Chito Gascon is the Chairman of the Philippines Human Rights Commission and member of the Human Rights Victims Claims Board, the body attached to the Commission on Human Rights mandated by law to administer a program of recognition and reparations to victims of the Marcos Martial Law Regime. In this capacity, he holds the rank of a Court of Appeals Justice. He is a political activist and social reformer who has been working on democratic governance concerns for three decades. Chito fought the dictatorship as a student leader. In the wake of the assassination of Senator Ninoy Aquino on 21 August 1983, he helped mobilize protest actions in schools demanding for justice, human rights, and political change. In 1985, he was elected to Chair the University of the Philippines Student Council and led the youth movement to actively participate in the February 1986 Non-Violent People Power Revolution. He organized the 1st Human Rights Awareness Fair in campuses and was an active member of the Philippine Section of Amnesty International at which he served as a board member for many years. He was also an active volunteer to the Lingap Bilanggo campaigns on behalf of Political Prisoners. He also has been and continues to be involved in many different Civil Society political coalitions and alliances that struggle for democracy such as the Kongresong Mamamayang Pilipino (KOMPIL 1& 2), Bansang Nagkaisa sa Diwa at Layunin (BANDILA), the Black & White Movement, Social Liberals & Democrats for the Advancement of Reforms (SoLiDAR), and Re:Publika@DemokraXXIa – a new network of progressive activists seeking to broaden and deepen democracy.

He was previously the Executive Director to both the liberal think tank National Institute for Policy Studies (NIPS) from 1987-2002 and LIBERTAS – a lawyers network for the Rule of Law from 2005-2008. He was founding trustee and corporate counsel of the International Center forInnovation, Transformation, and Excellence in Governance (InciteGov) – the policy group of the so-called ‘Hyatt 10′, and still remains part of its Advisory Group. He was Director General of the Liberal Party from 2008-2011 and was Political Director of its successful 2010 National Electoral Campaign. He has taught Law, Politics, & Human Rights at the Political Science Departments in both the Ateneo de Manila and the De la Salle Universities. He was also fellow at La Salle Instituteof Governance. In the transition to democracy, he served as the youngest member to both the Constitutional Commission that drafted the new Republic’s Constitution and the 8th Philippine Congress, passing landmark legislation that institutionalized youth participation in local government (Sanggunian Kabataan) as well as a special law providing for special protection to children from all forms of abuse (RA 7610). He has held several senior positions in government, such as Under Secretary for Legal, Legislative and Special Concerns at the Department of Education (DepEd) from 2002-2005, Board Member of the Bases Conversion Development Authority (BCDA) from 2010-2011, and Undersecretary for Political Affairs at the Office of the President from 2011-2014. He was part of the Government Delegation to the UN Human Rights Council for the Universal Periodic Review in 2012. He was Panel Member for Peace Negotiations with the National Democratic Front (NDF) from 2001-2004 and had served as the Chair of the Government’s Human Rights Monitoring Committee (GPhMC) of that peace process within the framework of the Comprehensive Agreement on Respect for Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law (CARHRIHL) from 2010-2014.

He has also assisted in peace negotiations involving the conflict with Muslim rebels in Mindanao as a member of the Technical Working Group on Power Sharing and Alternate Panel Member in peacetalks with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), and with the AdHoc High-Level Working Group for the Tripartite Review of the 1996 Final Peace Agreement with the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) together with the Organization of Islamic Cooperation’s Peace Committee for Southern Philippines. His continuing reform advocacy are in the areas of access to justice & human rights, transparency & accountability initiatives, political & electoral reforms, peace & conflict transformation, people’s participation & civic education, and state building in democratic transitions. He is the first Filipino recipient of both the Democracy and Development Fellowship at Stanford University’s Center for Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law in 2005 and the Reagan-Fascell Democracy Fellowship at the International Forum for Democratic Studies of the National Endowment for Democracy in 2006. He was also awarded the Benigno S. Aquino Fellowship for Public Service in 2001, the Asian Public Intellectual Fellowship in 2007, and Asian Leadership Fellowship in 2008. He has Bachelor of Arts (BA Philosophy) and Bachelor of Laws (LLB) degrees from the University of the Philippines, and has also earned a Master of Law (LLM) degree specializing in International Law (Human Rights, Law of Peace, and Settlement of International Disputes) from Cambridge University as a member of St. Edmund’s College through a joint British Chevening and Cambridge Overseas Trust Scholarship. He attended the 1997 Summer Institute on Human Rights administered by the International Institute for Human Rights with the European Human Rights Mechanisms in Strasbourg, France. He is married to Melissa P Mercado and has a daughter, Ciara Sophia.