A lever and a place to stand: Extraterritorial jurisdiction as a tool for implementing international environmental law

In this seminar, Professor Lydia Slobodian (Director of the Environmental Law and Policy Program at Georgetown Law in Washington, DC) presented part of her forthcoming chapter on extraterritorial jurisdiction as a tool to implement CITES.

The seminar was held at Melbourne Law School on Friday 17 March 2023.

Listen to the recording:

Background:

Environmental problems have never been more serious – from climate change to the biodiversity crisis – despite a proliferation of environmental law at every level from local to global.  While there is clearly room for legal development, there is also a gap in implementation of the laws that exist.  In this talk, Professor Lydia Slobodian discussed how extraterritorial jurisdiction and related tools can help close the implementation gap, by shifting some of the cost and burden of environmental governance from developing countries where important natural resources (including biodiversity and carbon sinks) are located, to developed countries which benefit from those resources.  The talk used the example of wildlife trade and discussed different options for extending extraterritorial reach over the legal and illegal supply chains.

Speaker:

Professor Lydia Slobodian is the Director of the Environmental Law and Policy Program at Georgetown Law in Washington, DC, where she teaches international environmental law.  Her research focuses on biodiversity and climate change and covers legal issues ranging from extraterritorial jurisdiction to intergenerational equity. Prior to Georgetown, she worked as Senior Legal Officer for IUCN, where she led the IUCN delegation to the negotiations on marine biodiversity of areas beyond national jurisdiction, which she continues to participate in.  She is a founding partner of L4Earth, an international nonprofit organization which strives to identify and promote legal levers for transformational planetary change.  She is currently working on projects on mangrove governance, ecosystem restoration and environmental rule of law with partners including IUCN, WWF and UNEP.