Kazuko Ito is a Tokyo-based human rights lawyer and a lecturer at the Keio University Law school. She is one of the founding members and vice president of Human Rights Now, a Tokyo-based international human rights NGO with UN consultative status, awarded Okinawa Peace Prize in 2024. As the first international human rights NGO based in Japan, Human Rights Now works for the promotion and protection of human rights worldwide, with a special focus in Asia using a variety of techniques including investigation, grass-roots empowerment for human rights defenders, solidarity action, and advocacy.

She is also the President of Human Rights Now New York, a board member of the International Human Rights Law Association in Japan, a board member of the Japan Association of Gender and Law, Co-Representative of Japan NGO Network for Nuclear Weapon Abolition, and served as chair of the Gender Equality Committee of the Japan Federation of Bar Associations. She is also associated with WWF Japan. She has an LL.B(1989) from Waseda University and Doctor of Law(2023) there. She was a visiting scholar at NYU School of Law(2005). Her research interests concern International Law and Justice, International Human Rights Law, Business and Human Rights, Gender and Law.

As an attorney, she handled cases concerning women’s rights, children’s rights, business and human rights and numerous public interested litigations including the U.S. Yokota Air Base Pollution Lawsuit. She has written numerous books and articles on human rights issues, including “Human Rights Beyond the Border”(2013), “Why is Fast Fashion Cheap?” (2016) and a chapter in the book “The Global Me Too Movement: How Social Media Propelled a Historic Movement and How the Law Responded” (2020).