To kick off the 2021 Earth Month Lecture Series, Mike Angstadt, J.D., Ph.D., will speak about how innovative ideas and uses of environmental law spread and gain traction around the world. “We don't live in a world of local or global environmentalism. Instead, local approaches are global, and global ideas are implemented locally,” he states. This theme “emphasizes the globally interconnected nature of environmental challenges like climate change,” and demonstrates the importance of “domestic efforts in contributing to international responses,” he continues.

Entitled When Ideas Walk, Rivers Can Talk: Innovation and Communication in Global Environmental Law, it is scheduled at 6:30pm on Thursday, April 1, 2021. The required webinar registration is HERE.

Dr. Angstadt’s goal is to highlight a process that exists within the law. “A useful case study shows how ideas spread and influence widely.” To illustrate this, he will discuss three developments that are being considered in countries around the world: (1) efforts to establish special courts/benches/judges that only hear environmental cases, (2) efforts to grant legal rights to natural objects -- trees, species, rivers, entire ecosystems, and (3) efforts to use domestic courts to address global challenges, like climate change.

Interestingly, the topic of Dr. Angstadt’s presentation offers a great parallel to Earth Day itself; two of the three ideas -- specialized environmental courts and extending rights to nature-- were proposed in the USA within a few years of the first Earth Day. Since then, they, like Earth Day, which also began here in the US, have ultimately gained broad adoption elsewhere.

As an environmental politics scholar and trained environmental lawyer, Angstadt is passionate about interdisciplinary undergraduate teaching and research at the nexus of international relations and environmental law and policy. His research examines domestic judicial institutions and their role in implementing international environmental law. Mike Angstadt holds a BA in Political Science from Hartwick College, a JD from Pace University School of Law where he was the Learned Hand Fellow in Environmental Law and received certificates in Environmental and International Law, and a PhD in Political Science with specialization in Environmental Politics from Colorado State University, where he completed an NSF IGERT traineeship. Presently, he is an assistant professor at Colorado College.

One PDH-CEU is offered for attendance by engineers, architects, and municipal officials.
Certificates will be issued upon completion of lecture questions.
After registering for the webinar, further register for the PDH-CEU by emailing cultural@sunyorange.edu with “for PDH-CEU” in the subject line.

This event, which is co-sponsored by SUNY Orange Cultural Affairs and SUNY Orange Sustainability, is free and open to the public. Questions may be directed to cultural@sunyorange.edu and/or kirsten.gabrielsen@sunyorange.edu

photo credit from top to bottom: Charlotte Gabrielsen; Kirsten Gabrielsen.