, Founder & Executive Director
+ 1 202.296.0800 | mdri@mdri.org
Eric Rosenthal is founder and Executive Director of Mental Disability Rights International (MDRI). Since establishing MDRI in 1993, Rosenthal has trained human rights and disability activists and provided technical assistance to governments and international development organizations worldwide. Rosenthal has conducted investigations in 23 countries of Europe, the Middle East, and the Americas and published reports on the human rights of people with disabilities in eight countries.
MDRI reports have brought unprecedented worldwide press coverage and attention to the concerns of people with disabilities. Rosenthal and his work have been profiled in The New York Times Magazine, ABC News 20/20, Good Morning America, and Nightline and has been the subject of main editorials in The New York Times, The International Herald Tribune, and The Washington Post. Eric Rosenthal has served as a consultant the World Health Organization (WHO), UNICEF, and the US National Council on Disability (NCD). On behalf of NCD, Rosenthal co-authored US Foreign Policy and Disability (September 2003), a report that led to legislation to make US foreign assistance accessible to people with disabilities.
In May 2001, the Mental Health Association of New York awarded Rosenthal a "Humanitarian Award" for "exceptional dedication and leadership in advocating for the humane treatment of people with mental disabilities worldwide." In October 2007, Eric Rosenthal accepted the Thomas J. Dodd Prize in International Justice and Human Rights on behalf of MDRI. In 2008, Rosenthal received the Henry A. Betts Award from the American Association of People with Disabilities for "pioneering the field of international human rights advocacy for people with disabilities and bringing unprecedented international awareness to their concerns.” The recent adoption of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) is, according to AAPD, "in no small part due to Rosenthal's role promoting disability rights as a human right."
Eric Rosenthal received a law degree cum laude from Georgetown (1992) and a BA from the University of Chicago (1985). Rosenthal has served as an advisor in the Public Interest Law Scholar’s program of the Georgetown University Law Center and has been an adjunct professor of law in public interest advocacy. Rosenthal was elected Vice-President of the US International Council on Disability (USICD), the US affiliate of Disabled Peoples International and Rehabilitation International.
Click here to view the 2008 AAPD Henry B. Betts Award Video highlighting Eric Rosenthal's work |
