Yale Center for Environmental Law and Policy

The Yale Center for Environmental Law & Policy is a joint initiative between the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies and the Yale Law School.

Mission

The Yale Center for Environmental Law & Policy seeks to advance fresh thinking and analytically rigorous approaches to environmental decisionmaking – across disciplines, sectors, and boundaries.

History

Established in 1994, the Yale Center for Environmental Law & Policy is a joint initiative between the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies and the Yale Law School.

The Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies, founded in 1900 by Gifford Pinchot, the first director of the U.S. Forest Service, helped to launch the conservation and natural resource management movement in the early 1900s. The School's graduates have provided ongoing leadership in the environmental and natural resource fields, both domestically and internationally.

Graduates of Yale Law School were the prime movers behind the environmental law movement of the late 1960s- and early 1970s, founding organizations such as the Environmental Defense Fund and the Natural Resources Defense Council. Yale Law School students are active in the [http://www.law.yale.edu/stuorgs/yaleenvironmentallawassociation.htm Yale Environmental Law Association] and special projects organized by the Center for Environmental Law & Policy.

Program areas

*Environmental Performance Measurement - The Environmental Performance Measurement (EPM) Project aims to shift environmental decision-making onto firmer analytic foundations using environmental indicators and statistics. In collaboration with the Center for International Earth Science Information Network at Columbia University and the World Economic Forum, the project produces a periodically updated Environmental Sustainability Index (ESI) that tracks 146 countries on 21 sustainability indicators. Work is now under way on an [http://www.yale.edu/epi/ Environmental Performance Index (EPI)] that will assess key environmental policy outcomes using trend analysis and policy targets linked to the Millennium Development Goals. The 2006 Pilot EPI was released in Davos, Switzerland, at the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum on Thursday, 26 January 2006.

*Environmental Attitudes and Behavior - The Environmental Attitudes and Behavior Program strives to address the relationship between Americans’ environmental values and subsequent personal and political decisionmaking.

*Business Innovations and the Environment - The Business Innovations and the Environment Program develops theory and practice at the nexus of business and the environment.

*Environmental Governance - The Environmental Governance Program aims to produce scholarly analysis and tools with policy application for government authorities, communities, NGO leaders, and corporate executives. Environmental governance research projects include the [http://www.yale.edu/gegdialogue/ Global Environmental Governance Project] and the [http://www.yale.edu/envirocenter/unitar.htm UNITAR-Yale Environment and Democracy Initiative] .

*Yale Environmental Protection Clinic - The Yale Environmental Protection Clinic is designed to introduce students to the fields of environmental advocacy and policymaking by exploring a variety of environmental law and policy questions and the tools environmental professionals use to address them. As a part of the program, teams of three to four students work with client organizations on "real-world" projects, with the goal of producing a major work product for the client by the end of the semester.

People and Partners

Faculty Researchers and Staff
*Daniel C. Esty, Director
*Dale Bryk, Director, Environmental Law Clinic
*Benjamin Cashore, Affiliated Faculty, Environmental Governance
*Lisa M. Curran, Affiliated Faculty, Environmental Governance
*Erica Dawson, Affiliated Faculty, Environmental Attitudes and Behavior
*Bradford S. Gentry, Principal Investigator, Private International Finance and the Environment Project
*Ysella Edyvean, Outreach Coordinator
*John Emerson, Affiliated Faculty, Environmental Performance Measurement
*Melissa Goodall, Associate Director
*Achim Halpaap, Director, UNITAR/Yale Environment and Democracy Project
*Maria Ivanova, Project Director, Global Environmental Governance Project
*Christine Kim, Program Manager
*Anthony Leisrowitz, Affiliated Research Scientist, Environmental Attitudes and Behavior
*Anastasia O'Rourke, Editor, Working Paper Series
*Robert Repetto, Affiliated Faculty, Environmental GovernanceFaculty Advisors

Fellows
*Sybil Ackerman
*Monica Araya
*Harri Kalimo
*James Cameron
*Sascha Mueller-Kraenner
*Andrew WinstonPartners
*Center for Business and the Environment at Yale
*Center for International Earth Science Information Network, Columbia University
*College of William and Mary
*Renewable Energy and International Law Project
*UN Institute for Training and Research
*Vermont Law School
*Yale Center for the Study of Globalization
*Yale Project on Climate Change

External links

* [http://www.yale.edu/envirocenter/ Yale Center for Environmental Law & Policy]