A global advocate for freedom, justice and development for over two decades, Mabel van Oranje is the initiator and chair of ‘Girls Not Brides: The Global Partnership to End Child Marriage’. She is also co-founder and the executive chair of the European Council on Foreign Relations. She is a member of the (advisory) boards of Global Witness, the Malala Fund, the Open Society Foundations, the Sigrid Rausing Trust, and The Elders. In 1993, Mabel founded the European Action Council for Peace in the Balkans and was its CEO until 1997. In 1997, she joined the Open Society Foundations as Executive Director of its Brussels office, becoming OSF’s London-based International Advocacy Director in 2003. From 2008 until 2012, she was the first CEO of The Elders. Mabel helped found the Dutch foundation War Child (1995), the global NGO coalition ‘Publish What You Pay’ (2002) and the Independent Commission on Turkey (2004). She has been actively engaged in the fight against HIV/AIDS and in global efforts that led to the establishment of the International Criminal Court in 2002. Former (advisory) board memberships include the Coalition for the International Criminal Court, Crisis Action, Interpeace, the Trust for Civil Society in Central & Eastern Europe, and Trust Women. Mabel is founding patron of the Dutch Masters Foundation, a UK charity which champions the advancement of Dutch arts by supporting three of the Netherlands’ leading cultural organisations: the Nederlands Dance Theater, the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra and the Royal Picture Gallery Mauritshuis. Mabel holds master’s degrees in Economics and in Political Science (cum laude) from the University of Amsterdam. The World Economic Forum named her one of its Global Leaders for Tomorrow (2003) and it Young Global Leaders (2005). Mabel received a Skoll Award for Social Entrepreneurship (2014), the John Diefenbaker Defender of Human Rights and Freedom Award (2014) and the ICRW Champions for Change Award for Innovation (2015) for her work with Girls Not Brides. In 2017, she received the World Without AIDS Award from the Deutsche AIDS-Stiftung. Mabel lives in London with her two daughters.
