Advisory Council

María Antonieta Alcalde 

María Antonieta Alcalde serves as the director of Ipas Latin America and the Caribbean, based in Mexico City. She brings a wealth of experience in the field of sexual and reproductive health and has been a dedicated advocate for the rights of women and youth since her time as a student at the Autonomous University of Mexico.

With 14 years of service at the International Planned Parenthood Federation/Western Hemisphere Region, Ms. Alcalde most recently held the position of director of advocacy and director of the UN Liaison office in New York of the entire IPPF.

In addition, she has spearheaded various youth initiatives in Mexico. She is the founder of Balance and Elige, Red de Jóvenes por los Derechos Sexuales y Reproductivos, a prominent organization advocating for the sexual and reproductive rights of young people in Mexico. Ms. Alcalde holds a master’s degree in gender and public policies and diplomas in youth leadership and gender studies, complementing her bachelor’s degree in accounting.

Radhika Balakrishnan

Radhika Balakrishan is a Professor of Women’s and Gender and Sexuality Studies at Rutgers University and holds a Ph.D. in Economics from Rutgers University. Formerly, she held the role of Faculty Director at the Center for Women’s Global Leadership (CWGL) at Rutgers. Radhika currently sits on the board of the Global Initiative of Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights (GI-ESCR) and is a member of the Global Future Council on the Future of the Care Economy.

Throughout her career, her roles include serving as a Commissioner for the Commission for Gender Equity for the City of New York and participating in the Global Advisory Council for the United Nations Population Fund. She was President of the International Association for Feminist Economics (IAFFE) from 2020 to 2021. She has chaired the Board of the United States Human Rights Network and the Board of the Center for Constitutional Rights. Her prior academic experience includes a Professor of Economics and International Studies position at Marymount Manhattan College from 2003 to 2009. Additionally, she contributed her expertise to the Ford Foundation as a program officer in the Asia Regional Program from 1992 to 1995.

Radhika Balakrishnan is the co-author of Rethinking Economic Policy for Social Justice: The radical potential of human rights with James Heintz and Diane Elson (Routledge, 2016). She is the co-editor with Diane Elson of Economic Policy and Human Rights: Holding Governments to Account (Zed Books, 2011). She edited The Hidden Assembly Line: Gender Dynamics of Subcontracted Work in a Global Economy (Kumarian Press, 2001) and co-edited Good Sex: Feminist Perspectives from the World’s Religions, with Patricia Jung and Mary Hunt (Rutgers University Press, 2000). She is the author of Why MES with Human Rights: Integrating Macro Economic Strategies with Human Rights (Marymount Manhattan College, 2005) and has authored numerous articles in books and journals.

Her research and advocacy work has sought to change the lens through which macroeconomic policy is interpreted and critiqued by applying international human rights norms to assess macroeconomic policy.

V. Eudene Barriteau

Dr. Eudine Barriteau is Professor Emerita of Gender and Public Policy, The University of the West Indies and an expert in gender analysis with considerable experience researching women’s leadership. She was the Lead Organizer for the Inaugural Gender and Development Forum, UNCTAD 15 held in Barbados October 2021.

She is a feminist, scholar and activist with extensive experience in research, executive educational administration and coordination of regional projects. She was the first Head of the Centre\Institute for Gender and Development Studies, University of the West Indies, Cave Hill Campus, Barbados and served as the first woman appointed Pro Vice Chancellor and Principal of The UWI, Cave Hill Campus, 2015- 2021. She served as President of the International Association for Feminist Economics, (IAFFE) 2009-2010.

Her research and publications include transformational leadership, feminist theorizing, investigations of Caribbean political economy and the intersections of relations of gender with public policy. She has delivered forty-eight distinguished or keynote public lectures nationally, regionally and internationally, designed and delivered many national and regional training workshops, and published thirty-eight book chapters and peer reviewed journal articles, including her first book, The Political Economy of Gender in the twentieth Century Caribbean (Palgrave 2001). In June 2024, UN member countries elected her to the UN CEDAW Committee and will serve January 2025 to December 2028.