Dr Lorenzo Cotula appointed Honorary Professor
Building upon pre-existing collaborations with SCELG
August 2017: The Strathclyde Centre for Environmental Law and Governance and the Strathclyde Centre for the Study of Human Rights are delighted to announce the appointment of Dr Lorenzo Cotula as Honorary Professor at Strathclyde Law School.
A unique blend of theoretical, doctrinal and socio-legal perspectives
Dr Cotula is Principal Researcher in Law and Sustainable Development and Team Leader of the Legal Tools Team, Natural Resources Group, at the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED). He has pioneered legal and interdisciplinary research on the interactions between international investment law, international human rights and environmental law, and the law of natural resources, with a focus on natural resource investments in low and middle-income countries. His research, offering a unique blend of theoretical, doctrinal and socio-legal perspectives, has been published in:
- International Affairs,
- the Leiden Journal of International Law,
- the Journal of World Investment & Trade,
- the Yearbook on International Investment Law & Policy,
- the International Journal of Law in Context,
- Third World Quarterly, the Journal of Legal Pluralism
- and the Journal of Development Studies, among others.
Dr Cotula is also the author of the monograph Human Rights, Natural Resource and Investment Law in a Globalised World: Shades of Grey in the Shadow of the Law (Routledge, 2012). He has consulted for the United Nations Development Programme, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the International Fund for Agricultural Development, the World Bank, the European Commission, and the European Parliament, among others. He is a member of the UNIDROIT Working Group on Agricultural Land Investment Contracts.
Expanding partnerships
Dr Cotula’s appointment builds upon his pre-existing collaboration with SCELG as a guest lecturer in comparative and global environmental law, as contributor and advisor in research projects led by Prof. Elisa Morgera (SCELG Director), and as a co-convener of international events, for instance at the UN Committee on Food Security.
As Honorary Professor, Dr Cotula will organize an innovative LLM course in International Investment Law and Sustainable Development, contribute to build students’ research skills notably in empirical legal research methods and in relation to law and development, and engage in research and knowledge exchange activities jointly with SCELG and the Centre for the Study of Human Rights (for instance, as part of Strathclyde’s collaboration with the UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food).
