Pratap Chatterjee (born

Birmingham Birmingham ( ) is a city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands in England. It is the second-largest city in the United Kingdom with a population of 1.145 million in the city proper, 2.92 million in the We ...

, United Kingdom) is an Indian/Sri Lankan investigative journalist and progressive author. He is a British citizen and grew up in India, although he lived in California for many years. He serves as the executive director of CorpWatch, an

Oakland Oakland is the largest city and the county seat of Alameda County, California, United States. A major West Coast port, Oakland is the largest city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area, the third largest city overall in the Bay ...

-based corporate accountability organisation. He also works for the

Bureau of Investigative Journalism The Bureau of Investigative Journalism (typically abbreviated to TBIJ or "the Bureau") is a nonprofit news organisation based in London. It was founded in 2010 to pursue "public interest" investigations. The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers '' The Observer'' and '' The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the ...

'' and serves on the board of

Amnesty International USA Amnesty International USA (AIUSA) is one of many country sections that make up Amnesty International worldwide. Amnesty International is an organization of more than 7 million supporters, activists and volunteers in over 150 countries, with compl ...

and of the

Corporate Europe Observatory The Corporate Europe Observatory (CEO) is a non-profit research and campaign group whose declared aim is to "expose any effects of corporate lobbying on EU policy making". It is based in Brussels. The team (2021) consists of 13 staff members. ...

Previously he was a producer and radio host at

KPFA KPFA (94.1 FM) is an American listener-funded talk radio and music radio station located in Berkeley, California, broadcasting to the San Francisco Bay Area. KPFA airs public news, public affairs, talk, and music programming. The station sig ...

-FM in

Berkeley, California Berkeley ( ) is a city on the eastern shore of San Francisco Bay in northern Alameda County, California, United States. It is named after the 18th-century Irish bishop and philosopher George Berkeley. It borders the cities of Oakland and E ...

, and a visiting fellow at the

Center for American Progress The Center for American Progress (CAP) is a public policy research and advocacy organization which presents a liberal viewpoint on economic and social issues. It has its headquarters in Washington, D.C. The president and chief executive offic ...

Chatterjee has also served as a community advisor to KQED, the San Francisco

public radio Public broadcasting involves radio, television and other electronic media outlets whose primary mission is public service. Public broadcasters receive funding from diverse sources including license fees, individual contributions, public financing ...

and

television Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of television transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertising, ...

station. He was a member of the board of th
Asian Pacific Environmental Network
from 2001 to 2005, and was an Environmental Commissioner for the city of Berkeley from 1998 to 2003.

Publications

His first book was a critique of the 1992 ''

Earth Summit The United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED), also known as the Rio Conference or the Earth Summit (Portuguese: ECO92), was a major United Nations conference held in Rio de Janeiro from June 3 to June 14, 1992. Earth Su ...

'' in Rio de Janeiro, written with Matthias Finger, titled ''The Earth Brokers: Power, Politics and World Development'' (Routledge Books, 1994) that analyses the United Nations response to global environmental crises. In the late 1990s, Chatterjee did a great deal of research surrounding the 1849

California Gold Rush The California Gold Rush (1848–1855) was a gold rush that began on January 24, 1848, when gold was found by James W. Marshall at Sutter's Mill in Coloma, California. The news of gold brought approximately 300,000 people to California f ...

and how it affected Californian American Indians which resulted in a booklet titled ''Gold, Greed & Genocide'', which he later turned into a DVD with a 16-page classroom activities and discussion guide distributed by Oyate. Chatterjee has travelled extensively in Central Asia and the Middle East to investigate the role of private military contractors working in Afghanistan and Iraq. In 2004, Chatterjee published the well-received ''Iraq, Inc.: A Profitable Occupation'' (Seven Stories Press). His footage was used in Michael Moore's 2004 film ''

Fahrenheit 9-11 ''Fahrenheit 9/11'' is a 2004 American documentary film directed, written by, and starring filmmaker, director, political commentator and activist Michael Moore. The film takes a liberal, critical look at the presidency of George W. Bush, the ...

'' and he was interviewed in Robert Greenwald's film '' Iraq for Sale: The War Profiteers'' In February 2009, Chatterjee published a detailed history of the role of Texas companies Halliburton and KBR titled ''Halliburton's Army: How A Well-Connected Texas Oil Company Revolutionized The Way America Makes War'' (Nation Books). In March 2009, he published several videos and an article of the failure of development aid in rural Afghanistan that was circulated via TomDispatch and on Salon. He followed this up with an article on the poor treatment of Afghan translators working under contract with Ohio-based Mission Essential Personnel for the US military. In 2017, Chatterjee published
Verax: The True History of Whistleblowers, Drone Warfare, and Mass Surveillance
' in collaboration with graphic novelist Khalil Bendib. It chronicles his own pursuits and the pursuits of other journalists to expose government mass surveillance and the flaws in the United States' drone warfare program. The piece is focused primarily around the story of

Edward Snowden Edward Joseph Snowden (born June 21, 1983) is an American and naturalized Russian former computer intelligence consultant who leaked highly classified information from the National Security Agency (NSA) in 2013, when he was an employee and su ...

and the beginning of WikiLeaks. But, alongside this narrative, the book breaks down how mass surveillance works in layman's terms, reveals the industry of spyware and surveillance conventions, and explores the stories of those most effected by the drone warfare resulting from these surveillance programs. He has been published in a number of popular media, including the ''

Financial Times The ''Financial Times'' (''FT'') is a British daily newspaper printed in broadsheet and published digitally that focuses on business and economic current affairs. Based in London, England, the paper is owned by a Japanese holding company, Nik ...

'', ''

The New Republic ''The New Republic'' is an American magazine of commentary on politics, contemporary culture, and the arts. Founded in 1914 by several leaders of the progressive movement, it attempted to find a balance between "a liberalism centered in hu ...

'', ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers '' The Observer'' and '' The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the ...

'', and ''

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publish ...

''. He often appears as a guest expert in a wide variety of media ranging from

Fox TV The Fox Broadcasting Company, commonly known simply as Fox and stylized in all caps as FOX, is an American commercial broadcast television network owned by Fox Corporation and headquartered in New York City, with master control operations and ...

to ''

Democracy Now! ''Democracy Now!'' is an hour-long American TV, radio, and Internet news program hosted by journalists Amy Goodman (who also acts as the show's executive producer), Juan González, and Nermeen Shaikh. The show, which airs live each weekday at ...

''. His writing has won a number of awards, from the National Newspaper Association and Project Censored, among others.

References

External links

KPFA's ''Terra Verde''
Weekly environmental affairs program founded and co-hosted by Pratap Chatterjee; airs Fridays 1:30–2:00 p.m., with audio of previous programs archived at website
Pratap Chatterjee – Halliburton's Army: How a Well-Connected Texas Oil Company Revolutionized the Way America Makes War
18 February 2009, talk at Powell's City of Books in Portland, Oregon, from recent book tour. {{DEFAULTSORT:Chatterjee, Pratap American radio journalists British investigative journalists Indian investigative journalists American non-fiction environmental writers Non-fiction environmental writers Anti-corporate activists American activists American male journalists American writers of Indian descent Bengali writers Living people Year of birth missing (living people) British emigrants to the United States American investigative journalists American people of Bengali descent