Anita serves as a Senior Advisor to the Global Business Initiative on Human Rights. She is Henry M. Jackson Professor of Law and the Director of the Sustainable International Development Graduate Program at the University of Washington School of Law and a visiting Research Fellow at Trinity Business School, Dublin. She is an expert in the fields of anti-corruption, commercial law, sustainable development and is one of the leading academics and a pioneer in the field of business and human rights.
Anita was a member of the United Nations Working Group on Business and Human Rights, having been appointed as a rapporteur by the United Nations Human Rights Council in 2016 and she previously served as its chair in 2020. In 2021, she was appointed as the Special Representative on Combatting Corruption at the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).
She is a founding co-editor in chief of the Business and Human Rights Journal, published by Cambridge University Press, and the Co-President of the Global Business and Human Rights Scholars Association and launched its annual research scholars forum. From 2017-2019, Anita served as president of the Uniform Law Commission, the 127-year-old organization comprised of lawyers from the 50 States that work to harmonize the laws where uniform is desirable. She was previously Chair of its Executive Committee and is an appointed Commissioner from Washington State. As of 2019, Ramasastry is a member of the World Economic Forum’s Global Future Council on Transparency and Anti-Corruption. She served as a member of the WEF’s Global Agenda Council on Human Rights from 2012–2016. Ramasastry sits on the advisory boards of Transparency International, the Institute of Human Rights and Business, and Global Witness.