{"id":7472,"date":"2026-06-01T09:08:06","date_gmt":"2026-06-01T13:08:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/human-rights-institute\/?page_id=7472"},"modified":"2026-06-01T09:08:06","modified_gmt":"2026-06-01T13:08:06","slug":"melysa-sperber-l04-strengthening-democracy-through-supporting-international-workers-rights-at-the-solidarity-center","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/human-rights-institute\/careers\/hoyas-in-human-rights\/melysa-sperber-l04-strengthening-democracy-through-supporting-international-workers-rights-at-the-solidarity-center\/","title":{"rendered":"Melysa Sperber (L\u201904): Strengthening Democracy through Supporting International Workers\u2019 Rights at the Solidarity Center"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Solidarity Center is one of the four core institutes of the National Endowment for Democracy, meaning in addition to the appropriations and foreign policy work of the organization, Melysa is focused on democracy, rights, and governance from a workers\u2019 rights lens. In recent years, that work has become more urgent as shifting political priorities have reshaped the landscape for democracy and labor rights programming.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Melysa explains that her job at the Solidarity Center is to confront these shifting political priorities. \u201cIn my role, I need to make sure Congress is appropriating funds that support programs that cover this kind of work,\u201d she says.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The programs Melysa is referring to range from supporting union organizing and collective bargaining efforts to providing legal assistance through global networks of labor lawyers. \"\"\u00a0The Solidarity Center\u2019s work aims to empower workers to advocate for themselves. In countries like Bangladesh, this can mean training lawyers, unions, and workers to monitor workplace safety and combat sexual harassment in garment factories. In Ukraine, it has involved helping unions transition to humanitarian support during wartime and now assisting veterans in reentering the workforce and training lawyers to facilitate that transition. <\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Across program-specific contexts, the goal and message of the Solidarity Center\u2019s work is consistent: \u201cDemocracy in workplaces strengthens democracies overall.\u201d By enabling workers to establish unions so they can effectively exercise their freedom of association and their right to collective bargaining, the Solidarity Center\u2019s programs strengthen democracy.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

From Implementation to Policy & Advocacy<\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

After graduating from Georgetown Law, Melysa began her career at the Tahirih Justice Center, where she worked directly with clients experiencing domestic violence, child marriage, and human trafficking. There, she saw firsthand how legal advocacy and policy reform could reinforce one another.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

She later moved to Vital Voices, where she spent several years implementing programs on gender-based violence prevention and women\u2019s leadership as the Africa Program Officer and then as the Director of Human Rights. Her work focused on labor conditions within global supply chains, particularly the exploitation of women workers who were exploited overseas. She started doing more work on the Hill, and leaned into how government appropriations intersect with the populations she worked with earlier in her career as a staff attorney at the Tahirih Justice Center.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Over time, and through her early career experiences, Melysa found herself drawn toward advocacy at the policy level. She started to shift away from implementation and toward government relations, philanthropy, and advocacy. \u201cI started to become really interested in how governments allocate resources and how those decisions shape what\u2019s possible,\u201d she says. That interest led her to Humanity United, where she managed a coalition advancing anti-trafficking advocacy and oversaw the foundation\u2019s government relations portfolio on trafficking and peacebuilding.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

After consulting for clients on advocacy related to immigration, gender equality, and human trafficking, and returning briefly to Vital Voices, Melysa realized she wanted to get back into working for an organization implementing the policies she had advocated for on the government relations and fundraising level. Her current position at the Solidarity Center brings those experiences together, with new challenges. In addition to advocating for funding across agencies like the Department of Labor and the State Department, Melysa has been navigating the fallout from the loss of significant U.S. government support for the Solidarity Center\u2019s labor rights and democracy programming.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Throughout her career, Melysa has worked across ideological lines, an aspect of her work she did not initially anticipate, but now sees as essential. \u201cOn issues like trafficking and democracy, I spend a lot of time working in coalition with different people, trying to find the space we can agree on,\u201d she says. \u201cBut if you can find areas of overlap, you can still make meaningful progress.\u201d<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe Need Good People Everywhere\u201d: Advice for Public Interest Law Students<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Her time at Georgetown played a formative role in shaping that perspective. Having earned a B.S. in Foreign Service and then a joint JD\/MPP from Georgetown, Melysa credits the University with fostering her commitment to social justice, activism, and her openness to exploring different career paths.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cGeorgetown made it easy to explore all of the different facets of public interest work,\u201d she recalls, referring to experiences ranging from internships with the African Commission on Human and Peoples\u2019 Rights and the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights to her work in the Center for Applied Legal Studies (CALS) clinic.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Melysa\u2019s relationships, which started at Georgetown, have been a defining feature of her career. \u201cEvery job I\u2019ve had has come through people\u2014people, connections and networks,\u201d Melysa notes. For students entering the public interest field, she emphasizes that building those relationships is just as important as submitting applications.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Looking back, Melysa describes her career not as a series of carefully planned steps, but as a process of staying curious and open to new challenges. \u201cI had no idea where I was going, but I knew it wouldn\u2019t be predictable or traditional. I was always looking for the outlier opportunities, ones that would touch my heart and make me want to work hard.\u201d<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Melysa encourages students to think expansively about where and how they can contribute. \u201cWe need good people everywhere\u2014government, nonprofits, firms,\u201d she says. \u201cThere are many ways to advance human rights.\u201d<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

That mindset continues to guide her today, as she navigates the increasingly difficult policy landscape of the United States\u2019 role in international aid and the human rights space. Even in challenging moments, she finds motivation in the impact of the work, and in the small but meaningful instances of progress.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cSometimes it\u2019s just tiny ways that people are able to come together,\u201d she reminds us.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Written by Edwina Tepper<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Solidarity Center is one of the four core institutes of the National Endowment for Democracy, meaning in addition to the appropriations and foreign policy work of the organization, Melysa […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14986,"featured_media":0,"parent":1615,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_price":"","_stock":"","_tribe_ticket_header":"","_tribe_default_ticket_provider":"","_tribe_ticket_capacity":"0","_ticket_start_date":"","_ticket_end_date":"","_tribe_ticket_show_description":"","_tribe_ticket_show_not_going":false,"_tribe_ticket_use_global_stock":"","_tribe_ticket_global_stock_level":"","_global_stock_mode":"","_global_stock_cap":"","_tribe_rsvp_for_event":"","_tribe_ticket_going_count":"","_tribe_ticket_not_going_count":"","_tribe_tickets_list":"[]","_tribe_ticket_has_attendee_info_fields":false,"footnotes":"","_tec_slr_enabled":"","_tec_slr_layout":""},"class_list":["post-7472","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"ticketed":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/human-rights-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/7472","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/human-rights-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/human-rights-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/human-rights-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14986"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/human-rights-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7472"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/human-rights-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/7472\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7475,"href":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/human-rights-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/7472\/revisions\/7475"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/human-rights-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1615"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/human-rights-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7472"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}