Victoria Holt is the Director of the John Sloan Dickey Center for International Understanding at Dartmouth University. She was previously a Vice President at the Henry L. Stimson Center, focused on international security and multilateral issues. From 2009 to early 2017 Holt served as U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State, Bureau of International Organization Affairs, where she was responsible for developing policy guidance on issues before the UN Security Council, including regional crises, peacekeeping and political operations, sanctions and counterterrorism. She also led diplomatic efforts on Presidential initiatives on peacekeeping and atrocity prevention. Before joining the State Department, Holt was a Senior Associate and co-director of the Future of Peace Operations program at Stimson, leading studies on the United Nations and regional peace operations, the protection of civilians, targeted sanctions, rule of law, and U.S. policy. Earlier she was appointed Senior Policy Advisor (Legislative Affairs), at the State Department during the Clinton Administration; led Washington-based policy programs at non-governmental organizations; and worked as senior staff to Members of Congress, including Rep. George Hochbrueckner and Rep. Tom Andrews, focused on defense and foreign policy. She is a graduate of the Naval War College and Wesleyan University.
Victoria Holt
Lawrence Coe Lanpher is Of Counsel with K&L Gates LLP, focusing on litigation, employment law, and internal investigations. He clerked for the Honorable Thomas A. Flannery of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia in 1974–1975 before becoming an associate, then partner at K&L Gates’ predecessor. He also taught early childhood courses from 1968 to 1971. He holds a BA in international relations from Stanford University, a master’s degree in early childhood education from Hampton Institute, and a JD from Georgetown University Law Center.
David McGowan is the Vice President, National Security Services at Kaiser Permanente. As Kaiser Permanente’s senior security executive, he is responsible for the full service and delivery of the organization’s physical security functions including technology, security force management, asset protection, investigations, and executive protection, as well as security standard operating procedures for Kaiser’s diverse health maintenance and delivery channels. He is a member of Kaiser’s Enterprise Business Services and its Enterprise Shared Services Executive Leadership teams. He was formerly the Vice President, Global Protection Services at Tiffany & Co, and the President of the Board of Directors of the International Security Management Association, a global association of leading corporate chief security officers. He was the 2017 recipient of the Security Industry Association Insightful Practitioner Award. He holds a BA from the College of the Holy Cross.
Bishakha Mukherjee is a development economist and financial services professional. She has been closely involved with implementing the FATF Recommendations, the international standards for anti–money laundering and countering the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT) and proliferation. She had a long career as chief economic adviser at the Commonwealth Secretariat, where jointly with the UK HM Treasury she advised member governments on improving the effectiveness of their AML/CFT systems. She now works for a range of companies and organizations as an international business development adviser and financial sector consultant, with a particular interest in emerging markets, and has served on the boards of private equity funds. She is vice chair on the Board of the Commonwealth Association and an adviser to the Commonwealth Businesswomen’s Network on Investment and Access to Resources. She holds a BA with honors and a PhD in economics from the London School of Economics.
Jacqueline Oburu is Vice President for Human Resources and Administration at Search for Common Ground. She leads the organization’s human resource management functions globally, providing leadership oversight for diversity, equity and inclusion, leadership development, global talent acquisition and management, compensation and benefits, performance management, and employee recognition and engagement. She has served in several human resource leadership roles in the international development sector, working with World Vision, Catholic Relief Services, WorldFish, and ChildFund International and was Chief Talent Officer with Tenderloin Neighborhood Development Corporation, an affordable housing nonprofit organization based in San Francisco. She has more than 25 years of human resource management expertise, working and living in Africa and Asia for 12 years, providing human resource leadership in more than 40 countries. She is a board member for the Kenya Scholarship Fund and holds an MA in intercultural studies and leadership development from Fuller Seminary.
Angela Vigil is a Partner and the Executive Director of the Pro Bono Practice at Baker McKenzie LLP. She has been a practicing children’s rights lawyer for more than 20 years, publishing and giving presentations focused on criminal justice; human trafficking; child welfare; homeless advocacy; lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and other sexual minority rights; and various other issues related to human rights of children, youth, and emerging adults. She is also the chair of the Board of Trustees for the National Institute of Trial Advocacy. She brings her experience in social justice, public interest law, pro bono advocacy, and organization and leadership of nongovernmental and nonprofit organizations to help support the work of the Global Center. She received her JD from Northwestern University School of Law.
Howie Wachtel is the Director of Global Sanctions Advisory and Strategy at PayPal, where he oversees a team responsible for developing and implementing global sanctions policies and investigative standards, while engaging with international organizations and regulatory bodies. He previously worked as the Director of United Nations and Multilateral Affairs at the White House National Security Council, where he covered a range of issues involving peacekeeping, international justice, multilateral sanctions, and human rights. Prior to this position, he served as Acting Coordinator of Sanctions Policy at the U.S. Department of State, where he coordinated strategic analysis and action on U.S. sanctions policy initiatives, including multilateral outreach to the United Nations and the European Union. Previously, he was the Deputy Chief of the Sanctions and Counterterrorism Unit in the Political Section of the U.S. Mission to the United Nations. From 2006 to 2009, he was a litigation associate at Simpson, Thacher & Bartlett LLP in New York. He has taught at the University of Virginia School of Law, the Duke University School of Law, and New York University’s Center for Global Affairs.
Mercy Buku is a Senior Fellow at the Global Center and a Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialist, an Advocate of the High Court of Kenya, and Commissioner for Oaths and Notary Public. She is currently a legal consultant on anti–money laundering (AML) and countering the financing of terrorism issues in the mobile payments and banking sector and was previously the Senior Manager in the Money Laundering Reporting Office for Safaricom Limited (Kenya) where she was charged with the responsibility for overseeing AML efforts for M-Pesa. She has extensive experience as a trainer, consultant, and author in compliance and AML issues in the mobile payments and banking sector and has made presentations at various domestic and international AML workshops and conferences. She is also an Associate of the Chartered Institute of Bankers (UK). She holds a bachelor of laws honors degree from the University of Nairobi and an LLM in banking and financial law from the University of London.
Rachel Briggs is the former Executive Director of Hostage US, a nonprofit organization that works to ensure that U.S. hostages and their families get the support and guidance they need to survive the challenge of a kidnapping. She has been a writer and policy analyst working on preventing and countering violent extremism and other national security issues with governments and the private sector around the world. She was awarded an OBE (Officer of the British Empire) by Her Majesty the Queen in 2014 in recognition for her services to hostage families and kidnapping victims overseas. She is an advisory committee member for an initiative of Harvard University’s Berkman Center for Internet and Society to counter youth-oriented hate speech online, an Associate Fellow at the Royal United Services Institute, and a member of the Risk and Security Management Forum. She was a member of the Advisory Council of Wilton Park, an executive agency of the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office, from 2006 to 2015 and co-chair of the European Commission’s working group on the role of the internet and social media in tackling radicalization from 2012 to 2014.
Michele Cesari is a Senior Fellow for the Global Center. He provides consultancy services to government departments and international and national agencies on strategy design, proposal development, and evaluation of complex programs. With 17 years of international programming and research experience in fragile contexts, including eight years in East Africa, he has designed, managed, and evaluated projects and research initiatives investigating the modus operandi of al-Shabaab and other Islamist militant organizations and their impact on stability, as well as programs engaging multiple armed groups and private sector investment streams. Published in several books and journals, he has an LLB and LLM from Università degli Studi di Urbino ‘Carlo Bo,’ is completing an MBA at Heriot-Watt University, and is a Certified Sustainability Practitioner.