Scientific advisory board

Kenneth Olwig

Kenneth Olwig is a landscape geographer and emeritus professor of landscape planning at the Department of Landscape Architecture, Planning and Management at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU), Alnarp, Sweden. He has conducted some of the most far-reaching work on the origins and meaning of landscape, drawing on historical sources and etymological texts. His seminal paper, ‘Recovering the Substantive Nature of Landscape’ (Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 86:4, 1996) propounds a ‘substantive’ rather than scenic understanding of landscape, one that is “more concerned with social law and justice than with natural law or aesthetics.” Olwig’s work has emphasised the elements of community justice, body politic and custom as inherently embedded in early notions of landscape. Some of his best-known writings include Nature's Ideological Landscape (1984), Landscape, Nature and the Body Politic (2002), Justice Power and the Political Landscape (2007, co-editor) and more recently, The Meanings of Landscape: Essays on Place, Space, Nature and Justice (2019), a compilation of his writings reworked for a wider readership. Olwig’s substantive understanding of landscape has been a great source of inspiration for this project, which is attempting in some way to recover the substantive understanding of landscape in law, or at least attempting to highlight those attachments between people and place that are not given adequate consideration in the law.

Nicole Graham

Nicole Graham (BA (Hons), LLB (Hons), PG Cert Higher Ed, PhD) is Associate Professor at the Sydney Law School, The University of Sydney, Australia, where she teaches and researches in the fields of property law and theory, and legal geography. Nicole has written on the relationship between law, environment, and culture with a particular focus on property rights, natural resource regulation and the concept of place. In Lawscape (Routledge 2011), her study of how property law transforms natural environments and social economics, Nicole links the commodification of land instituted in and by property law, and ecological and economic histories. She also provides an insight into the origins of the term property and how its meaning has shifted over time. Nicole has received teaching awards for her work teaching property law, is recognised as a highly effective first year specialist, and has made significant contributions to educational development in embedding Indigenous laws and perspectives into the law curriculum; and sustainability in legal education. She is currently working on two projects funded by the Australian Research Council on property law, theory and practice.

Lorenzo Cotula

Lorenzo Cotulais a Principal Researcher in Law and Sustainable Development at the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED), a policy research institute based in the United Kingdom. He is also a Visiting Professor at the School of Law, University of Strathclyde (Glasgow). Lorenzo leads research and action on the legal arenas where natural resource governance meets the global economy – cutting across land and natural resource governance; international investment law; human rights; political economy of natural resources and foreign investment; and legal empowerment, citizen agency and public accountability. Representative writings include (Dis)integration in Global Resource Governance: Extractivism, Human Rights, and Investment Treaties; Between Hope and Critique: Human Rights, Social Justice and Re-Imagining International Law from the Bottom Up; Reconsidering Sovereignty, Ownership and Consent in Natural Resource Contracts: From Concepts to Practice; Land, Property and Sovereignty in International Law; and ’Land Grabbing’ and International Investment Law: Toward a Global Reconfiguration of Property?.

Ambreena Manji

Ambreena Manji is Professor of Land Law and Development at Cardiff University and previously the Director of the British Academy's British Institute in Eastern Africa (2010-2014). Her research is focused on Law and Society in Africa and is strongly interdisciplinary and collaborative. Ambreena has a strong research and professional interest in land law and development, evidenced by her publications and advisory work. Her most recent book is The Struggle for Land and Justice in Kenya (James Currey/Boydell & Brewer 2020).

At Cardiff, she co-founded the Law and Global Justice Centre. With funding from the British Academy, the Centre launched its Socio-Legal Journals Global South Initiative in 2018, with writing workshops for early-career legal scholars hosted by partner Law Schools in Recife, Bangalore, Accra and Nairobi attended by editors from five of the UK’s leading law journals. As a result of her strong links with the African judiciary and legal profession, Ambreena initiated the African Feminist Judgments project which seeks to bring interdisciplinary insights to bear on African jurisprudence at national and regional levels. Her roles include: President, African Studies Association UK (2018-2020); Editor, African Affairs (April 2020-); Editorial Board, Social and Legal Studies; Member, Governing Council, Arts and Humanities Council (AHRC) (March 2020-); Member, British Academy International Engagement Committee (September 2020); and Member, Area Studies sub-panel, REF 2021.

Francesco Francioni

Francesco Francioni (1942-2024) was Professor Emeritus of international law at the European University Institute, Florence and Professor of international Cultural Heritage law at LUISS University, Rome. He was a member of the Institut de droit international, General Editor of the Italian YBK of International Law, as well as the co-founder and General Editor with A. Vrdoljak of the Oxford University Press Series “Cultural Heritage Law and Policy”. He was a member of the Italian delegation in numerous international negotiations and diplomatic conferences for the adoption of treaties in the field of environmental protection and cultural heritage, including the Protocol on Environmental Protection to the Antarctic Treaty (1991). He also served as a member of the Italian national commission to UNESCO, as President of the UNESCO World Heritage Committee 1997-1998, and judge ad hoc at the ITLOS. Francesco was a tireless advocate for a more human international law, an inspiring mentor, and humanist. We deeply mourn his loss and are grateful to him for paving the way for research such as ours. Ar dheis Dé go raibh a anam.