EAD Announces Plenary Panel to Keynote “Systems of Global Exploitation”

DECEMBER 19, 2014 – WASHINGTON, DC —  Ecumenical Advocacy Days for Global Peace with Justice (EAD) is pleased to announce the panel of speakers who will keynote the Sunday morning “international” policy plenary at its 13^th annual national gathering on April 19, 2015. The theme for the gathering is “Breaking the Chains: Mass Incarceration and Systems of Exploitation,” and the title for the plenary is “Systems of Global Exploitation.”

At EAD 2015, Christian advocates will join together in building a movement to shake the foundations of systems of human exploitation (Acts 16:16-40), including a prison-industrial system that incarcerates millions of people in the U.S. and abroad. The theme description for the gathering reads in part, “A world that incarcerates so many and allows some to profit from the exploitation of slave, trafficked and forced labor remains far from the ‘beloved community’ which we are all called to seek. At EAD, we will confess our personal and corporate failure to break the chains of poverty, racism, and greed institutionalized in our laws, economy, and social behaviors that collude to perpetuate such human exploitation and strip civil and human rights.”

During the Sunday, April 19^th morning plenary, panelists will give example to how “imprisonment” is a worldwide problem that takes various forms, as everywhere people around the world remain trapped in detention centers, prisons, factories and drug wars that bind and dehumanize individuals for political or economic profit.  During the plenary, EAD participants will face the reality of mass incarceration and corporate exploitation with a particular look at issues affecting Africa, Asia Pacific, Latin America and the Middle East – and the role that the U.S. plays.   Presenters will explore and give vision to how just and faithful national policies could bring liberation both to the prisoner and to a world in need of restoration.

Plenary speakers include:

Moderator

David Schilling is Senior Program Director for Human Rights & Resources at the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility. He joined the staff at the ICCR in  1994 and has worked with ICCR members and allies to engage corporations, cross-sectoral and multi-stakeholder initiatives on human rights in corporate operations and global supply chains.  He has participated in delegations to a number of countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America visiting factories and meeting with workers and non-governmental organizations.  For the past ten years, David has provided staff leadership for ICCR’s programmatic initiatives to counter human trafficking and modern day slavery in the US and globally. Read More About David.

Keynote Panel

For Africa:

Emira Woods is the Global Client Principal for Social Impact Programs at ThoughtWorks, a technology firm commited to social and economic justice. She is originally from Liberia. From 2003 to 2014, she was co-director of Foreign Policy In Focus at the Institute for Policy Studies, and an expert on U.S. foreign policy with a special emphasis on Africa and the developing world. She has written on a range of issues from debt, trade and development to U.S. military policy. Emira serves on the Board of Directors of Africa Action, Just Associates, Global Justice and the Financial Policy Forum. She is also on the Network Council of Jubilee USA.Read more about Emira.  

For Asia-Pacific:

Father Shay Cullen is the founder of People’s Recovery Empowerment and Development Assistance Foundation in the Philippines. He has been nominated three times for the Nobel Peace Prize and other Human Rights Awards, is a Missionary priest from Ireland and a member of the Missionary Society of St. Columban and has worked protecting women and children and human rights in the Philippines since 1969. He has received several human rights awards and has been nominated three times for the Nobel Peace Prize and other human rights awards. He has testified before the U.S. Congress, The Philippine Senate and is a well known speaker and facilitator at numerous other international conferences. Read more about Father Shay.

For Latin America:

Joanne Blaney is a Maryknoll lay missioner, currently serving in Brazil. She lives in the mega-city of Sao Paulo and works at the Human Rights and Popular Education Center of Campo Limpo. Her primary ministry is in training educators and leaders of community and church groups in violence prevention and restorative justice practices in order to resolve interpersonal and group conflicts. Joanne and her teammates travel throughout Brazil to teach courses on anger management, forgiveness, non-violent communication, reconciliation, mediation of conflicts and restorative practices.  The workshops and courses are given in the popular education-holistic model of Paulo Freire and are accompanied by on-going supervision so that participants become multipliers of the course. Read more about Joanne.

For the Middle East:

Raed Jarrar is the Policy Impact Coordinator for American Friends Service Committee in  Washington, D.C., and is of Iraqi and Palestinian descent. Since his immigration to the U.S. in 2005, he has worked on political and cultural issues pertaining to U.S. engagement in the Arab and Muslim worlds. He is widely recognized as an expert on political, social, and economic developments in the Middle East. He has testified in numerous Congressional hearings and briefings, and he is also a frequent guest on national and international media outlets in both Arabic and English. Read more about Raed.

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