Icons
Prince Harry and Meghan, The Duke and Duchess of Sussex
– The couple ‘turn compassion into boots on the ground through their Archewell foundation’, according to chef and the founder of World Central Kitchen Jose Andres.
Naomi Osaka
– Tennis star won last year’s US Open and participated in protests in Minneapolis before prioritising her mental health.
Alexei Navalny
– The Russian opposition leader was jailed last year and has been a thorn in Vladimir Putin’s side for decades.
Britney Spears
– ‘She’s survived more than a decade of trauma and abuse from her conservatorship’, writes Paris Hilton, yet still ’embodies joy’.
Sherrilyn Ifill
– A lawyer whose ‘advocacy creates paths for the unconvinced to understand things they have overlooked—and that may be the real genius of her leadership and skill,’ writes Bryan Stevenson.
Dolly Parton
– Country music star has ‘diligently celebrated the queer community’, says Miley Cyrus, as well as donating $1million to Covid-19 vaccine research.
Shohei Ohtani
– A Japanese baseball pitcher who has been described as the best player this year.
Cathy Park Hong
– A poet who has published three volumes focusing on mixed language including English, Spanish, French and Korean.
Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara
– A Cuba-born performance artist who has openly criticised the government and its policies.
Nasrin Sotoudeh
– An Iranian human rights lawyer who has represented opposition activists and politicians.
Manjusha P. Kulkarni, Russell Jeung and Cynthia Choi
– The Stop AAPI Hate co-founders work together to combat a rise in Asian hate speech.
Muna El-Kurd and Mohammed El-Kurd
– 23-year-old siblings who have become social media stars with more than two million followers.
Pioneers
Billie Eilish
– Award-winning 19-year-old singer-songwriter is the 26th highest certified digital artist.
Ben Crump
– Benjamin Lloyd Crump is an American attorney who specializes in civil rights and catastrophic personal injury cases such as wrongful death lawsuits.
Adi Utarini
– An Indonesian public health researcher who works on disease control of dengue fever.
Sunisa Lee
– The artistic gymnast was a 2020 Olympic all-around champion and uneven bars bronze medallist.
Felwine Sarr and Benedicte Savoy
– Economist Sarr and art historian Savoy proposed objects obtained through colonial-era theft be returned in 2018.
Fatih Birol
– A Turkish economist and energy expert who has served as the Executive Director of the International Energy Agency since September 2015.
Aurora James
– Founder of the fashion label Brother Vellies, with the goal of promoting traditional African design practices and techniques.
Adar Poonawalla
– Chief executive officer (CEO) of Serum Institute of India. Founded in 1966 by his father, Cyrus Poonawalla, it is the world’s largest vaccine manufacturer by number of doses produced.
Phyllis Omido
– Dubbed the ‘East African Erin Brockovich’, Omido is a Kenyan environmental activist.
Frans Timmermans
– A Dutch politician and diplomat serving as First Vice President of the European Commission since 2014.
Indyra Mendoza and Claudia Spellmant
– Activists and LGBTQ+ women who spent years working to demand justice for Vicky Hernández – a transgender woman found dead in the street in Honduras in 2009.
Roger Cox
– Partner at the Dutch law firm Paulussen Advocaten wrote a book calling for judicial intervention to save the planet.
Olimpia Coral Melo Cruz
– A Mexican activist who promoted the creation of a law against digital harassment in Mexico.
Dorottya Redai
– A scholar and activist focusing on gender and sexualities.
Esther Ze Naw Bamvo And Ei Thinzar Maung
– Lead the first large-scale protests against the coup in Yangon.
Titans
Tim Cook
– American business executive who has been the chief executive officer of Apple Inc. since 2011.
Shonda Rhimes
– Showrunner—creator, head writer, and executive producer—of the television medical drama Grey’s Anatomy.
Timbaland and Swizz Beatz
– Creators of Verzuz, an American webcast series that airs on Verzuz TV and was introduced during the COVID-19 pandemic as a virtual DJ battle.
Nikole Hannah-Jones
– Nikole Sheri Hannah-Jones is an American investigative journalist, known for her coverage of civil rights in the United States.
Tom Brady
– An American football quarterback for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers of the National Football League.
Youn Yuh Jung
– A South Korean actress whose career in film and television spans across five decades.
Allyson Felix
– American track and field athlete who specialized in the 200 meters sprint and gradually shifted to the 400 meters sprint later in her career.
Angelique Kidjo
– A Beninese singer-songwriter, actress, and activist who is noted for her diverse musical influences and creative music videos. She has been a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador since 2002.
Kenneth C. Frazier and Kenneth I. Chenault
– OneTen co-founders are fighting against legislation that critics say is designed to make it harder for minorities to cast ballots.
Luiza Trajano
– A Brazilian billionaire businesswoman who is chair of the retailer Magazine Luiza and associated companies.
Artists
Kate Winslet
– A British actress often regarded by film critics as one of the ‘preeminent actresses of her generation’.
Bad Bunny
– A Puerto Rican rapper, singer, and songwriter whose music is often defined as Latin trap and reggaeto.
Chloe Zhao
– A Chinese-born filmmaker known primarily for her work on independent films.
Jason Sudeikis
– An American actor, comedian, writer, and producer who began his career in improv comedy in the early 1990s.
Scarlett Johansson
– An American actress and singer who was the world’s highest-paid actress in 2018 and 2019.
Lil Nas X
– An American rapper and singer-songwriter who rose to prominence with the release of his country rap single ‘Old Town Road’.
Jessica B. Harris
– An American culinary historian, college professor, cookbook author and journalist.
Bowen Yang
– An Australian-born Chinese American actor, comedian, podcaster, and writer based in New York City.
Tracee Ellis Ross
– An American actress, singer, television host, producer and director known for her lead roles in the television series Girlfriends and Black-ish.
Mark Bradford
– An American artist best known for his collaged painting works, which have been shown internationally.
N.K. Jemisin
– An American science fiction and fantasy writer, better known as N. K. Jemisin who has also worked as a counselling psychologist.
Steven Yeun
– An American actor and producer who initially rose to prominence for his roles as Glenn Rhee in the television series The Walking Dead and Ben in the film Burning.
Daniel Kaluuya
– Ugandan-British actor and former writer who portrayed Posh Kenneth in the first two seasons of the British television series Skins.
Omar Sy
– A French actor, best known for his sketches with Fred Testot on the Service après-vente des émissions television show.
Barbara Kruger
– A conceptual artist whose work consists of black-and-white photographs overlaid with declarative captions.
Kane Brown
– A singer and songwriter who first gained popularity through social media.
Leaders
Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala
– Director-General of WTO: World Trade Organization since March 2021, Okonjo-Iweala is a Nigerian-American economist, fair trade leader, environmental sustainability advocate, human welfare champion, sustainable finance maven and global development expert.
Joe Biden
– The 46th and current president of the United States.
Xi Jinping
– General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party and Chairman of the Central Military Commission since 2012.
Liz Cheney
– An American attorney and politician who has been the US Representative for Wyoming’s at-large congressional district since 2017.
Kamala Harris
– The first female vice president and the highest-ranking female official in US history, as well as the first African American and first Asian American vice president.
Mario Draghi
– Italian economist, banker, academic, and civil servant who has been serving as Prime Minister of Italy since February 13, 2021.
Tucker Carlson
– Paleoconservative television host and political commentator who has hosted the nightly political talk show Tucker Carlson Tonight on Fox News since 2016.
Naftali Bennett
– Israeli politician serving as the 13th and current prime minister of Israel since June 13, 2021.
Stacey Abrams
– American politician, lawyer, voting rights activist, and author who served in the Georgia House of Representatives from 2007 to 2017.
Nayib Bukele
– The 43rd and current president of El Salvador.
Donald Trump
– American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States.
Narendra Modi
– An Indian politician serving as the 14th and current prime minister of India since 2014.
Mahbouba Seraj
– An Afghan journalist and women’s rights advocate who stayed in the country as the Taliban took over.
Joe Machin
– An American Democrat serving as the senior United States senator from West Virginia.
Ebrahim Raisi
– An Iranian conservative Islamist, politician, Muslim jurist, and the eighth and current president of Iran since August 3, 2021.
Rochelle Walensky
– Physician-scientist who is the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the administrator of the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry.
Mamata Banerjee
– An Indian academic and politician who is serving as the ninth and current Chief Minister of the Indian state of West Bengal since 2011.
Ron Klain
– An American attorney, political consultant, and former lobbyist serving as White House chief of staff under President Joe Biden.
Elisa Loncon Antileo
– Mapuche linguist and indigenous rights activist in Chile.
Abdul Ghani Baradar
– Afghan political and religious leader who is currently the acting first deputy prime minister of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan.
Innovators
Jensen Huang
– A Taiwanese-American billionaire businessman and electrical engineer.
Elon Musk
– One of the richest people in the world, Musk is the founder, CEO, and Chief Engineer at SpaceX; early stage investor, CEO, and Product Architect of Tesla, Inc.; founder of The Boring Company; and co-founder of Neuralink and OpenAI.
Adrienne Banfield Norris, Willow Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith
– Hosts of Red Table Talk, which was previously presented with an Emmy award in the outstanding informative talk show category.
Katalin Kariko
– Hungarian biochemist who specializes in RNA-mediated mechanisms.
Mary Barra
– An American businesswoman who has been the chair and chief executive officer of General Motors since January 15, 2014.
John Nkengasong
– Cameroonian virologist and the Director of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention.
MiMi Aung
– Burmese-American engineer and project manager at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
Vitalik Buterin
– Russian-Canadian programmer and writer who is best known as one of the co-founders of Ethereum.
Viya
– China’s star saleswoman Viya runs a $60 billion world of live online shopping.
Barney Graham
– An American immunologist, virologist, and clinical trials physician.
Friederike Otto and Geert Jan Van Oldenborgh
– Founders of The World Weather Attribution (WWA) initiative, a collaboration between climate scientists in the UK, the Netherlands, France, the US and Switzerland.
Kengo Kuma
– Japanese architect and professor in the Department of Architecture at the University of Tokyo.
Sara Menker
– A trustee of the Mandela Institute for Development Studies and elected one of the World Economic Forum Young Global Leaders.
Lidia Morawska
– As a distinguished professor in the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, Morawska conducts research in the field of air quality and its impact on human health and the environment.