Georgette Bennett

Why you should listen

A sociologist and criminologist, Georgette Bennett now specializes in conflict resolution and building bridges between communities. In 1992, she founded the Tanenbaum Center for Interreligious Understanding, a secular nonprofit which works to combat religious prejudice, confront hate and build respect for religious difference. In 2013, she founded the Multifaith Alliance for Syrian Refugees, which has delivered hundreds of millions of dollars in aid to Syrian war victims. She also cofounded the nonprofit Global Covenant Partners, which aims to delegitimize the use of religion to justify violence and extremism.

Bennett spent 10 years as a broadcast journalist and served in the US State Department's Religion and Foreign Policy working group on conflict mitigation. She's done pioneering work on community policing with the NYPD, where she also successfully lobbied for the establishment of the first sex crimes unit. She's a winner of the AARP Purpose Prize and was named to the 2021 Forbes "50 Over 50 Women of Impact" list.