Jared Genser

- Lecturer in Law
Biography
Jared Genser an international human rights lawyer based in Washington, D.C. He is Managing Director of Perseus Strategies, a public interest law firm, Special Advisor on the Responsibility to Protect to the Organization of American States, and Senior Fellow for Technology and Human Rights at Harvard University’s Carr Center for Human Rights Policy. Referred to by the New York Times as “The Extractor” for his work freeing political prisoners worldwide, he has served as pro bono counsel to five Nobel Peace Prize Laureates, including three Laureates who won their Prize while imprisoned — Aung San Suu Kyi (Burma, 2006-2010), Liu Xiaobo (China, 2010-2017), and Ales Bialiatski (Belarus, 2023-Present) — as well as Archbishop Desmond Tutu and Elie Wiesel. He also served as pro bono counsel to former Czech Republic President Vaclav Havel.
Mr. Genser was previously a partner in the government affairs practice of DLA Piper LLP and a management consultant with McKinsey & Co. He has also been an Adjunct Professor of Law at Georgetown University Law Center, the University of Pennsylvania Law School, and the University of Michigan Law School.
He is co-editor of The UN Security Council in the Age of Human Rights (Cambridge University Press, 2016) and The Responsibility to Protect: The Promise of Stopping Mass Atrocities in Our Times (Oxford University Press, 2011). And he is author of The UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention: Commentary and Guide to Practice (Cambridge University Press, 2019). His next book is a co-edited volume with former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein entitled The Oxford Handbook on the UN Human Rights System (Oxford University Press, 2025).
Education
- BS, Cornell University
- MPP, Harvard University, John F. Kennedy School of Government
- JD, University of Michigan Law School