Louise Arbour, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, has had a distinguished career as a lawyer, academic, and judge. She served on the Supreme Court of Ontario, the Ontario Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court of Canada, and she made history as the courageous and determined Chief Prosecutor for the International Criminal Tribunals for former Yugoslavia and Rwanda. Since accepting the role of High Commissioner for Human Rights in 2004, she has implemented reforms of her Office and, among other concerns, has encouraged the fast-tracking of the new U.N. Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. Mme Arbour was born in Montreal.

National Chief Shawn A-in-chut Atleo is a Hereditary Chief from the Ahousaht First Nation in British Columbia. During two terms as the BC Regional Chief of the Assembly of First Nations (AFN), his skills contributed to a historic accord, overcoming decades of discord among BC First Nations leadership. He was elected AFN National Chief in 2009. He holds a Master of Education degree in Adult Learning and Global Change, and is Chancellor of Vancouver Island University. He is supported by his partner of 23 years, Nancy, and their two adult children.

Craig Jones is the Executive Director of The John Howard Society of Canada, an NGO based in Kingston whose mission statement is “effective, just and humane responses to the causes and consequences of crime.” He holds a doctorate in political economy from Queen's University and before coming to the Society was a researcher in the Faculty of Health Sciences and the Centre for the Study of Democracy (both at Queen's) as well as a teacher and lecturer at Queen's, RMC, St. Lawrence and Loyalist Colleges. He has published on drug policy, public policy, crime and mental illness.

Dr. Lloyd Axworthy is President and Vice Chancellor of the University of Winnipeg. Formerly he headed the Liu Institute for Global Issues. During his 27- year political career he held various Cabinet posts including Minister of Foreign Affairs (1995-2000). He is internationally acclaimed for his advancement of the human security concept, his work establishing the International Criminal Court and the Protocol on child soldiers, and the global treaty banning anti-personnel landmines. For this he was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.

Ian Brown is a feature writer for the Globe and Mail; and anchor of TVO’s Human Edge and The View from Here, Canada’s pre-eminent television documentary series. For ten years he was host of CBC Radio’s Talking Books. His reporting and editing have won more than a dozen national magazine and newspaper awards. He is the editor of the anthology What I Meant to Say: The Private Lives of Men, and author of the books Freewheeling and Man Overboard, and most recently, The Boy in the Moon: A Father’s Search for his Disabled Son.

Philip Coulter is a documentary producer with the CBC Radio program Ideas and also the producer of many of the prestigious Massey Lectures. The common thread in his work is his interest in the things that form us as societies and how we choose to live together. He has brought his considerable gifts to the exploration of topics as diverse as the contemporary Maya and Inca, the mystery of pain, landscape architecture, the detainees at Guantanamo Bay, and the contribution of individuals such as Jean Vanier. He is presently preparing a series on the people who live near Chernobyl and is also working with Margaret Somerville on the 2006 Massey Lectures.

Pamela Cushing is a Cultural Anthropologist teaching at King's College, University of Western Ontario. Her research includes health and disability studies, social inclusion, the politics of difference, and experiential education. She did her doctoral research at L'Arche, interviewing over 100 L'Arche assistants across Canada, and her post-doctoral research with Camphill Schools in Scotland. She has also done research with numerous other organizations (Roeher Institute, CACL, the Laidlaw, Templeton and McConnell Family Foundations). Pam grew up in Montreal, and has lived in Europe, the U.S.A., and Togo. She and her husband, Jay, and their young son live in London, Ontario.

Jacques Dufresne, well-known Quebec philosopher and social commentator, is editor of the independent French language magazine of ideas and debate, L'Agora, and director of the evolving L'Encyclopédie de L'Agora, on the internet. For 30 years as a thought- provoking journalist and lecturer he has been at the center of social debate in Quebec on issues as diverse as suicide, sport, the health system, and agriculture. He is a founder of Philia, a Canadian organization dedicated to the promotion of dialogue encouraging of civil society. He did his doctoral work on Simone Weil.

Danny Graham is a thought leader on justice reform, democratic renewal and citizen engagement. He has long encouraged the practice of restorative justice and he advises international agencies on its institution in developing countries. He is the Chief Negotiator for the Province of Nova Scotia in the Mi’kmaq rights and title initiative. Previously, he served as Nova Scotia Liberal Party leader, was a defence lawyer with Nova Scotia Legal Aid and Pink Murray Graham, and worked for Justice Canada to advance prominent national legislative initiatives. He is the father of three funloving boys.

Gerry Helleiner is economics professor emeritus and distinguished research fellow  at  the University of Toronto’s Munk Centre. He has written widely on developing countries, and was a faculty member at Yale, Oxford, Sussex and the Universities of Ibadan and Dar es Salaam. He was research director of the developing countries’ caucus at the IMF and World Bank, and board chair of the North-South Institute, the International Food Policy Research Institute and International Lawyers and Economists Against Poverty. He has also advised numerous UN agencies and African governments.

Stephen Lewis is the UN Secretary-General's Special Envoy for HIV/AIDS in Africa. He also sits on the WHO's Commission on the Social Determinants of Health and he is a director of the Stephen Lewis Foundation, dedicated to easing the pain of HIV/AIDS in Africa. His roles over the past two decades include Deputy Executive Director of UNICEF and Canadian Ambassador to the UN. Recipient of many honours, he is well known for his deeply compassionate commitment to issues of justice and his concern for Africa. He is this year's CBC Massey Lecturer.

Gabor Maté is a medical doctor and author in Vancouver, British Columbia. He has worked in family practice, palliative medicine, and addiction medicine. Currently he is staff physician at a facility for drug addicted persons in Vancouver’s Downtown East Side, many of them with HIV. His special interest is impact of early childhood experience on lifelong emotional and  physical health. Dr. Maté has written four nationally bestselling books in Canada, most  recently In The Realm of  Hungry Ghosts: Close Encounters With Addiction.

Elizabeth May, lawyer, writer and internationally recognized environmentalist, is Executive Director of the Sierra Club of Canada. In the 1970s she became known in the Canadian media for her successful volunteer work against insecticide spraying near her Cape Breton home. Before going to the Sierra Club in 1989, she was a Senior Policy Advisor to the Federal Minister of the Environment and was instrumental in establishing several parks. In 2001, she fasted 17 days on Parliament Hill to draw attention to the plight of people whose homes were on contaminated land in Sydney, Nova Scotia.

Dr. Balfour Mount, F.R.C.S.C., is a urologist and surgical oncologist. He pioneered palliative care and founded the hospice movement in Canada. He was founding director of the Royal Victoria Hospital Palliative Service, and he established the McGill Palliative Care and Integrated Whole Person Care programs. He is also a much-loved teacher.

Jean Vanier is founder of L'Arche and a spokesperson for all who are marginalized. Maclean's magazine has called him "A Canadian who inspires the world." Both Balfour Mount and Jean Vanier speak from the profound integrity of lives given fully to the vision and values they present.

Katharine Pearson has been with the J.W. McConnell Family Foundation, one of the largest private foundations in Canada, since 1997. She is director of the Foundation's five-year "Social Innovation Generation" initiative, the goal of which is to strengthen understanding of and capacity for social innovation in Canada. She serves on the board of Oxfam-Quebec and the program advisory group of the Foundation of Greater Montreal. Katharine's father was a diplomat and she grew up in India, Mexico and France. The Hon. Lester B. Pearson was her grandfather.

James Penner, veteran youth specialist, is Associate Director of Dr. Reginald Bibby's "Project Teen Canada 2008." He teaches Sociology of Youth at the University of Lethbridge, and is co-author of Soul Searching the Millennial Generation (2005), and this fall, Aboriginal Millennials in National Perspective, and Ten Things You Have to Know About Today's Teenagers. Formerly a national youth consultant with InterVarsity Christian Fellowship and a public school educator, James is primary researcher of James Penner and Associates. He and his wife Claire have two adult children."

Jean Vanier is known as a social visionary with a keen sense of what makes for a compassionate society. He has received numerous humanitarian honours including the Companion of the Order of Canada. He had a naval career, earned a doctorate in philosophy (Institut Catholique, Paris) and taught at St. Michael's College, University of Toronto, before founding L'Arche. Jean Vanier also founded an international network of support groups for families of people with developmental disabilities. He is a son of Canadian Governor-General Georges Vanier and Pauline Vanier.

Jessica Vorstermans  is a recent MA graduate from the University in Utrecht, The Netherlands, where she studied Conflict Studies and Human Rights and completed an internship at the European Center for Conflict Prevention in The Hague. She has volunteered, worked and studied in various Latin American countries--Ecuador, Paraguay, Guatemala and Cuba--and considers these experiences as definitive in shaping her in a moral, intellectual and spiritual way. Jessica is currently working as a freelance consultant and plans to continue her studies at the PhD level in September 2009.

Pamela Wallin's distinguished career spans 30 years and several continents. She has worked with CBC radio, in the Ottawa bureau of the Toronto Star, as co-host of Canada AM, as CTV's Ottawa bureau chief, and as first woman co-anchor of CBC television's nightly national news. Through her own production company she hosted a nightly interview program. She has written three books, and has received many honours for her work in journalism. In 2002, she accepted an appointment to the prestigious post of Canada's Consul General to New York City.