Advocacy statements
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“Becoming an activist is not a rational thing:” A conversation with Laureate Walden Bello
When Walden Bello arrived in Stockholm in May 2026, it was to reconnect with a fellow activist from the Philippines pro-democracy movement of the 1970s and 80s, and to revisit the city where he received the Right Livelihood Award in 2003. In the decades since, he has remained a leading voice on the global left:…
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Walden Bello: The far right rose because the left abandoned working people
2003 Laureate Walden Bello sat down with Right Livelihood in Stockholm to discuss his new book “Backlash: The Global Rise of the Radical Right”. Far from concentrating blame on figures and parties like US President Donald Trump and Alternative for Germany, Walden argued the mainstream left, and its embrace of neoliberalism, created fertile ground for…
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“It is a crime against humanity:” Women Laureates call out gendered repression against activists
Women human rights and environmental defenders face escalating repression simply because of their gender and need stronger international protections to continue their work, Right Livelihood Laureates warned at a United Nations side event last week. The event, organised by Right Livelihood as part of the Women Laureates Hub and Exile Project programmes during the 62nd…
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Venezuela earthquake relief: How Cecosesola is mobilising community solidarity
One week after a powerful double earthquake struck northern Venezuela, Right Livelihood Laureate Cecosesola is helping coordinate relief efforts, demonstrating once again how community-led organisation becomes a lifeline in times of crisis. As emergency responders continue searching for survivors following the powerful earthquakes that struck Venezuela on 24 June, the cooperative network Cecosesola has transformed…
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Juan Pablo Orrego Silva on Chile’s new government: “The assault is totally regressive”
Chilean ecologist and Right Livelihood Laureate Juan Pablo Orrego Silva warns that President José Antonio Kast’s first 100 days in office have accelerated a decades-long model of exploitation and degradation. Setbacks in protective legislation and permissions for extractivism mark the current environmental decisions in Chile and beyond. The first 100 days of a new administration…
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“What was taken by force”: Aminatou Haidar on Western Sahara’s vanishing hope
When asked to close their eyes and imagine home, most people would reach for a familiar recipe, song or smell. Aminatou Haidar reaches for something different. “I see the prisons, the torture, the arbitrary detentions, the daily repression — even against children, women and the elderly,” she told Right Livelihood during a recent visit to…
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Civil society “could crumble” under Uganda’s new foreign agents law
On May 17, Uganda’s President Yoweri Museveni signed a “foreign agents” bill into law, aimed at restricting the flow of funding into civil society by criminalising organisations “acting on behalf of foreign interests”. Diana Nabiruma, the Programmes and Communications Manager at Africa Institute for Energy Governance (AFIEGO), says the law could collapse Ugandan civil society,…
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Laureate Helena Norberg-Hodge launches “The Real Economy” platform at Right Livelihood headquarters
Fatima Osam Abdalla, Helena Norberg-Hodge and Gustaf Skarsgård at the Right Livelihood headquarters in Stockholm
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Theo van Boven, who put human rights at the centre of international law, passes away at 91
Theo van Boven, one of the architects of the modern human rights system, has died at the age of 91. The Dutch lawyer and scholar spent his life fighting to put human rights at the centre of international law — not as an afterthought, but as its foundation. He died on May 9. Van Boven…
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‘Like going back to the same school’: Ales Bialiatski on prison, war and the world that collapsed outside his cell
For Right Livelihood and Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Ales Bialiatski, incarceration meant being held within walking distance of his own apartment while the world outside collapsed into war. On July 14, 2021, human rights defender Ales Bialiatski was arrested by Belarusian authorities alongside several of his colleagues. It was not the first time. “This was…