Chair of the Human Rights Subcommittee of the European Union
 

Barbara Lochbihler, born in 1959 in Ronsberg in the Bavarian region of Allgäu, South Germany. Learned tax inspector and social work studies (Diplom) in Munich. Direction of a service centre and home for the elderly. Foundation of a flat-sharing community for the elderly. Studies in political science, international law and economics (Magister). From 1987 to 1991, assistant (Parlamentsreferent) of the MP Eleonore Romberg (die Grünen) within the Bavarian Parliament. Between 1992 and 1999, Secretary General of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom in Geneva. From 1999 to 2009, Secretary General of the German section of Amnesty International. Barbara Lochbihler has encountered social inequality both during her studies and her time as social worker and quickly understood the need for concrete help in individual cases. At the same, however, she realized that politics have the responsibility to guarantee the basic conditions necessary to a humane and decent life. Moreover, the fact of looking into many feminist subjects in Germany sparked her interest in the living conditions of women in extreme poverty, violent conflicts and wars. Barbara Lochbihler’s political interest is based on a passionate commitment to peace, which should be understood as more than the mere absence of war and the rejection of exclusions of any kind. These are the main reasons explaining her decision to work with the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom, and with Amnesty International. It still fascinates her to understand both individual fates and the surrounding global framework, and to try and influence this very framework in order to allow for a humane and self-determined life in all its diversity.