Georgetown Law established the Robert F. Drinan, S.J., Chair in Human Rights in 2006. This position is designed to bring distinguished human rights practitioners to Georgetown Law to teach and engage with our community.

Alfred Brownell

Environmental activist Alfred Lahai Brownell, Sr. is the 2024-2025 Robert F. Drinan, S.J. Chair in Human Rights. Alfred is the pre-eminent leader in environmental and climate advocacy in Africa. He has worked for decades to defend communities in West Africa and beyond that seek to protect natural resources from exploitation and secure the right to a healthy and sustainable environment for all people. Alfred is the founding president of Global Climate Legal Defense (CliDef), an NGO that provides legal representation and protection for environmental rights activists around the world. As the founding executive director of Green Advocates International, Alfred pioneered a framework for environmental law within Liberia’s legal system. Alfred’s efforts have led to significant successes, including the temporary protection of six million acres of forest from development by palm oil companies. He has spent decades defending communities, human rights defenders, and Indigenous Peoples in West Africa and beyond, advocating for the protection of natural resources from exploitation and securing the right to a livable climate and a healthy, sustainable environment for all. But his advocacy has come at a steep personal cost; in 2016, following repeated death threats and narrowly escaping an attempt on his life, Alfred and his family were forced to flee Liberia and now live in exile in the United States.

He is not staying silent. Instead, Alfred is turning the threats, risks, and challenges he has encountered into a proactive response, taking action, and building a support infrastructure for the Global Climate Movement. Across Africa, he serves as the Lead Campaigner for the Environmental Rights Legal Framework Coalition for Africa (ERA-Africa), which advocates for an environmental rights legal framework informed by lessons from the Escazú Agreement. Additionally, he leads the African Climate Platform, coordinating a team of over fifty African public interest lawyers and nearly one hundred civil society organizations and frontline communities. Together, they are preparing to submit a petition to the African Court seeking an advisory opinion on the human rights obligations of African governments in addressing the climate crisis.

Alfred has a passion for engaging with students and enriching law school communities with his human rights expertise. For the past few years, Alfred has shared his environmental and human rights advocacy experience with students at Yale Law School, where he taught and was the 2020–21 Tom & Andi Bernstein Visiting Human Rights Fellow. Previously, Alfred served as an associate research professor and distinguished scholar at Northeastern University School of Law, where he was honored by the Institute of International Education Scholar Rescue Fund with the inaugural Beau Biden Chair and was a senior fellow with the Program on Human Rights and the Global Economy. For these and other extraordinary accomplishments, Alfred received the 2019 Goldman Environmental Prize (known as the “Green Nobel”).

Read more about Alfred in Georgetown Law’s announcement.

As Georgetown Law’s Drinan Chair, Brownell will teach a course in the spring semester focused on environmental protection and human rights. He will also serve as a mentor to students and participate in the Human Rights Institute’s programming. Watch the Drinan Lecture, held in October 2024, here.