Peace Brigades International-Canada is governed by an exceptional volunteer board of directors. The Board of Directors provides strategic direction to the organization, ensures stringent financial oversight, and helps to build our overall capacity to defend human rights. Each member is elected for a term of two years and may sit on the Board for a maximum of six consecutive years.

Ed Bianchi, Ottawa: Ed is the Programs Manager at KAIROS, an ecumenical movement for ecological justice and human rights. He was previously the coordinator of their Indigenous Rights Program. Ed has a Bachelor of Journalism (Television) from Carleton University and a Masters Degree in Fine Arts (Film) and Environmental Studies.

Paul Bocking, Toronto: Paul is a lecturer in labour studies at McMaster University and geography at the University of Toronto, and an elected local officer of the Ontario Secondary School Teachers’ Federation. He studies labour internationalism, geographies of labour, and teachers’ work in Canada, the US and Mexico.

Peter Cross, Hamilton: Peter is a retired partner of Taylor Leibow, chartered accountants. He has been involved with supporting refugee settlement in Canada since 1979. He is an active Quaker and a trustee of the Canadian Yearly Meeting (Quakers) and the Samuel Rogers Memorial Trust.

Fiona Meyer Cook, North Cowichan: Fiona is a Professor of Social Work at Vancouver Island University. She is a past coordinator of CCIC’s Americas Policy Group and worked for the Native Women’s Association of Canada. She is completing her Ph.D. in Social Work and Political Economy at Carleton University.

Heather Neun, Denman Island: Heather is a lawyer specializing in human rights and labour law. She is also on the Board of Lawyers’ Rights Watch Canada, for which she has monitored attacks on human rights defenders in Colombia and Guatemala. Heather recently completed her LL.M. and her thesis examined conceptions of the right to equality as between Canada and the Inter-American human rights system.

Luis Van Isschot, Toronto: Luis is a Professor of History at the University of Toronto specializing in the study of social movements, popular radicalism, political violence and human rights. He is the author of ‘The Social Origins of Human Rights: Protesting Political Violence in Colombia’s Oil Capital, 1919-2010’.

Brent Patterson, Ottawa: Brent is the new Executive Director of Peace Brigades International-Canada. He has 20+ years with non-governmental organizations. He has a Masters Degree in International Relations from York University.