Digital Commons Network^™

Our Bandit Future? Cities, Shantytowns, And Climate Change Governance, Colin Crawford

Fordham Urban Law Journal

This Article seeks to begin to define a role for cities and their inhabitants in climate change governance. Part I argues that if there is a failure to take into account global urbanization and its defining characteristics, namely extreme squalor and associated social ills, as a central feature of climate change policy, we face a future where cities will experience sustained and perhaps intractable urban violence and social disintegration, a development that can only hasten the separate but related harms caused by climate change on the world’s human and biological populations. Part II explores some of the consequences of the …

Public Interest Litigation: Insights From Theory And Practice, Scott L. Cummings, Deborah L. Rhode

Fordham Urban Law Journal

If public interest litigation has not always delivered all that we desire, it has surely provided no lack of experience. Our challenge now is to integrate these lessons from practice with insights from allied disciplines. Taken together, they remind us of the need to coordinate litigation with broader mobilizing efforts, to think strategically about effectiveness, and to create adequate systems of evaluation and accountability.

Can Socially Responsible Investment Provide A Means Of Environmental Regulation?, Benjamin J. Richardson

Articles & Book Chapters

The seemingly rapid growth of the market for socially responsible investment ('SRI) in Australia and other jurisdictions promises to make financing decisions more accountable to social and environmental criteria. Indeed, the ability of financiers to withhold funds and thereby hinder development, such as the decision of the Australia and New Zealand Banking Group Ltd in 2008 to shun financing a Tasmanian pulp mill planned by Gunns Ltd, raises hopes that financial institutions could act as surrogate environmental regulators. The long-standing SRI movement arose partly as an answer to the lacunae or weaknesses of official regulation, providing a means by which …

Keeping Ethical Investment Ethical: Regulatory Issues For Investing For Sustainability, Benjamin J. Richardson

Articles & Book Chapters

Regulation must target the financial sector, which often funds and profits from environmentally unsustainable development. In an era of global financial markets, the financial sector has a crucial impact on the state of the environment. The long-standing movement for ethically and socially responsible investment (SRI) has recently begun to advocate environmental standards for financiers. While this movement is gaining more adherents, it has increasingly justified responsible financing as a path to be prosperous, rather than virtuous. This trend partly owes to how financial institutions view their legal responsibilities. The business case motivations that now predominantly drive SRI are not sufficient …

Gender-Benders': Sex And Law In The Constitution Of Polluted Bodies, Dayna Nadine Scott

Articles & Book Chapters

This paper explores how law might conceive of the injury or harm of endocrine disruption as it applies to an aboriginal community experiencing chronic chemical pollution. The effect of the pollution in this case is not only gendered, but gendering: it seems to be causing the ‘production’ of two girl babies for every boy born on the reserve. This presents an opening to interrogate how law is implicated in the constitution of not just gender but sex. The analysis takes an embodied turn, attempting to validate the real and material consequences of synthetic chemicals acting on bodies — but uncovers …

Seven Things The New Epa Administrator Should Do, Michael B. Gerrard

Faculty Scholarship

In view of the dramatic shift in the nation's environmental policy that is presaged by the ascension of Barack Obama, I have been asked to suggest several actions that should be undertaken by the new administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

This article was written on Jan. 26, 2009, six days after the inauguration. It is to appear in March. Thus every reader will know something that, today, I don't – what long-pent-up actions were taken by President Obama shortly after he moved into the Oval Office. But I am guessing that by the time this article appears, Lisa …

Comment On Developing A Comprehensive Approach To Climate Change Mitigation Policy In The United States: Integrating Levels Of Government And Economic Sectors, Michael B. Gerrard

Faculty Scholarship

The article by Thomas D. Peterson, Robert B. McKinstry Jr., and John C. Dernbach (PM&D) has two central insights: (1) Any serious national effort to control emissions of greenhouse gases (GHGs) must continue to leave important roles to the states; and (2) It would be a mistake to put too many eggs in the cap-and-trade basket. A portfolio approach that utilizes many different regulatory techniques is important.

I certainly agree with PM&D about these insights, and they are correct that much of the current Congressional debate has given too little attention to these considerations. However, I have serious reservations about …

Soc 3820 : Environmental Sociology, Sociology And Anthropology

Approved Course Proposals

No abstract provided.

Primary &(And) Secondary Education - Law Review Digests

The Journal of Law and Education

No abstract provided.

Streamlining Nepa To Combat Global Climate Change: Heresy Or Necessity?, Irma S. Russell

Faculty Law Review Articles

This article discusses the impact of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) on the development of noncarbon energy sources and raises the question of whether the NEPA process should be altered to bring clean power online faster. The article examines the ability of the market to respond to the call for rapid adaptation to climate change and for rapid development of noncarbon sources of energy, given the regulatory environment and existing regulatory treatment of NEPA processes. In addition, the article examines examples of current streamlining of the NEPA process in the energy arena. The author notes arguments for and against …

The Justice Of Saving Our World: Rawlsian Theory Applied To Environmentalism And Alternative Energy, Devon Bryson

Global Tides

While respect for nature pervades contemporary thought, issues of environmentalism and alternative energy largely lack a place in modern global conceptions of social justice. A theoretical or philosophical defense of these issues is therefore necessary to reinforce intuitions about nature, and ground them upon some substantive justification. One can find this justification in the Rawlsian theory of justice, which already informs many modern liberal notions. Rawlsian justice relies upon the Kantian notion that humans are autonomous beings— beings that are “ends” in themselves (that have inherent value). Rawls’ theory of justice attempts to respect each of these “ends.” However, traditional …

From Constitution To Constitutionalism: A Global Framework For Legitimate Public Power Systems, Larry Catá Backer

Dickinson Law Review (1908-2003)

Academic and policy engagements with constitutions and constitutionalism have largely been built around unstated frameworks within which legitimated activity can take place. The essay suggests both the disorientation of much of the discussion and proposes an ideological framework that captures the assumptions about which constitutionalist discourse has evolved. Constitutionalism at one time could be said to involve the study of the peculiarities of the unique domestic constitutionalf ramework through which government was constituted and power institutionalized. No longer. This essay examines the current discourse of constitutionalism. That discourse reveals the current dynamic character of the concept. The old consensus of …

Sister Katie: The Memory And Making Of A 1.5 Generation Working Class Transnational, Caroline Waldron Merithew

History Faculty Publications

Identifying the theoretical and chronological fault lines that divide immigration and women’s history, I use memory and biography to argue that assimilation and transnationalism in the 1.5 and second generations were not oppositional. In this article, I tell the story of an Italian immigrant who moved to the United States as a young child and who became a self-proclaimed “left winger.” I cast Katie’s story less from her own words as from the recollections of others who remade and remembered her from the 1930s until 1960. I argue that a working-class transnational’s identity was one that could move through large …

The Ghost In Our Genes: Legal And Ethical Implications Of Epigenetics, Mark A. Rothstein, Yu Cai, Gary E. Marchant

Health Matrix: The Journal of Law-Medicine

No abstract provided.

The Black Press As A Political Institution: How The Chicago Defender Portrayed Jesse Jackson And Barack Obama's Historical Presidential Campaigns, Cristina Mislan

LSU Master's Theses

Since the inception of Freedom’s Journal in 1827, the black press has sought to elevate the black community as well as advocate for civil rights and justice. This thesis examines news coverage in the Chicago Defender, a prominent black newspaper that has created a public sphere for the black community. Specifically, this research reveals whether the newspaper framed Reverend Jesse Jackson’s 1988 campaign differently from President Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign. Furthermore, this thesis sought to reveal how a well-known black newspaper provided meaning for its readers about two black presidential candidates who adopted disparate political messages in order to appeal …

Ltc Newsletter, University Of Dayton. Ryan C. Harris Learning Teaching Center

LTC Newsletter

Spring 2009

Using Local Knowledge To Shrink The Individual Carbon Footprint, Katrina Fischer Kuh

Hofstra Law Review

The unexpected willingness of local governments to engage in climate change mitigation has occasioned a flurry of reflection and debate about whether local efforts are meaningful, what the implications of local climate change initiatives are for theories of environmental federalism, and how the motivations of local actors can be understood. Additionally, there has been much discussion about the efficacy of local actions and the appropriate role for local governments in addressing the climate change problem.

This Idea does not consider which level of government is best suited to address or attempt to define the optimal role of local governments with …

Steans Center Newsletter, Steans Center

Steans Center Newsletters, Press Releases and News Items

No abstract provided.

From Despot To Steward: The Greening Of Catholic Social Teaching, Brian G. Henning

Philosophy Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

A Human Rights Approach To Corporate Accountability And Environmental Litigation, Oscar Omar Salazar-Duran

University of San Francisco Law Review

This Comment explores how a human rights approach would provide a more efficient means of achieving compensation and deterring environmental law violations.

Public Access To Spatial Data On Private-Land Conservation, Jessica Owley, Amy Wilson Morris, Adena R. Rissman

Articles

No abstract provided.

Anthropology (Anth), Montclair State University

Course Descriptions

No abstract provided.

Justice Studies (Just), Montclair State University

Course Descriptions

No abstract provided.

Sociology (Soci), Montclair State University

Course Descriptions

No abstract provided.

Tributes To Dean Karen H. Rothenberg, Martin J. O'Malley, Benjamin L. Cardin, Robert M. Bell, Andre M. Davis

Maryland Law Review

No abstract provided.

Collision Course - Science, Law, And Regulation In The Emerging Science Of Low Dose Toxicity, Jody A. Roberts

Villanova Environmental Law Journal (1991 - )

No abstract provided.

Raising Environmental Justice Claims Through The Law Of Public Nuisance, Mandy Garrells

Villanova Environmental Law Journal (1991 - )

No abstract provided.

Permitting Under The Clean Air Act: How Current Standards Impose Obstacles To Achieving Environmental Justice, Annise Katherine Maguire

Michigan Journal of Race and Law

Most studies about the environmental justice movement focus on the disproportionate share of environmental burdens minority and low-income populations bear, the negative effects of an unequal distribution of undesirable land uses, and how industry contributes to the adverse impacts suffered by the communities. Unfortunately, trying to prove that an injury was caused by actions of a nearby facility is difficult, and this approach has yielded few legal victories for environmental justice communities. While it is important to remain focused on how environmental justice communities are disproportionately impacted by undesirable land uses, the analysis must shift if the law is to …

Policing, Place, And Race, Bennett Capers

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Contextualizing Environmental Human Rights: A Relativist Perspective, Roda Mushkat

Pace Environmental Law Review

No abstract provided.