Jacob Mchangama – Executive Director
Jacob Mchangama is the founder and executive director of Justitia and a visiting fellow at the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education in Washington. In 2018 he was a visiting scholar at Columbia’s Global Freedom of Expression Center. He has commented extensively on free speech and human rights in outlets including the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, The Economist, Foreign Affairs and Foreign Policy. Jacob has published in academic and peer-reviewed journals, including Human Rights Quarterly, Policy Review, and Amnesty International’s Strategic Studies.Jacob is the host and narrator of the podcast Clear and Present Danger: a history of free speech and is the recipient of numerous awards for his work on free speech and human rights.
Christian Bjørnskov – Affiliate Senior Research Fellow
Christian Bjørnskov is professor of economics at Aarhus University in Aarhus, Denmark. He is also affiliated research at the Research Institute of Industrial Economics (IFN) in Stockholm, Sweden. His research focuses mainly on public choice and political economy, and has featured in a wide range of journals including the American Journal of Political Science, Journal of Development Economics, Journal of Conflict Resolution and Public Choice. Bjørnskov’s recent research has focused on how the freedom of speech is protected after emergencies and terrorist attacks.
Natalie Alkiviadou – Senior Research Fellow
Natalie Alkiviadou’s research focuses on free speech, ‘hate speech’ and the far-right. Her monograph ‘The Far-Right in International and European Law’ was published by Routledge in May 2019 and her second monograph ‘Legal Challenges to the Far-Right: Lessons from England and Wales’ was published by Routledge in December 2019. She has several publications in a wide range of peer-reviewed journals. Natalie has worked in higher education for the last eight years, teaching subjects related to International Human Rights Law and European Law. She has worked with civil society, educators and public servants in the framework of training and capacity building on the freedom of expression and related themes.
Lars Hvidberg – Press and Communications
Lars Hvidberg is it communcations director for Justitia and the Future of Free Speech. He is a journalist, writer and a former speech writer. He is the co-author of Ahmed Akkari’s book Mod til at tvivle (2018). He has an M.A. from the University of Copenhagen, and an M.S. in Journalism from Columbia University, New York.
Adeline Lee – Affiliate Fellow
Adeline Lee works at the American Civil Liberties Union’s Speech, Privacy and Technology Project dedicated to expanding and defending First and Fourth Amendment freedoms amid changes in science and technology. Prior to the ACLU, Adeline helped establish the Campus Free Speech Program at PEN America, where she worked with university officials, faculty, and students to promote greater dialogue and understanding around principles of free expression following speech- and race-related controversies.
Raghav Mendiratta – Affiliate Fellow
Raghav Mendiratta is an Indian qualified advocate and a legal researcher specialising in areas of freedom of speech, privacy and criminal law. He is pursuing an LL.M. in Information Technology, Media and Communication law at the London School of Economics (LSE) where he is also a member of the Teaching Committee. He is an alumnus of the Annenberg-Oxford Media Policy Institute and has been a long-term Legal Researcher for Columbia Global Freedom of Expression, New York.
Suthan Krishnarajan – Affiliate Fellow
Suthan Krishnarajan is an Affiliate Fellow for the Future of Free Speech Project where he is responsible for collecting and analyzing the global survey data on freedom of speech in more than 25 countries. He is an Assistant Professor in Political Science at Aarhus University focusing on regime instability in democracies and autocracies around the world historically as well as today. Currently, his primary focus is on public perceptions of undemocratic behavior in Western democracies today. His PhD dissertation won the 2019 Aarhus University Research Foundation PhD Award, and his work has been published in leading international journals such as International Studies Quarterly and Journal of Conflict Resolution.
Svend-Erik Skaaning – Affiliate Fellow
Svend-Erik Skaaning is affiliate fellow for the Future of Free Speech Project, where he will work on the opinions of ordinary citizens related to free speech. This work will be based on surveys from a broad selection of countries from all world regions. Skaaning is professor of political science specialized in comparative studies of democratization, civil liberties, and the rule of law. He is currently working on historical patterns of political regime changes. His most recent books – on the measurement of democracy and on democratic stability in times of crisis, respectively – have been published with Cambridge University Press and Oxford University Press.
Agnès Callamard – Director, Columbia Global Freedom of Expression
Dr. Agnès Callamard is the Director of Columbia University Global Freedom of Expression, an initiative seeking to advance understanding on freedom of expression global norms, and Special Adviser to the President of Columbia University, first amendment scholar Lee Bollinger. Agnès has advised senior levels of multilateral organizations and governments around the world and has led human rights investigations in more than 30 countries. She has published broadly in the field of human rights, women’s rights, refugee movements and accountability and holds a PhD in Political Science from the New School for Social Research in New York.
Hawley Johnson – Associate Director, Columbia Global Freedom of Expression
Hawley has over twelve years of experience in international media development both academically and professionally, with a focus on Eastern Europe. She recently worked with the award winning Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project to launch the Investigative Dashboard (ID), a joint effort with Google Ideas offering specialized databases and research tools for journalists in emerging democracies. She has a M.A. from Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs and a B.A. in International Affairs from American University.
Bach Avezdjanov – Program Officer, Columbia Global Freedom of Expression
Bach Avezdjanov is the Program Officer for Columbia Global Freedom of Expression, where he largely focuses on research and analysis of legal trends related to freedom of expression in Russia and Central Asia. Bach holds a law degree from the Boston University School of Law and is fluent in Russian.