Suzanne Nossel has served as Executive Director of PEN American Center, the largest branch of the world’s leading literary and human rights organization, since February, 2013.

In that capacity, she has expanded PEN’s role on issues of surveillance and digital freedom and augmented its cultural programming, membership, and support base. Prior to that she served as Executive Director of Amnesty International USA where she led a major restructuring that stabilized the organization’s finances and reinvigorated its human rights advocacy and membership engagement. Before that she served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for International Organizations under Secretary of State Hillary Clinton where she spearheaded U.S. leadership in revitalizing the UN Human Rights Council, and oversaw humanitarian affairs and Congressional relations for the International Organizations Bureau. She was also the Chief Operating Officer of Human Rights Watch where she led a major strategic planning process and strengthened the organization’s global management infrastructure. During the Clinton Administration she served as Deputy to the U.S. Ambassador for UN Management and Reform at the U.S. Mission to the United Nations. She has also served as a Visiting Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and as an Executive at Dow Jones/The Wall Street Journal and at Bertelsmann. Nossel spent two years in South Africa working to address political violence during that country’s transition into democracy. She has published pieces on international affairs and human rights in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Dissent, The National Interest, and Foreign Affairs magazine, where she coined the term “Smart Power,” the title of a 2004 article. Nossel received her A.B. from Harvard College and her J.D. from Harvard Law School.