EG802 | Environmental Governance

While, every student of law gets equipped in domestic Environmental law, policy and practice through a foundation course at the undergraduate level, the thrust at the Masters’ level is to give an overview of the International Environmental legal regime and bring different legal regimes into a comparative focus.  In this endeavour, seamless integration of Natural Resources Management appears logical and gets attempted here. Human Rights concerns and its influence on the content and enforcement of environment-related laws, forms the context of study.
The Course attempts to look beyond the tools of resource management and governance and a perception of viewing natural resources as commodity and object of trade. The attempt here is to open a window and expand on a vision that believes in   an indivisible and invaluable bond of relationship between human beings and the natural resources and the extent of its accommodation in the legal ordering, cutting across different legal systems.
This is an endeavour in mainstreaming conservation; livelihood concerns and equity in access, use and management of resources in the environmental legal discourse. The scope and sweep of the enquiry include global, regional, national and local environmental legal frames and their comparison.
The enquiry at the Masters level is to explore the international moorings and compulsions that contribute to the content and administration of domestic Environmental Law. It includes an analysis of the extent of commitment, compliance, besides concerns towards the fulfilment of international obligations undertaken by states in a comparative context. Drawing lessons from the experiences of states in different aspects of environmental law-making and implementation constitute an integral aspect of the study.
Analysis of the influence and impact of domestic traditions, practices, laws and institutional arrangements upon Global Environmental Governance also forms part of the study here. Further, the role of non-state actors in steering Global, Regional and National environmental legal regimes also find space in this study. The underpinnings of human rights concerns get reflected in the entire discourse.
The approach is essentially Analytical, Comparative and Evaluative. The teaching methods include lectures, panel and group discussions, and presentations from invited speakers, student-presentations and field exercises.