Johanna Chao Kreilick is president of the Union of Concerned Scientists, a leading science-based advocacy organization that combines technical analysis and advocacy to create and implement innovative, practical solutions for a healthy, safe, and sustainable future.
Ms. Kreilick has three decades of experience with social movements, science policy, and working to combat climate change. Before leading UCS, Ms. Kreilick served on the executive team of the Open Society Foundations, a $27 billion global rights and justice philanthropy. There she established and led the Foundations’ strategy unit responsible for planning, research and assessment for the Foundations’ 50 global programs, national foundations, and advocacy offices. While at Open Society, she also founded the $43 million Climate Action Initiative. The US component includes support for nonpartisan public mobilization and policy advocacy at city, state, regional, and federal levels, as well as shareholder advocacy and litigation aimed at corporate polluters.
Prior to joining Open Society in 2013, Ms. Kreilick created and led a justice and human rights program at the Hauser Center for Nonprofit Organizations at Harvard University. She previously launched and led an economic justice grant-making program at the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee, supporting informal workers’ movements globally, and organized within the Asian and Pacific Islander immigrant community to advance rights-respecting economic and health policy.
Ms. Kreilick is a trained mediator and facilitator, and serves on numerous nonprofit boards. She earned a BA with distinction in anthropology from Stanford University and an MPA from the Harvard Kennedy School of Government, where she was named a Lucius N. Littauer Fellow.