Shawna Bader-Blau

Shawna Bader-Blau leads the Solidarity Center—the largest global worker rights organization based in the United States—and its 300-plus staff, 30 field offices and programs in more than 60 countries. Shawna also hosts The Solidarity Center Podcast. She has served as executive director since October 2011.

Shawna is an advocate and activist for safe, dignified and family-supporting livelihoods—where workers can exercise their fundamental rights and shape working conditions and public policies that impact their lives. She is a leader in helping link the human rights community with the labor movement’s struggle to protect worker rights. She works to ensure that labor rights are part of policy discussions on international development and within the women’s movement and broader civil society.

Shawna was the 2019 Alice B. Grant Labor Leader in Residence at Cornell University’s School of Industrial and Labor Relations and the 2022 co-recipient of the Julia Vadala Taft Outstanding Leadership Award from InterAction. She serves on the board of the Business and Human Rights Resource Center and on the advisory board of Foreign Policy for America. She holds a master’s degree from Georgetown University and a bachelor’s degree from the University of California, Berkeley. Follow Shawna on X at @Shawna_SolCntr.