December 15, 2020

 

Dear GNHRE Members,

 

It’s been quite a year for the Global Network for Human Rights and the Environment!  As you all know, the GNHRE is a loose affiliation of lawyers, academics, activists and other professionals, globally dispersed and intellectually diverse, who all share a human rights orientation to environmental protection.

 

We write now to give you an update of what the GNHRE has been up to, and a preview of the year ahead.

 

The GNHRE’s greatest resource is the people who are members, and we are especially grateful to those members of the Core Team whose energies and enthusiasm have galvanized the network’s activities. This year, we have expanded the Core Team to enlarge our global reach and to focus on programming and progress in a few key areas.

 

THE CORE TEAM 

Erin Daly, Director

Dina Lupin Townsend, Deputy Director

 

Astrid Bernal, Media and Web Content

Tim Blackman, Website Management

Josh Gellers, New Members

Sara Seck, Research Repository

Uday Shankar, New Members

Natalia Urzola, Membership Coordinator

 

Regional Directors and Deputy Directors

Africa: Clive Vinti, Caiphas Brewster Soyapi, Angela Kariuki

Asia: Uday Shankar and Pankaj Karn

Asia-Pacific: Peter Burdon and Manuel Solis

Caribbean: Lisa Benjamin

Europe: Annalisa Savaresi and Margaretha Wewerinke

Latin America: Maria Antonia Tigre and Daniel Noroña

North America: Sara Seck and Rebecca Bratspies

 

 

Natalia Urzola, our new Membership Coordinator, is excited to be working with GNHRE’s members -- our greatest resource! She'll be developing new opportunities for enhancing members’ connections to each other and to support and promote knowledge exchange. One of those opportunities is a new mentorship program, which aims to provide a forum where one-to-one relationships between members with similar interests and experience are able to emerge and thrive. Look for some more exciting new programs in the near future!

Astrid Bernal is our new Coordinator for Media and Web Content – ensuring up-to-date communications with our 1.200-1.600 friends and followers on Facebook and Twitter, with help from Daniella Toma and Otto Spijkers.

 

NEW PROGRAMS

 

This year, for the first time, we organized a series of Webinars focusing on Human Rights Strategies in Climate Change Litigation, the recordings of which are available in the Video Library on our newly renovated website.

• A Global Overview (June), with Hari Osofsky, Joana Setzer, David Boyd, and Tessa Khan (organized by Annalisa Savaresi)
• Southeast Asia (July), with Surya Deva, Sanjay Upadhyay, Tara Prasad Sapkota (organized by Uday Shankar)
• Latin America (August), with Soledad Garcia Muñoz, Astrid Puentes, Juan Auz, and Monica Feria-Tinta (organized by Maria Antonia Tigre and Daniel Noroña)
• Europe (September), with Roda Verheyen, Andrew Jackson, Dennis van Berkel, and Louise Fournier (organized by Margaretha Wewerinke), and 
• Africa (November), with Nicole Loser, Passy Amayo, Gino Cocchiaro, and Andrew Gilder (organized by Clive Vinti, Angela Kariuki, and Caiphas Soyapi)

This series complemented a webinar co-sponsored with Environmental Law and Governance Association offering an introduction to the field of human rights and the environment and featuring John Knox, David Boyd, Sumudu Atapattu, and Dina Lupin Townsend.

 

We have also launched a Book Discussion series, which will continue in 2021. In November, we featured Josh Gellers’ Rights for Robots, available for free download! This event is also available in the Video Library. Next year, we’ll complement the series with Curated Reading Lists on selected topics.

 

Also upcoming: GNHRE is proud to be a co-sponsor of THE TIME IS NOW: Canadian and Global Recognition of the Right to a Healthy Environment, January 26, 2021, 5-7 pm PST | 8-10 pm EST

Register now: bit.ly/Enviro2021

 

Please contact us ([log in to unmask]) if you’d like to discuss new events.

 

NEW WEBSITE FEATURES

 

In addition to our ever-growing community pages – featuring upcoming events, blog posts, and other news of interest to our community members – the new website includes our growing Research Repository, as well as a page featuring our new institutional partnerships.

 

This year, the GNHRE Community page has featured a number of exceptional blog posts and commentaries. Maria-Antonia Tigre and Victoria Lichet blog post in October discussed the UNHRC's recent adoption of a resolution on realising the rights of the child through a healthy environment. The blog post explores the critical links between the human rights of children and the protection of a healthy environment, a critical issue given the heightened vulnerability of children to air and water pollution as well as to the effects of climate change. In September, Maria Antonia Tigre & Alex Goodman wrote an excellent blog post on Case ADPF 708 involving Brazil’s Climate Fund. This case constituted Brazil's first public hearing on climate policy. The plaintiff's in the case challenged the Bolsonaro government's effective policy of paralysing the Fund. This blog post highlights the importance of this case, emphasising the Court's decision to hold a hearing and Judge Barroso's statement that “environmental protection is not a political option, but a constitutional duty.” In June, Tracy Lynn Field contributed a fascinating discussion of her new book, ‘State Governance of Mining, Development and Sustainability’. In the post, Tracy describes her 'five-year research journey into the languages we speak about mining, development and sustainability, and their translation into legal and economic concepts and rules', providing us with fantastic insight both into the book itself and the road she took to writing it. In February, Otto Spijkers contributed an important blog post on the Urgenda case in the Netherlands and the idea of dikastophobia, challenging us to think about the impacts and costs of the case on public interest litigation for the environment. Hector Herrera's blog post on fracking provided an invaluable human rights perspective on the state of fracking all over the globe, discussing recent developments and tracking global trends. The post discusses developments in regulation and litigation and makes the connections between human rights, climate change and fracking explicit. In addition to these insightful and topical blog posts, each of our webinars has been accompanied by a blog post.

 

One of the website’s most popular features is the new Member Spotlight, in which we’ve so far featured Gabriela Oanta, Monica Feria-Tinta, Maria Antonia Tigre, and GNHRE Founder Anna Grear.

 

Thanks to the extraordinary efforts of Tim Blackman, we continue to improve and strengthen the website. Early next year, we’ll roll out a new Member Profile page; at that point, we’ll ask you to update your photo and biographical information.

 

We wish you all a very happy and healthy end of 2021 and we look forward to bright things ahead in 2021!

 

 

Warmly,

 

Erin Daly & Dina Townsend, on behalf of the GNHRE Core Team