Dr Antonio Cardesa-Salzmann

Senior Lecturer

Law

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Personal statement

I am an academic at the Strathclyde Law School, whose main area of expertise is international and EU environmental law.  As a researcher, my main interest lies in assessing how legal systems, from global and comparative perspectives, interact and contribute to, or hinder, more sustainable patterns of social reproduction. De/coloniality and critical perspectives on ‘global’ law are important perspectives to my teaching and research.
My recent work is developing along two specific lines of research. One focuses on the subjectivisation of ecosystems and Nature as an emerging trend in comparative environmental law. Another seeks to develop critical, socio-legal perspectives on the complex relationship between sustainability and tourism, which is a globally burgeoning economic sector with major -increasingly contested- social and environmental impacts.
More generally, I have an established track-record of published research about the compliance with and enforcement of international environmental law and, more specifically, of multilateral environmental treaties. My recent publications in this field discuss the respective remits and performances of international courts and treaty-specific compliance procedures.
After joining the Strathclyde Law School, I have also engaged extensively in knowledge exchange activities. These have focused on the implications of the UK’s decision to leave the EU on environmental law and governance in Scotland, as well as the sentencing of environmental crimes in Scotland. I have also collaborated with the UN Environment Programme for the development of CPD materials on the international legal framework for the protection of the ozone layer.

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Prize And Awards

Juan de la Cierva Fellowship
Recipient
31/10/2013

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Qualifications

PhD, University of Barcelona

LLM, University of Barcelona

Diplôme des Hautes Études Européenes et Internationales, Institut Européen des Hautes Études Internationales (Nice, France)

LLB, University of Barcelona

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Teaching

At PGT level, I lead or co-lead the following subjects within the LLM in Global Environmental Law and Governance:

  • Global Environmental Law: Issues of Equity and Sustainability (with Dr Saskia Vermeylen)
  • Public International Law & the Environment
  • EU Environmental Law

I also contribute to modules such as ‘Environmental Treaties: Fragmentation and Regime Interactions’, ‘Fisheries Law and Sustainability’, and ‘Blue Economy and International Law’.

At undergraduate level, I lead the LLB Graduate Entry and Part-time programmes. I teach the 'Environmental Law (Hons)' fourth year module. I have also designed and lead the new 2nd and 3rd year elective 'An Introduction to Environmental Law'. 

In the past years, I have also lectured Public International Law and led tutorials in Public Law.

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Research Interests

Global law, Public International law, EU law, comparative law, decoloniality, rights of Nature, global justice, Anthropocene

Sustainability and tourism, critical tourism studies

Regime interactions, compliance with and enforcement of multilateral environmental treaties, transnational environmental crime

EU environmental law, external environmental policy of the EU

Brexit and environmental law and governance in Scotland

Professional Activities

Journal of International Wildlife Law & Policy (Journal)
Peer reviewer
8/2026
Workshop Research Group on Tourism
Participant
13/7/2026
Review of European, Comparative and International Environmental Law (Journal)
Peer reviewer
6/2026
Public Humanities (Journal)
Peer reviewer
2026
University of Barcelona - Faculty of Law
Visiting researcher
3/7/2025
Sustainable Tourism? Toward a new socio-legal research agenda
Organiser
5/6/2025

More professional activities

Projects

The Legal Characterisation of Sustainable Tourism as a Structuring Instrument for a Common Mediterranean Area
Huici Sancho, Laura (Principal Investigator) Álvarez Verdugo, Milagros (Principal Investigator) Cardesa-Salzmann, Antonio (Researcher) Ntona, Maria (Researcher)
The JUSTURMED project asks whether sustainable tourism can act as a legal basis for the construction of a Common Mediterranean Area. It takes into account the strategic significance of tourism in the region, as the world's top tourist destination, and the challenges it faces, such as climate change, seasonal demographic pressure, environmental degradation, and risks to cultural and natural heritage, which highlight the need for more coherent and efficient cooperation frameworks. The Mediterranean is also a particularly complex area, where geopolitical tensions, structural inequalities between shores and significant institutional fragmentation converge. In this context, sustainable tourism offers a privileged prism for analysing the interaction between different regulatory systems and the capacity of law to drive structural change.
The research focuses on the complex interaction between international law and European Union law, as well as the role of regional organisations and structures that influence tourism governance. This analysis will provide an understanding of how different legal instruments (hard law, soft law and cooperation mechanisms) converge, overlap or generate gaps that directly affect the sustainability of tourism in the region.
The project has four main objectives. First, to assess the potential of tourism as a factor in Mediterranean regionalisation, identifying areas of convergence and divergence that may influence the possible creation of a Common Mediterranean Area. Second, to legally define sustainable tourism, taking into account the cultural, environmental and security specificities that characterise the region, incorporating elements such as heritage protection, distributive equity and obligations related to the safety of destinations and travellers. Thirdly, to analyse the regulatory interaction between international and European instruments, both hard law and soft law, with particular attention to the challenges posed by regulatory fragmentation and opportunities for legal coordination. And fourthly, to assess the capacities and limitations of Mediterranean institutional cooperation, including the EU, UNESCO, UNWTO, the UfM and other relevant structures in the region, in order to promote coherent and effective models of sustainable tourism.
JUSTURMED aims to generate knowledge that contributes to the implementation of the new Mediterranean Pact which, among other instruments, assigns sustainable tourism a strategic role in the articulation of a shared regional space. It also seeks to improve Euro-Mediterranean governance through operational legal proposals that support the design of coherent public policies, promote institutional coordination and enable sustainability challenges to be addressed more effectively. The project aims to provide useful tools for the development of national and European strategies that reinforce an environmentally protected, socially inclusive and culturally preserved Mediterranean.
01-Jan-2026 - 31-Jan-2029
Sustainability and Tourism: Towards a new socio-legal research agenda
Cardesa-Salzmann, Antonio (Principal Investigator) Ntona, Maria (Principal Investigator)
This project is funded by the University's International Stategic Patnership Fund. It seeks to lay the ground for a larger funding bid for a collaborative research project on Sustainable Tourism from a socio-legal perspective with academic and non-academic partners. It builds on existing academic networks and initial expressions of interest with decision-makers, stakeholders in the tourism sector, and civil society organisations.
Tourism is a multifaceted economic sector, whose relevance and impact cuts across jurisdictions and levels of governance. Ensuring the sector’s sustainability is a challenging endeavour, requiring a complex approach to regulation and decision-making. Yet scholarship on sustainable tourism is sorely lacking in legal perspectives, including ones of a critical, comparative, and interdisciplinary nature.
Planned activities aim at filling this critical knowledge gap. They aim to bring together a diverse team of academics, stakeholders and decision-makers, based in Scotland and abroad, and invite them to co-produce an agenda for future socio-legal impact-driven research on sustainable tourism.
14-Jan-2024 - 15-Jan-2025
The International Legal System for Sustainable Tourism Governance
Huici Sancho, Laura (Principal Investigator) Álvarez Verdugo, Milagros (Principal Investigator) Cardesa-Salzmann, Antonio (Researcher)
01-Jan-2023 - 31-Jan-2026
Development of an online intermediate level course on the International Legal Framework on Ozone Depletion for the Ozone Secretariat at UNEP (InfoMEA Phase III Project - amendment)
Cardesa-Salzmann, Antonio (Principal Investigator)
20-Jan-2021 - 31-Jan-2022
SRSS Strathclyde Excellence Award PGR Studentship
Cardesa-Salzmann, Antonio (Principal Investigator) McCorkindale, Christopher (Co-investigator) McEntee, Iona (Post Grad Student)
National courts and North-South legal ecumenism. Exploring the role of transnational inter-judicial dialogue between the Global North and the Global South for the promotion of climate justice. PGR Student: Iona McEntee
01-Jan-2021 - 30-Jan-2024
UKRI CoA Covid Extension
Garvey, Brian (Principal Investigator) Portes Virginio, Francis (Researcher) Cardesa-Salzmann, Antonio (Researcher)
UKRI sponsored extension of projects affected by Covid-19
01-Jan-2021 - 30-Jan-2021

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Contact

Dr Antonio Cardesa-Salzmann
Senior Lecturer
Law

Email: antonio.cardesa-salzmann@strath.ac.uk
Tel: 548 3330