Belgian human rights defender and international relations expert Rémy Bonny has been appointed the prestigious Global LGBTQI+ Human Rights Fellowship for 2026–27 at Harvard Kennedy School’s Carr-Ryan Center for Human Rights.
Bonny, Executive Director of the Europe-wide LGBTIQ+ human rights organisation Forbidden Colours, becomes only the second European to receive the fellowship, following former Irish Taoiseach (Prime Minister) Dr. Leo Varadkar.
The appointment recognises Bonny’s work at the intersection of LGBTIQ+ rights, democratic backsliding, foreign interference and European rule-of-law policy. Over the past years, he has documented how ultraconservative and anti-democratic governments use attacks on LGBTIQ+ communities as part of broader domestic and international political strategies.
“It is an extraordinary honour to join Harvard Kennedy School,” said Rémy Bonny. “But I see this fellowship first and foremost as an opportunity to strengthen the fight for democracy and human rights in Europe. The attacks we see against LGBTIQ+ people are increasingly connected to attacks on independent institutions, the rule of law and democracy itself.”
From exposing Russian influence to a landmark EU court case
Bonny has become a prominent European voice on the links between anti-LGBTIQ+ politics, authoritarianism and foreign interference.
In 2019, he exposed a coordinated international disinformation campaign led by the Russian Federation in cooperation with Viktor Orbán’s previous government in Hungary, targeting LGBTIQ+ communities across Europe. His work was among the earliest to document how anti-LGBTIQ+ narratives were being weaponised as part of a broader strategy of foreign interference and democratic destabilisation.
He has since briefed national and European policymakers on subversive activities and disinformation campaigns and advised governments and supranational institutions on Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference (FIMI) and human rights sanctions.
In 2021, Bonny was the first international activist to expose Hungary’s anti-LGBTIQ+ ‘propaganda’ law as a direct copy of Russia’s 2013 legislation.
Two years later, he led a Forbidden Colours campaign that mobilised an unprecedented coalition of 16 EU Member States and the European Parliament to intervene in proceedings against the Hungarian law before the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU).
That case culminated in a landmark 2026 judgment, in which the Court found, for the first time, a stand-alone violation of Article 2 of the Treaty on European Union, which enshrines the Union’s fundamental values.
“The European Union has powerful legal and political tools to defend its values, but those tools only matter when governments are willing to use them,” Bonny said. “My work at Harvard will examine how Europe can close the gap between the values it proclaims internationally and the way it protects democracy and fundamental rights within its own borders.”
Rethinking Europe’s role as a global defender of democracy
During his fellowship, Bonny will examine how the European Union can reclaim its role as a credible global defender of democracy and human rights in an era of authoritarian resurgence.
His fellowship project will result in a book-length essay examining how democratic backsliding, selective enforcement of EU law and the limitations of a predominantly market-driven model of European integration have weakened the Union’s political legitimacy.
The research will use LGBTQI+ rights as a constitutional stress test for European democracy, drawing on case studies from countries including Hungary, Poland, Georgia, and Serbia, as well as Bonny’s direct experience in European policymaking and advocacy.
The project will explore reforms aimed at strengthening democratic safeguards, rule-of-law enforcement and fundamental rights protection across Europe.
“If Europe wants to be credible when it defends democracy in Georgia, Ukraine or elsewhere in the world, it must be equally determined to defend democracy and fundamental rights inside the European Union,” Bonny said. “LGBTIQ+ rights provide an especially revealing test of whether our institutions are prepared to defend their own constitutional principles when doing so becomes politically difficult.”
Second European fellow after Leo Varadkar
Bonny is only the second European to receive the Global LGBTQI+ Human Rights Fellowship, following former Irish Taoiseach Leo Varadkar.
The appointment brings a European civil-society and policy perspective to the programme at a moment when questions surrounding democratic resilience, authoritarian influence and the future of liberal democracy have moved to the centre of European politics.
Bonny will continue serving as Executive Director of Forbidden Colours throughout the fellowship, allowing him to combine his research at Harvard with ongoing advocacy at European level.
“I am not stepping away from Forbidden Colours,” Bonny said. “The fellowship gives us an opportunity to connect what we experience on the ground in Europe with some of the world’s leading academic thinking on democracy and human rights — and to bring those insights back into European policymaking.”
About Rémy Bonny
Born and raised in Belgium, Rémy Bonny is a human rights defender and expert in international relations. He serves as Executive Director of Forbidden Colours, a Europe-wide non-profit working to advance human rights and democracy for LGBTIQ+ people.
His work specialises in how ultraconservative and anti-democratic regimes use opposition to LGBTIQ+ rights in their international relations, including through disinformation, foreign influence and transnational political networks.
His work has been featured by international media including CNN, TIME, POLITICO, The Guardian, Sky News, Le Monde, Libération, and El País. He has lectured at institutions including Harvard University and HEC Paris.
Bonny holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees in Political Science from the Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB) and a European Master in Human Rights and Democratisation from the Global Campus of Human Rights.
