Bring a MADRE Speaker to Your Area!

In the current climate of conflict, MADRE Executive Director Vivian Stromberg and Communications Director Yifat Susskind have an essential perspective to share.

Vivian and Yifat speak at schools, community centers, places of worship and conferences across the country as well as internationally. Their talks are a terrific opportunity to learn more about US foreign policy, human rights crises around the world, and the initiatives for peace and justice of MADRE's sister organizations in Colombia, Cuba, Guatemala, Haiti, Iraq, Kenya, Mexico, Nicaragua, Palestine, Peru, and Sudan.

If you are associated with a university, high school, religious institution or community organization that can arrange for an honorarium and cover travel expenses, please contact us at (212) 627-0444 or email us

Speakers' Bios

Vivian Stromberg is the Executive Director and a founding Board Member of MADRE. Ms. Stromberg's areas of expertise include women's economic development, US foreign policy, healthcare, popular education, sexual violence, human rights, and child development. With an emphasis on gender in all areas of work, she speaks on a broad range of subjects, both in the United States and internationally, as a keynote speaker at conferences, seminars, and symposia.

As a MADRE representative to the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations, Ms. Stromberg has participated in numerous international conferences, such as the 1992 United Nations Conference on Human Rights in Vienna; the 1995 United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women and the NGO Women's Forum in Beijing, China; and the World Social Forum in Porto Alegre in 2002. She was also an Expert-in-Residence for the W.K. Kellogg Foundation in 1994. She has received awards and recognition from the New York City Council, the Committee for a Democratic Palestine, Gloria Steinem Women of Vision, United Bronx Parents, and Haitian Women in Solidarity. She has been featured in print media, radio, television, and film, including Ms. Magazine, The Progressive, Working Mother, The Gay Financial Network, and CNBC.

Yifat Susskind, MADRE's Communications Director, was born and raised in Israel and is a longtime advocate of Palestinian rights. Since joining the staff of MADRE in 1997, her critical analysis of US foreign policy, women's human rights, and development issues, has appeared in online and print publications such as CommonDreams.org, TomPaine.com, Foreign Policy in Focus, and The W Effect: Bush's War on Women (Feminist Press, 2004).

Ms. Susskind has been featured as a commentator on CNN, National Public Radio, and BBC. She has written for Middle East Research & Information Project (MERIP) and been profiled in Ms. magazine and New York City's Daily News. She is also the author of a book on US foreign policy and women's rights forthcoming.