Patti Lynn

“I have witnessed incredible courage in the hearts and actions of so many people through this work,” says Patti. “We face down tremendous power and win important change together with people around the world.”

These changes give Patti hope and fuel her in the day-to-day work of running the organization. As executive director, she builds the organization’s strength, resources, and power toward winning campaigns and accomplishing our mission. She ensures that our strategic planning process, honed over forty years, sets us on the most effective course toward that end.

Patti also focuses on developing the leadership of Corporate Accountability’s talented, skilled, and big-hearted staff at every level of the organization.Patti started on her path to help advance social justice and dismantle systems of oppression in her lifetime when, in college, she learned about South Africa and the African National Congress. After graduating she lived and worked in Johannesburg, South Africa during the time of Nelson Mandela’s election. When she returned to the U.S., she built her organizing skills through Green Corps, campaigned successfully to stop rollbacks on federal clean water laws with Clean Water Action, and then joined Corporate Accountability in 1998.

At Corporate Accountability, Patti has held various positions including campaign director, major gifts officer, national religious outreach coordinator, press officer, and managing director. She is committed to organizing more deeply and equitably with communities of color in the U.S. and around the world to challenge corporate power.

“The fire in my belly grows stronger as I go,” she says. She stays grounded and inspired by working shoulder to shoulder with allies in Lagos, Nigeria and across the Global South toward justice and a better world. Patti holds a master’s degree in International Peace Studies from the University of Notre Dame. She also loves her hometown of Philly, in all of its warmth, grit, realness, and toughness.