Creating a Healthier, More Just World: A Q&A with GCC Board Member Soudie Tahmassebipour

Soudie Tahmassebipour is an Iranian-American attorney and certified diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging expert. Prior to becoming a consultant, she worked for 20 years as a public defender, first at the New Hampshire Public Defenders Office and then at the Committee for Public Counsel Services in Massachusetts. She has supervised hundreds of attorneys and has dedicated her career to empowering and advocating for individuals who have been historically marginalized by the system. She is the founder and executive director of the Wachusett Area Social Justice Alliance and has presented at trainings and events all over New England and abroad. Soudi is also the founder of Reenvision Consulting, where she serves as its certified diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging strategist. 
 
You began your career as an attorney, working for two decades as a public defender in New Hampshire and Massachusetts. How did that experience inform the work you do now?
My experience as a public defender redefined my perspective on justice systems in the United States and throughout the world. Our criminal justice system is incredibly broken. Much of the system as we know it was developed during segregation and when the majority of the country still didn't have access to voting rights. It is still painfully hierarchical and paternalistic in that people who report crimes often lose control over what happens throughout the process and people accused of crimes are publicly treated as guilty (regardless of what the Constitution explicitly tells us) in the way they are treated throughout the process. 
 
In even the most progressive legal systems around the world, "justice" still is more gracious and attainable for people from white or light-skinned, affluent backgrounds simply because of the power dynamics – and also because they can afford to hire experts and have an elaborative financial support system that allows them to maintain a roof over their heads and cut in front of the line into elaborate treatment programs that can mitigate the ultimate results of their case. 
 
Science and the system are rarely aligned. Children in many places are still being treated as adults even though for decades, scientific studies have shown that adolescent brain development impacts decision-making and people truly do make horrible decisions as youth that they would never make as adults. It's an important area that is still archaic in many ways and genuinely needs to be overhauled both here in the United States and throughout the world. Still, because of the factional political divide and stubborn adherence to outdated tradition, we are all sidelined and forced to observe painful injustice after injustice happen in our world, our communities, and even in our personal lives without a meaningful path towards healing and peace. 
 
Your current role is as a certified diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging strategist. Why does this work matter to you?
My experience as an Iranian immigrant coupled with my experience as a public defender solidified my decision to become an organizational consultant with an emphasis on fostering healthy, equitable spaces for people from all backgrounds and lived experiences. I have experienced, firsthand, the impact of an unhealthy work environment on my health as well as my personal and professional relationships. I saw how it impacted my colleagues who were expected to work like machines while doing incredibly hard, trauma-based work with little personal reprieve. 
 
Even the most progressive countries still fail to prioritize healthy workplaces, even when it impacts retention and the bottom line. We engage in the same methods over and over again despite how they fail us and expect different results. It's short-sighted and just plain ignorant. 
 
If we learned nothing else from the recent pandemic, we should have learned that human beings in every role in our workplaces are vital to our mission and must be treated with dignity for our organizations to survive. If it wasn't for the hospital cleaning crews who were sent into clean rooms when we knew the least about the potential deadliness of the virus, the healthcare workers couldn't use the room for the next patient. If it wasn't for our grocery store clerks who went into work (because they often didn't have a choice) just to stock the shelves and check us out in our rush to get sustenance, many people couldn't hurry in and out of a potentially deadly environment to get their basic staples for their families. 
 
It is in our ability to see the shared humanity in each other that we can begin to do better by each other and create a healthier, more just world. That begins and ends with holding up the mirror to ourselves and our systems and changing what no longer serves us and is often, actually, destroying us. 
 
I want, so much, to leave the world a better place for future generations than we found it. I dream of a world where human beings aren't simply valued for what they produce but by who they are as individuals. I want us to create a world where everyone has an opportunity to live and thrive, not simply survive. I want us to embrace constant learning regardless of age and to support science and progress and healthy spaces where everyone can openly  engage in dialogue towards a better humanity. Maybe that's too much to ask, but we can try. With organizations like Global Citizens Circle (GCC), we may even succeed!
 
What is it about GCC that drew you to its mission and decades of work?
GCC strives to create a world that embraces the justice and humanity I tried to describe above. Fifty years ago, the Dunfeys had a collective vision for a better world. When I learned about the organization, and then had the honor of meeting and getting to know some of the amazing people behind that vision, I knew I wanted to be a part of the organization. 
 
What GCC is doing is truly remarkable. There are so many amazing human rights organizations throughout the world; public defenders do this work individual by individual. Other direct service organizations work to meet the day-to-day human needs of our shared communities. What GCC does is create a space where silos can be broken down and great organizations doing the day-to-day work can come together and share their visions, missions, and values and, as a result, lift each other up. 
 
In a world where inhumanity often gets the headlines, GCC creates a space for truly thoughtful, open dialogue, where people from all over the world can feel like they are not alone in their hopes for a better, more just world. There are few organizations more dedicated to our shared humanity and who walk the talk better than the GCC. 
 
Imagine an organization that needs funding to sustain itself, that constantly shines the light on other organizations and encourages people to financially support them. That is the GCC way! I feel blessed, every day, to have found such an amazing organization. 
 
What has your involvement been with GCC, and what keeps you engaged?
I love serving as a GCC Board Member. I am involved on many levels. I have facilitated a strategic planning session. I have recruited board members. I have helped with funding campaigns. Frankly, there is very little I wouldn't do if asked by the amazing leadership at GCC. That's how much I believe in the mission of this incredible organization. 
 
What advice do you have for those who wish to make a positive change in the world?
I think every generation has to have a vested interest in working collectively to fight for justice and human rights around the world. We all have such valuable experiences and insights into real-life events that shaped who we are and the world we find ourselves in.
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• We have to memorialize the experiences of older generations and learn from them about the insights they gained first-hand through their lived experiences and what they wish they would have done differently. 

 

• We have to incorporate voices that have been traditionally marginalized because the silencing of those voices is what led us to where we find ourselves today. 

 

• We must engage younger generations and their knowledge of technology and their fearlessness to remind us of what hope looks like. 

 

• Finally, we have to reconsider the traditional systems and models we have relied on for far too long that have only served the elite few and consider models that haven't yet been imagined or allowed to take root. It is why I named my consulting business, "Reenvision"!

 
That can only happen through the efforts of organizations like the GCC where people from all over the world can come together to have really hard conversations. Conversations where we hold a mirror up and self-reflect on our roles in creating the challenges and implementing the changes we need to address injustice and inequities in our world. We must have continuous global dialogues to remind us of who we are today and who we want to become for the sake of the future of humanity. This work is vital and it needs to happen now. 

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It is in our ability to see the shared humanity in each other that we can begin to do better by each other and create a healthier, more just world.
                                                                                                          -Soudie Tahmassebipour