Then: Co-Founder of the Northern Ireland Women’s Coalition Political Party

Later: Chief Commissioner of the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission, Oversight Commissioner for Prison Reform in Northern Ireland

Monica McWilliams cofounded the Northern Ireland Women’s Coalition (NIWC) in 1996 to secure the representation of women in the Belfast peace negotiations. Just months before the 1998 Good Friday Agreement was finally signed, ending 30 years of conflict in Northern Ireland, McWilliams participated in a special peace symposium hosted by the Seminar, where “the consensus style of politics eventually created not a demand for surrender, but a demand for us to work together,” she said. In addition to serving in the Legislative Assembly of Northern Ireland, she was Chief Commissioner of the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission, and in 2016 helped train female negotiators for the UN Syrian peace talks.