Natalie Bridgeman

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2009

Natalie Bridgeman

Accountability Counsel

San Francisco, California, United States

Civil and Human Rights

The Bold Idea:

The Bold Idea: Partner with communities harmed by international finance and development projects to hold international institutions and corporations accountable and develop new accountability systems where none exist.

Imagine a community in rural India that is about to be forcibly displaced by a mine. The community was neither consulted about the mining project, nor offered resettlement support. A multilateral development bank and private corporations sponsored the project, and in the process, violated a long list of social and environmental standards. However, the project sponsors cannot be sued because of legal immunity and local corruption.

Accountability Counsel partners directly with communities seeking redress for harm caused by development projects and works to create broad, systemic change through the creation of a new Foreign Investor Accountability Mechanism (“FIAM”). At the grassroots level, Accountability Counsel conducts trainings regarding accountability tools and assists communities with strategies to implement those tools, including claims to accountability mechanisms and litigation. To implement the FIAM, Accountability Counsel is convening a series of forums engaging a broad range of key stakeholders.

Biography:

Starting from an early age when she spent time in apartheid South Africa and in the USSR with children from Chernobyl, attorney Natalie Bridgeman has worked on environmental and human rights issues, with a focus on development accountability. A graduate of Cornell University (where she was a Udall Scholar and recipient of the Schwerner National Activist Award) and UCLA School of Law’s Program in Public Interest Law and Policy (where she was Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of International Law and Foreign Affairs), she has worked with NGOs on advocacy campaigns in the U.S. and around the world, as a litigator at a large law firm, and as an accountability consultant for organizations and international institutions. Natalie is also a singer/songwriter in her vocal trio, Mayim.

Moment of Obligation: What experiences led to the desire to start your own organization?
In 1998, I spent a semester during college working at the Center for International Environmental Law in Washington DC where I was mentored by attorneys David Hunter and Dana Clark, both of whom I continue to work with today. They taught me the importance of the role of international financial institutions in human rights and environmental issues, and they also showed me how their work in coalition with other organizations was powerful enough to shift institutional practice. After that semester, I went to Chile to work at an environmental organization. While there, I traveled to the BioBio River where the indigenous Mapuche were protesting the illegal construction of a large series of hydroelectric dams on the River, which were displacing their villages and inundating their land. I stood a few feet away while the police tear gassed the eighty-year-old Mapuche women who were fighting for their land. I learned that the project was financed by an institution that used US taxpayer money – that my country was funding this injustice. They implored me to help. There was no turning back from development accountability work after that.

Gall to Think Big: What has given you the ability to dream big and take on deeply entrenched social and difficult problems? (Such as experiences, skills, events, etc.)
The communities I work with have in common that they have been unjustly harmed by a corporation or international institution: they include an indigenous community in Peru whose environment was poisoned by an oil company, a village in India that had their land and livelihoods stolen out from under them to make way for a mining project, and others who have been literally beaten into submission when they challenge similar injustices. On the other hand, I have been given the tools to work toward accountability through exposure to these issues starting from an early age, the fortune of having been born in a nation where citizenship confers power, and the benefits of a superb education and legal training. I do not take these privileges for granted and feel a responsibility to use them to address the challenges I see so plainly in front of me with solutions that are in reach. The gravity and complexity of these challenges require forceful and creative responses. I derive the courage and inspiration to develop and implement these responses from the people in these communities who are looking for ways to speak up and struggle against powerful institutions and corporations with their health, security and their children’s future at stake.

New and Untested: What's innovative about your new idea for social change?
No other organization offers communities harmed by international development finance the opportunity to receive training about the methods of advocacy that could be used to address their concerns and support in implementing their advocacy strategies. Those strategies may include complaints to the little-known accountability mechanisms of the international financial institutions, or litigation. Importantly, Accountability Counsel is the only organization to combine this community work with a plan of action to create a new Foreign Investor Accountability Mechanism to enable communities to hold corporations to their social and environmental policy commitments in cases where there are currently no avenues for redress and to provide corporations with a credible tool for risk management of disputes.

Seeing Possibilities: What are the most important qualities to be a successful social entrepreneur?
Leadership, creativity, and stubbornness.

Which musical artists/albums get you going and keep you inspired?
Ozomatli - a band I've been listening to and seeing live for years - they combine salsa, hip hop and rap and their lyrics are powerful, rockin' and multilingual. Iron and Wine for more mellow music and the poetic symmetry of their songs. And shamelessly, my own seventeen-year running vocal trio Mayim.

What books do you recommend (pleasure, work and anything in between)?
My favorite books touching on the issues I work on are:

• Mortgaging the Earth, a classic about the World Bank--Bruce Rich
• The Shock Doctrine--Naomi Klein
• The Red Tent--Anita Diamant, because I love historical fiction.

Which websites do you visit often (work and/or personal)?

• nytimes.com
• bbc.co.uk

What advice or quote do you keep close to your heart as a social change leader?
You must be the change you want to see in the world. - Gandhi.