Advisory Board Member: Maria Banda, D.Phil. International Relations, University of Oxford, J.D. (Law), Harvard University

Maria Banda completed her doctoral dissertation in International Relations at Oxford University, which examined the evolving doctrine and practice of the “Responsibility to Protect” (R2P) in 2001-2009 from the perspective of both international relations and international law.  A Rhodes and a Trudeau Scholar, Maria is a graduate of Trinity College at the University of Toronto, Oxford University, and Harvard Law School. She has worked with several international organizations and written on Canada-U.S. relations, global governance, climate change, and the environment. She is a member of the New York State bar.

Advisory Board Member: Kathleen Davis, J.D. (Law) Queen’s University 

Kathleen Davis is a Canadian lawyer who has specialized in the field of international law. She is currently completing her doctorate at The University of Toronto Faculty of Law, where she is studying how the responsibility to protect and international criminal law can best be harmonized to achieve a more synergistic system of international peace, security, and justice. She also teaches international criminal law at Osgoode Hall Law School in Toronto. Kathleenhas provided assistance to the prosecution teams at the International Criminal Court, the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, and the Special Tribunal for Lebanon. She has also served in the Peace and Security Division of UN Women, where she conducted research and assisted in efforts to reduce the prevalence and impact of conflict-related sexual violence and gender discrimination. Prior to completing her LL.M. at NYU,Kathleen obtained her B.A. from The University of Western Ontario and her J.D. from Queen’s University. She completed her articles at Torys LLP, and is a member of the Bar of Ontario.

Advisory Board Member: Martha Hall Findlay, J.D. (Law), Osgoode Hall Law School

Martha is a former Member of the Canadian Parliament, and held several senior shadow Cabinet positions in the Official Opposition: Associate Finance; Transport, Infrastructure and Communities; Public Works and Government Services, and International Trade.  She served on the House of Commons Standing Committees on Finance; Transport, Infrastructure and Communities; Government Operations and Estimates, and International Trade.  She is known and respected across all party lines for her focus on respectful politics and her efforts to work constructively with colleagues of all parties. She has recently been appointed an Executive Fellow with the School of Public Policy at the University of Calgary, and as Chair of the Couchiching Institute on Public Affairs’ 2012 Conference.

Advisory Board Member: Naomi Kikoler, L.L.B. and B.C.L., McGill University, M.Sc. (Forced Migration), University of Oxford

Naomi Kikoler is the Director of Policy & Advocacy with the Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect where she oversees the Centre’s work on populations at risk of mass atrocities. Prior to joining the Centre she was a legal fellow with Amnesty International Canada, where she focused on national security and refugee issues. Naomi has worked as a legal consultant on genocide prevention, clerked in the Office of the Prosecutor at the United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, and interned with the Brookings-Bern Project on Internal Displacement at the Brookings Institution. She has a B.A. in Peace and Conflict Studies from the University of Toronto, an L.L.B. and B.C.L. from McGill University, and an M.Sc. in Forced Migration from Oxford University, where she wrote her thesis on the Rwandan Genocide. She is a member of the Bar of Upper Canada.

Advisory Board Member: John Kirton, Ph.D., Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies, M.A., Norman Paterson School of International Affairs at Carleton University

John Kirton is the director of the G8 Research Group, established at the University of Toronto in 1987. In 1992-93, he served as a Special Projects Officer in Canada’s Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, devising a strategy for Canada’s G7 participation. He has conducted media analyses of the G7/G8 Summits on behalf of the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade. He served on the Foreign Policy Committee of the National Roundtable on the Environment and the Economy, an advisory body to the Prime Minister of Canada, and participated in the preparations for the 1995 Halifax Summit. He was a member of the Canadian Government’s International Trade Advisory Committee from 1995 to 1997.

Professor Kirton is an Associate Professor of Political Science, a Research Associate of the Centre for International Studies and a Fellow of Trinity College at the University of Toronto. He has advised the Canadian government on G7 participation and international trade and sustainable development, and has written widely on G7/G8 summitry. Professor Kirton is the Principal Investigator of “Strengthening Canada’s Environmental Community through International Regime Reform” (the EnviReform project). He is editor of the G8 and Global Governance Series published by Ashgate.

Advisory Board Member: Erin Mooney, M. Phil., University of Cambridge, Ph. D., University of Cambridge

To be updated.

 

 

 

Advisory Board Member: Gilberto Rodrigues,  Ph. D., Pontifical Catholic University of São Paulo

Professor Rodrigues is currently a professor at the International Relations Program, Federal University of ABC (UFABC), Brazil, and a Board Member of the Coordinadora Regional de Investigaciones Económicas y Sociales (CRIES), a Latin American Civil Society Organizations Network based in Buenos Aires, Argentina, which is a founder and Steering Committee member of the International Coalition for RtoP (ICRtoP). He was the inaugural holder of the Brazilian Fulbright Scholarship Program on Human Rights for a Visiting Scholar at the Center for Civil and Human Rights at the University of Notre Dame (2010). He holds a Ph.D. in International Relations, a LL.B. from the Pontifical Catholic University of São Paulo, a MSc. in International Relations from the UPEACE, Costa Rica, and a Diploma in Conflict Resolution from the Uppsala University.

Advisory Board Member: Michael Valpy, Award-Winning Journalist, The Globe and Mail, D. Litt., Trent University

Michael Valpy is a journalist. He writes on politics, public policy, culture, ethics and religion. He also teaches media theory.

He began his journalistic career on The Vancouver Sun and became that newspaper’s associate editor and national political columnist. For The Globe and Mail, he has been a member of the editorial board, Ottawa political columnist, Africa correspondent, deputy managing editor and columnist on social and political issues.

He has produced public affairs documentaries for CBC Radio (Sunday Morning), written for Maclean’s, Elm Street, Shambhala Sun, Policy Options, Literary Review of Canada and Time (Canada) magazines, contributed chapters to several books on public policy issues, won three national newspaper awards (two for international reporting and one for the impact of children from dysfunctional families on the public education system) and been nominated for a fourth (for a profile of Michael Ignatieff), co-authored two books on Canada’s Constitution — The National Deal (1982) and To Match A Dream (1998) — and one on Canada’s emerging generation of adults — New Canada: Report on the Next Generation (2003).

He was awarded an honorary doctorate in literature in 1997 by Trent University and the Queen’s Jubilee Medal for his journalism in 2002. He is a senior fellow at Massey College at the University of Toronto and a fellow at U of T’s School of Public Policy and Governance. He also is the 2012 CanWest Global Fellow at University of Western Ontario’s  Faculty of Information and Media Studies. He teaches media theory in U of T’s St. Michael’s College book and media studies programme. His home is in Ontario’s Grey County.