. Her research and teaching are interdisciplinary. Of particular importance in her litigation and scholarship are the obstacles to fair trials experienced by people accused of crimes who are not part of the dominant culture. Professor Maguigan is a member of the Family Violence Prevention Fund's National Advisory Committee on Cultural Considerations in Domestic Violence cases. She serves on the boards of directors of the National Clearinghouse for the Defense of Battered Women and the William Moses Kunstler Fund for Racial Justice. She is also co-president of the Society of American Law Teachers, the largest membership organization of law professors in the U.S.
Marie Saint Cyr is a social worker by profession. Trained at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, she holds a Bachelor's degree in International Relations and a Master's Degree in Social Work. She has held an array of positions working with programs for women's health, child abuse and neglect research, and programs for women out of prisons in Philadelphia. She has developed and directed a comprehensive community clinic for Haitians in Florida, consisting of a day- care, a Credit Union, ESL and adult education classes and a medical clinic. She was the Director of the Haitian Coalition on AIDS in New York City and developed the first program for women (WARN) Women and AIDS Resource Network in Brooklyn NY. Responding to the needs of the constituency she serves, she became the first Haitian Deputy Commissioner in New York City under the Dinkins Administration. She was Deputy Commissioner for Human Rights, responsible for the Community Relations Department, The AIDS Discrimination Unit and initiated the Commission's Prison Project for Offenders with AIDS.
Pam Spees is a practicing attorney in Louisiana and a consultant in international law with a focus on women's human rights. Prior to setting up practice in Louisiana, she served as Program Director of the Women's Caucus for Gender Justice, an international advocacy network dedicated to ensuring that accountability for war crimes of sexual and gender violence and crimes against humanity were included in the treaty establishing the International Criminal Court. She now serves as an advisor to the Women's Initiatives for Gender Justice (formerly the Women's Caucus), which is now based in The Hague, to monitor the Court and continue the advocacy for accountability for violence against women. Pam is also a member of the Coalition for Women's Human Rights in Conflict Situations.
