Home What we do The Right Livelihood Award Selecting the Laureates

Selecting the Laureates

Our research process helps our Jury choose the most innovative change-makers from all walks of life.

We receive nominations for the Right Livelihood Award from all regions in the world, covering a variety of topics. This allows us to acquire a sense of what people around the world perceive to be the most urgent problems – and crucially, who is working to solve them.

Each year, we manage upwards of 100 nominations for the Award. During a thorough research process, which lasts roughly from March until August, we build a clear understanding of the nominees’ activities, achievements and reputation among relevant stakeholders. We collect this information by reaching out to independent experts for comment and conducting background research and literature reviews. In some cases, we visit nominees in person to observe their work on the ground. All information gathered during this process is kept fully confidential.

Following our research, detailed reports are written and submitted to our Board and Jury. It is our Jury that ultimately decides on the year’s Laureates. Composed of Right Livelihood Board members, previous Laureates and their representatives, and independent experts, the Jury meets in late August to select the Laureates in a unanimous decision. Their decision is later announced at a press conference in Stockholm, Sweden.

Jury members

2010 LaureAte

Nnimmo Bassey

about nnimmo

Nnimmo is the Executive Director of Health of Mother Earth Foundation, an environmental/ecological think tank and advocacy organisation. He co-founded Environmental Rights Action (ERA) to deal with environmental human rights issues in Nigeria, serving as ERA’s Executive Director for two decades and a member of its Advisory Board until today. ERA is also known as Friends of the Earth Nigeria, and is the national chapter of Friends of the Earth International (FOEI).

Nnimmo received the Right Livelihood Award in 2010.

LEGACY HOLDER FOR 2012 LAUREATE GENE SHARP

Jamila Raqib

about jamila

Jamila Raqib is the Executive Director of the Albert Einstein Institution and a Research Affiliate of the Center for International Studies at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). She worked closely with Dr. Gene Sharp, the world’s foremost scholar on strategic nonviolent action. In 2009, she collaborated with Dr. Sharp to create a new curriculum titled Self-Liberation: A Guide to Strategic Planning for Action to End a Dictatorship or Other Oppression, which has been translated into Mandarin, Vietnamese, and Italian. She was a nominee for the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize.

1998 LAUREATE

Juan Pablo Orrego

about juan pablo

Juan is an ecologist and environmentalist. He is the current president of the Ecosistemas (NGO). He is one of the most influential environmental voices in Chile, and Latin America as consequence of his important participation in campaigns against damming projects in Chile that threatened local communities and valuable ecosystems.

He received the Right Livelihood Award in 1998.

BOARD MEMBER AND 2013 LAUREATE

Paul Walker

about Paul

Paul is the Director of Green Cross International’s Environmental Security and Sustainability programme. He has worked as a professional staff member for the Committee on Armed Services in the U.S. House of Representatives, where he organised the first US on-site inspection of a Russian chemical weapons stockpile in 1994, published several books, such as The Price of Defense and The Nuclear Almanac, and collaborated with a multitude of international organisations working on arms control and justice. He is known for his skills in bringing together and engaging various stakeholders from around the world. Since the mid-1990s, Paul is leading the Environmental Security and Sustainability Program at Green Cross International.

He received the Right Livelihood Award in 2013.

Director of Friends of Lake Turkana

Ikal Angelei

about Ikal

Ikal Angelei is a Kenyan environmental activist. She co-founded and still directs Friends of Lake Turkana, a grassroots organisation that ensures social, economic and ecological justice in the Lake Turkana Basin. She received the 2012 Goldman Environmental Prize for organising and speaking out on behalf of Indigenous communities against the construction of the Gibe 3 Dam.

Chair of the board

Gunilla Hallonsten

about Gunilla

Gunilla Hallonsten serves as Dean at the Church of Sweden in Malmö. She has previously held several positions at the Church of Sweden, including Acting Executive Director, Acting International Director, Policy Director and Policy Advisor on HIV, Gender and Theology.

former VICE CHAIR OF THE BOARD

Amelie von Zweigbergk

about Amelie

Amelie von Zweigbergk is a former politician for the Swedish Liberal Party. Before she started her own consultancy, Zweig Solutions, she was responsible for adult education at the Swedish employers’ organisation Teknikföretagen. Earlier, she was the Nordic representative on the UNESCO Executive Board. She is also chair of Learning for Active Citizenship and board member of the European Association for the Education of Adults.

Amelie was press secretary at the Ministry of Social Affairs from 1991-1994. From 1998-2001 and then again from 2003-2006, she was a project leader at the Swedish Social Insurance Agency.

In 2006, Amelie joined the Ministry of Education, where she became State Secretary in 2007. In 2010, she became State Secretary in the government coordination office (Statsrådsberedningen) and then again at the Ministry of Education, with responsibility for the Swedish student support scheme, adult education as well as youth, integration and equality. She held this post until 2012.

Board member

Joshua Castellino

about Joshua

Joshua Castellino serves as the Co-Executive Director of Minority Rights Group, bringing to the Jury a wealth of legal knowledge about minority rights, access to justice and the interplay between security, development and human rights. Previously, he was the Dean of the School of Law at Middlesex University which he founded in 2012.

VICE CHAIR OF THE BOARD

Juliane Kronen

about juliane

Juliane Kronen is a consultant and entrepreneur. She built a career in strategy consulting, working with the Boston Consulting Group (BCG) on worldwide assignments from 1994 to 2010, and from 2002 onwards as a partner and managing director. She was the global sector head for information technology in the telecommunications industry, and served as the European head of BCG’s global women initiative from 2004 to 2007, which aimed to sustainably increase the share of female consultants by improving recruiting and retention measures.

Juliane served as an advisor on strategic and organizational issues to the Board of the Right Livelihood Award Foundation from 2007 until 2010, when she was appointed as a Trustee.

BOARD MEMBER

Reinhard Loske

about Reinhard

Reinhard Loske brings decades of experience as a scholar, researcher and author on climate policy and social transformation. Previously, he has served as a member of the German Bundestag, including as environmental policy spokesman for the Bündnis 90/Die Grünen party. Between 2007 and 2011, he was Senator for the Environment, Construction, Transport and Europe in the city of Bremen.

Among other positions, Reinhard is a Senior Associate Fellow of the German Foreign Policy Council (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Auswärtige Politik) and a member of ECOROPA, the European Network for Ecological Reflection and Action.