Richard Pearshouse

Richard Pearshouse is the Director of the Environment and Human Rights Division at Human Rights Watch, where he manages a multidisciplinary team investigating human rights abuses in the context of environmental degradation. Since early 2022, he has overseen high-impact work with extensive geographic reach, including human rights violations by the fossil fuel industry in the UAE, Bosnia, and the United States; tropical deforestation in Malaysia and the Brazilian Amazon; and climate-related displacement in Panama, Senegal, and the Solomon Islands. To leverage research, the team has innovatively explored global coalition-building, strategic litigation and geospatial data analysis to protect marginalized communities. 

Richard frequently undertakes high-level advocacy with national governments, the United Nations, development donors, and corporations. In his senior management capacity, Richard is responsible for the strategic integration of environmental priorities across Human Rights Watch’s programmatic operations.

Prior to his current appointment, Richard served as the Head of Crisis and the Environment at Amnesty International (2018–2022), where he led a global program of environmental research, advocacy and campaigns in crisis- and conflict-affected regions, including Iraq, Mozambique and West Papua. He previously spent ten years at Human Rights Watch, where he helped found the Environment and Human Rights Division in 2017. An expert in environmental health, he has authored numerous reports on highly hazardous pesticides, arsenic, lead, mercury, and industrial chemicals. 

Richard is a Senior Fellow in Residence at the Geneva Graduate Institute and a lawyer of the Supreme Court of New South Wales, Australia.