The international legal regime has assumed an increasingly large role in addressing climate change; it has achieved some success while also encountering limitations on its approach. The intersection of global governance, international law enforcement, and environmental law shines a light on the international human rights framework and the dynamic interplay between courts, international institutions, and civil society.
The panel will include:
- Professor Michael B. Gerrard is the Andrew Sabin Professor of Professional Practice at Columbia Law School. He teaches courses on environmental law, climate change law, and energy regulation, and founded and directs the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law. He also chaired the faculty of Columbia University’s Earth Institute from 2015 to 2018. From 1979 through 2008, he practiced environmental law in New York, most recently as partner in charge of the New York office of Arnold & Porter. Upon joining the Law School faculty in 2009, he became the senior counsel to the firm. His practice involved trying numerous cases and arguing many appeals in federal and state courts and administrative tribunals; handling the environmental aspects of numerous transactions and development projects; and providing regulatory compliance advice to a wide variety of clients in the private and public sectors.
- Professor Smita Narula is the inaugural Haub Distinguished Chair of International Law at the Elisabeth Haub School of Law at Pace University. She is author of dozens of widely-cited publications on human rights and environmental issues, and has helped formulate policy, legal, and community-led responses to a range of social and ecological justice issues worldwide. Prior to joining Pace, she was Distinguished Lecturer and Interim Director of the Human Rights Program at the Roosevelt House Public Policy Institute at Hunter College. Prior to Hunter, she was Associate Professor of Clinical Law at NYU School of Law where she taught the International Human Rights Clinic and served as Faculty Director of the Center for Human Rights and Global Justice. In 2008, Professor Narula was appointed legal advisor to the U.N. Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food and served in this capacity for the duration of the Rapporteur’s six-year mandate. From 1997 to 2003, she served as India researcher and Senior Researcher for South Asia at Human Rights Watch.
