Home / Catalog / The Leadership of Women
The Leadership of Women
The Leadership of Women
More Stories of Solidarity and Struggle in the Human Rights Movement
Author(s): David Hinkley

Celebrating the resilience and innovations of women's contributions to global human rights.
Publication Date 21 November, 2025 Available in all formats
ISBN: 9781918526790
Pages: 240
https://doi.org/10.62859/c.159984

PAPERBACK

EBOOK (EPUB)

EBOOK (PDF)

Audiobook

About The Book

Table of Contents

About The Author

Subject(s): activism, social justice, feminism, ethnography, cultural studies, Human Rights, Refugee rights, Grassroots, movements, International relations, Global solidarity

**What can we learn from the women whose leadership has shaped human rights struggles across the globe? **

The Leadership of Women is a powerful memoir by David Hinkley that celebrates the remarkable women who inspired his work beyond Amnesty International, spotlighting their groundbreaking contributions to movements for justice. Through vivid stories of collaboration, resilience, and innovation, Hinkley honors these champions while offering lessons for activists today.

This book is both a tribute and a call to action—an invitation to join ongoing struggles for the rights of women, refugees, people in poverty, and victims of abuse worldwide. The Leadership of Women is ideal for students, scholars, and activists seeking to understand and advance human rights in the 21st century.

David Hinkley is a lifelong human rights activist, educator, and writer whose work spans Amnesty International leadership, global advocacy, and decades of engagement with movements for justice and equality.

David Hinkley is from Cherokee, a small rural town in northwest Iowa and the county seat of Cherokee County. The town is served by the Illinois Central Railroad. The nearest city is Sioux City, Iowa—the state’s fourth-largest city—located at the navigational head of the Missouri River, approximately 55 miles southwest of Cherokee. Cherokee is also about 70 miles south of the Iowa Great Lakes region, which includes the popular resort destinations of Lake Okoboji and Spirit Lake near the Minnesota border.

About The Book
Subject(s): activism, social justice, feminism, ethnography, cultural studies, Human Rights, Refugee rights, Grassroots, movements, International relations, Global solidarity

**What can we learn from the women whose leadership has shaped human rights struggles across the globe? **

The Leadership of Women is a powerful memoir by David Hinkley that celebrates the remarkable women who inspired his work beyond Amnesty International, spotlighting their groundbreaking contributions to movements for justice. Through vivid stories of collaboration, resilience, and innovation, Hinkley honors these champions while offering lessons for activists today.

This book is both a tribute and a call to action—an invitation to join ongoing struggles for the rights of women, refugees, people in poverty, and victims of abuse worldwide. The Leadership of Women is ideal for students, scholars, and activists seeking to understand and advance human rights in the 21st century.

Table of Contents

Contents

    • About The Author

    David Hinkley is a lifelong human rights activist, educator, and writer whose work spans Amnesty International leadership, global advocacy, and decades of engagement with movements for justice and equality.

    Rate this Book

    Tell us what you think.

    Engaging and inspirational, The Leadership of Women introduces the reader to a group of courageous women leaders in the international human rights movement. The book, designed as a teaching tool, includes a glossary, a list of recommended projects and other useful components. David Hinkley’s long and impactful career in Amnesty International placed him in a unique position to work with Joan Baez, Rose Styron, Karen Musalo, and many other influential leaders. These Stories of Solidarity and Struggle are a lasting tribute to the struggle for a better world.
    —Alicia Partnoy. Professor Emerita, Loyola Marymount University. Author of The Little School. Tales of Disappearance and Survival.
    “Its not that women have been written out of history, its that we were never written in”. So said Bernadette Devlin an Irish civil rights activist and politician. Books like this one need to be written so that we can at least start to capture the incredible role that women play and have played in building and upholding communities, in all their manifestations. The Human rights movement is just one of them but one which encapsulates so much of what women have always done but has never been valued. Case in point, Sandy Coliver. Those of us in the movement know the incredible role she has played, quietly, doggedly connecting people, seeing connections between law and necessity. Being brilliant. She is but one of those unsung heroines David has recognised in this collection of important stories which draw our attention to different ways of being a leader and why that is important.
    Madeleine Rees
    David Hinkley’s book, “The Leadership of Women,” is a true to life account of the struggle for human rights. Having enjoyed the opportunity to work with some of the women portrayed in his book, I can vouch for the validity of the tribute he pays to them.
    —Aryeh Neier, Co-Founder, Human Rights Watch (and former National Executive Director of the ACLU)
    “It was a truly great pleasure to read David Hinkley’s homage to some amazing women champions of the human rights movement. Some of it a trip down human rights memory lane over the past half century! I have the great pleasure and privilege to call three of those featured in the book my friends – Joan Baez, Rose Styron, and Susannah Sirkin. These three are everything good and strong about the movement. They are activists who have devoted their lives to the struggle. In my experience the leadership and example provided by the women who have been at the barricades for human rights is unequalled and their courage and fortitude puts us men to shame. David has written a personal, moving, and important account of the contribution these women made to making this world a better place.”
    —Bill Shipsey, Founder & Executive Director Art for Human Rights (formerly Art for Amnesty)
    Congratulations on publication of your new book, shedding the light of the powerful insights of your life's work into the full range of human rights struggles and achievements.
    —Abdullahi Ahmed An-Na'im, Emory University
    Related Titles