CEREL hosts a series of Friday seminars on critical issues in environmental law and policy.

Climate Change, Human Rights, and Adaptive Mobility

Abstract

The potential for climate change to cause vast human movement is a major global issue. Dominant approaches to climate-related migration take mobility as the starting point, exploring legal frameworks that tend to provide protection for migrants only after they move and overlooking measures that could help avoid forced movement. The seminar provides a new conceptual approach, shaping more proactive and anticipatory action based on the UNFCCC and the Paris Agreement, and argues that adaptation obligations require states to take measures to address foreseeable risks and ensure human rights.

Presenter bio

Lauren Nishimura (opens in a new tab) is a Lecturer in Law at the University of Melbourne Law School and Senior Program Lead of the Law and Litigation theme at Melbourne Climate Futures. Her research focuses on international obligations and climate change.

Upcoming Friday seminars

Date Name and affiliation Seminar title

27 November

Rebecca Nelson (opens in a new tab), Professor of Law at the University of Melbourne Law School and Director of the Melbourne Centre for Law and the Environment. 

Regulating a Thousand Cuts: Global Law and Policy Solutions to Cumulative Environmental Problems

Previous Friday seminars

Date Name and affiliation Seminar title

2026 seminars

25 September

Dr Anna Marie Brennan(opens in a new tab), Senior Lecturer at the University of Waikato and was a Borrin Foundation Women Leaders in Law Fellow (2024-2026).

Extractivism in Orbit: International Law, New Space, and the Political Economy of Future Asteroid Mining

28 August

Randall Abate (opens in a new tab), Professor, Florida State University, College of Law.

From Ocean Governance to Ocean Equity: Enhancing Protection of the Marine Environment and the Communities that Depend on it

2025 seminars

28 November

Professor Achinthi Vithanage (opens in a new tab), Executive Director of Environmental Law Programs, Elizabeth Haud School of Law, Pace University, New York.

The changing role of Lawyers in a time of Environmental Crisis

26 September

Justice Brian Preston (opens in a new tab), Chief Judge of the Land and Environment Court of New South Wales.

Climate Litigation: Cases and Trends

30 May

Professor Marie-Claire Cordonier Segger (opens in a new tab) PhD (Cantab) DPhil (Oxon) MEM (Yale) BCL LLB (Vic/Carl) FRSC FRSA WIJA, Fellow of the Lauterpacht Centre for International Law and Lucy Cavendish College, University of Cambridge.

COPS - where to next

21 May

Andrew Balmford (opens in a new tab) FRS, Professor of Conservation Science at the Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge. 

Feeding the world at least cost to the planet

2023 seminar

15 November

Nicole Graham (opens in a new tab), Professor at University of Sydney Law School.

All law is Environmental Law