Félix Maradiaga is a Nicaraguan academic, human rights defender, and former presidential candidate. In 2021, he was arbitrarily imprisoned by the Ortega regime and held in solitary confinement for 21 months before being released and stripped of his citizenship. He is currently nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize and, in 2023, received both the Sergei Magnitsky Award for Outstanding Democratic Opposition and the Geneva Summit Courage Award.

Félix serves as Professor of Global Democracy at the University of Virginia and Johns Hopkins University, and is Director of the World Liberty Congress Academy, which trains pro-democracy dissidents from over 60 countries. He also coordinates the Global Knowledge Network on Authoritarianism, a collaborative platform connecting activists and scholars to identify and counter authoritarian tactics. He is a Trustee of Freedom House and President of the Red Liberal de América Latina, the region’s largest liberal political network.

He is widely regarded as an expert in political strategy and civic resistance, specializing in advising movements operating under authoritarian regimes and high-repression contexts. He has supported dissident groups across Latin America, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia in their efforts to engage in nonviolent resistance, leadership, and democratic transition.

In addition to his fieldwork, Félix is a prolific public intellectual, having co-authored over ten books and published more than 250 academic and policy papers on public policy, democracy, and post-conflict transition. He holds an MPA from the Harvard Kennedy School and an MEng from the University of Barcelona. He is a Yale World Fellow, as well as a fellow at Stanford University and Florida International University.

Earlier in his career, he served as Secretary General of Nicaragua’s Ministry of Defense. He was named by Forbes as one of Central America’s 25 most influential people for his impact on civil society.