Corporate Accountability Lab - 2025-26 Fellowships

RESPONSIBILITIES

A fellowship at Corporate Accountability Lab provides entry-level lawyers with the opportunity to work full-time on cutting-edge human rights work related to corporate accountability. Fellows work closely with CAL’s directors on projects, participate in the legal design lab, and are involved in all facets of the organization.

To apply

Please provide your academic transcript; an up-to-date resume; a short writing sample; and a cover letter outlining your interests, experience, and what fellowships and other sources of funding you plan to apply to, including bridge to practice fellowships. (Please note that because most of our work is international in nature, past fellows have been ineligible for Equal Justice Works funding.)

Please send all materials to info@corpaccountabilitylab.org. 

Corporate Accountability Lab is an equal opportunity employer that does not discriminate in its hiring practices. We actively encourage low-income, BIPOC, women, people with disabilities, and LGBTQ+ people to apply for all our positions.

ABOUT US

Transnational corporations often do business in ways that destroy environments, harm communities, and exploit workers. For twenty years, a once forgotten statute from 1789 provided a way to sue corporations for those actions. But in 2013, the US Supreme Court decided Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum, which limited the ability of U.S. courts to hear these claims for human rights abuses committed overseas, effectively robbing victims of corporate abuse of one of the few tools at their disposal. This came a year after the Supreme Court eliminated corporate liability under a different statute that had previously made it possible to bring claims in U.S. courts against companies for torture and killings that occurred overseas. 

This trend in the courts sends a dangerous signal. When companies know they can violate rights without consequences, they are more likely to engage in behavior that puts their workers, local communities, and the environment at risk. This behavior can come in the form of negligent selection of suppliers, lack of due diligence, hiring of corrupt militaries and illegal armed groups for security, violent land grabs, and even direct and knowing participation in human rights and environmental violations.

That’s where CAL comes in. We are a team with diverse experiences in labor rights, human rights, and environmental rights, working towards a shared goal of making companies legally accountable when they harm people and the environment.

CAL was founded in response to the crisis of widespread corporate abuse of human rights and the environment and disappearing legal tools to hold corporations accountable. In the midst of this ongoing crisis, public interest lawyers and the broader social justice community are too often overburdened with work using existing tools and lack the time, resources, and space to come up with creative strategies for broad impact. CAL aims to change that.