Prerequisite: a background in law
The environment knows no boundaries, while national legal systems do. It is therefore of the utmost importance to develop international law approaches in order to deal with transboundary and global environmental problems. While environmental law originally focused on local problems like smoke and noise, today we are confronted with transboundary and global environmental problems like the continuing loss of biodiversity, long-distance air-pollution, and the threat of climate change. The conservation of important nature, the sound condition of air, water and soil, and the environmental safety of products and economic activities are core concerns.
Law serves as an important instrument to improve and protect the environment. The course International Environmental Law (IEL) discusses the role of international law – and the emerging body of global environmental law – in order to protect the environment. It takes a fundamental approach which means that we will examine environmental law from the perspective of principles, environmental rights, and the choice and design of regulatory instruments. Both strengths and, unfortunately, weaknesses will be discussed. As far as international law falling short, the importance of national approaches and private initiatives will be addressed. Some specific attention will go to the European Union as a regional international organisation addressing, inter alia, environmental problems. The world-wide problem of climate change serves as the leading case of this course.
This course will examine the physical and anthropogenic geographical aspects of global environmental change, focusing on natural variations of the environment over time, the impact of human activities on the Earth’s systems, and the projection of future environmental changes.
Course syllabi are provided as a guide only. Class timetables are released closer to program start date.
An investigation into the energy sources that make our modern world possible and the impact of those energy sources on the environment. Fossil fuels, nuclear energy, solar power, hydropower, wind power, and alternative energy sources will be investigated. The class will consider some major issues: What to do when we reach peak oil? What should we do in response to global warming? What changes are the students likely to see during their lifetimes?
PREREQUISITES: None
Course syllabi are provided as a guide only. Class timetables are released closer to program start date.
This module examines both the impact of climate change on cultural expression, and of cultural texts on our attitudes towards the environment. To facilitate these two perspectives, the module intersperses weeks on contemporary climate fiction (cli-fi) with weeks on other, broader texts, from ancient to modern: theatre, visual art, music and cinema. The module will equip students with an ecocritical vocabulary and the facility and opportunity to employ that vocabulary across a range of media and forms.
