Kerry Kennedy started working in the field of human rights in 1981, when she investigated abuses committed by US immigration officials against refugees from El Salvador. Since then, her life has been devoted to the vindication of equal justice, to the promotion and protection of basic rights, and to the preservation of the rule of law. She has led over 40 human rights delegations to over 30 countries. At a time of diminished idealism and growing cynicism about public service, her life and lectures are testaments to commitment to the basic values of human rights.

She is the author of Speak Truth to Power: Human Rights Defenders Who Are Changing Our World, which features interviews with human rights activists ranging from the famous (Helen Prejean, Marian Wright Edelman, the Dalai Lama, Desmond Tutu, Elie Wiesel, and Oscar Arias, to name a few) to lesser-known stories of courage. The book was also accompanied by a major photographic exhibit which opened at The Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C.; a theatrical presentation, written by Ariel Dorfman, based on the stories featured in the book; a television program which aired on PBS; and education and advocacy tools distributed to 10,000 high schools and colleges. Her most recent book is Being Catholic Now, a collection of essays written by well-known Catholics, discussing their faith and what it means to their lives in contemporary American society.

Kennedy served as executive director, and is now on the board of directors, of the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial, a nonprofit organization that addresses the problems of social justice in the spirit of her late father. She ran three programs: The National Juvenile Justice Project, which helps cities create more effective and less costly programs for dealing with young offenders; The RFK Journalism and RFK Book Awards, known as the “poor people’s Pulitzers,” which recognize those who prod our conscience and expose the problems of the dispossessed; and the RFK Center for Human Rights, which she founded in 1988.

Kennedy established the RFK Center for Human Rights to ensure the protection of rights codified under the UN Declaration of Human Rights. The Center provides a base of support to human rights defenders, and uncovers and publicizes abuses such as torture, disappearances, and repression of free speech; urges Congress and the administration to highlight human rights in foreign policy; supplies activists with the resources they need to advance their work; and creates other programs to advance respect for human rights.

Kennedy has worked on diverse human rights issues such as child labor, disappearances, indigenous land rights, judicial independence, freedom of expression, ethnic violence, impunity, the environment, and women’s rights. She has appeared on many television programs, and her writings have been widely published in national newspapers and journals. As a special correspondent for the environmental magazine TV program, Network Earth, she reported on human rights and the environment. She has also interviewed human rights leaders for Voice of America.

Ms. Kennedy is chair of the Amnesty International Leadership Council, and is a judge for the Reebok Human Rights Award. She serves several boards, including those of the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights, the Bloody Sunday Trust, and the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial. She is also on several advisory committees; has served in numerous political campaigns; and is a member of the Massachusetts and DC bar associations.