Professor of international and European environmental law
TLS: Tilburg Law School
TLS: Public Law and Governance
Jonathan Verschuuren is a professor of international and European environmental law law. He received his doctorate degree in 1993 cum laude. His research focuses primarily on the impact of environmental law on the environment. His current research interest is the relationship between climate change and food security. In 2015, Jonathan received a prestigious EU Marie Sklodowska Curie fellowship to develop a new regulatory framework for climate smart agriculture. He was a research fellow at the Australian Centre for Climate and Environmental Law for one year (2016). In 2017, Jonathan was awarded the IUCN Academy of Environmental Law senior scholarship prize for his work in the field of environmental law. He has written numerous publications in the field of environmental law, including several books and many articles in outstanding peer reviewed journals throughout the world. He is often asked to give advice on a range of environmental policy issues.
Jonathan has more than 35 years of experience in environmental law research. Over these years, he has addressed such research themes as climate change mitigation and adaptation, greenhouse gas emissions trading, climate litigation, coastal adaptation, climate engineering, climate change and armed conflicts, climate change and biodiversity, carbon farming, climate change and food security, environmental justice, human rights and the environment, the anthropocene, nature conservation law (especially EU Wild Birds and Habitats Directives, Wetlands Convention), the precautionary principle, codification of environmental law, globalisation and the environment, corporate social responsibility and environmental law, the role of civil society in sustainable development law, transboundary cooperation.
At Tilburg University, Jonathan has taught a range of courses in the fields of administrative law, constitutional law, European law, international law, human rights law, environmental law. His current main courses are 'Climate change law', 'International and European environmental law' and 'The EU and global environmental risk'. Abroad, Jonathan taught in several LLM programmes in the area of environmental and climate law, such as at Leuven University (2002-2011), University of Malta (2013-2017), University of Connecticut (2000, 2009), University of Sydney (2011), North West University, South Africa (2005-2014), and video lectures at Cambridge University (2014) and Columbia University, NY (2011). In the PhD programme, Jonathan has supervised 26 PhD students (14 of whom now have senior academic positions at universities in the Netherlands, USA, Australia, China, South Africa, and Ethiopia), with 6 current (2024).
Jonathan currently is an extraordinary professor at the North West University and at the University of the Western Cape (South Africa)
Other examples of major collaborations:
Research Council of Norway, KARBONMAT: Designing sustainable business model concepts for carbon sequestration in soils to transform the Norwegian food system (2023-2026): Ruralis, Western Norway Uni of Appl Sciences, Grønt Fagsenter Buskerud, University of Western Australia, Norges Vel, Stiftelsen Norsk Mat
Legal Forum on Climate Change Adaptation (2011-2019): Universities of Leuven, Malta, Maastricht (METRO), Madrid (IE), Insubria, Utrecht, Imperial College London
Legal framework for carbon farming (2016-2017): University of Sydney (ACCEL)
EU FP7 project ‘Economic instruments to achieve climate targets in Europe’ (Entracte) (2012-2016): Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment, Centre for European Economic Research, Imperial College
Project website 'Constitutionalizing the Anthropocene' (2019/2026)
Tilburg Law School's website on the NWO project 'regulating greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture' (2020/2023)
INCLUDE's website on the NWO/WOTRO project on sustainable development CSOs in Ethiopia (2017/2019)
IUCN Academy of Environmental Law's senior scholarship award report (2017)
Some of the books Jonathan edited: Research Handbook on Climate Change Adaptation Law (2nd ed., 2022), Regional Environmental Law (2015), Environmental Law and Climate Change (2015), Research Handbook on Climate Change Mitigation Law (2nd ed., 2022)
Jonathan is the series editor of the Research Handbooks in Climate Law and the Elgar Studies in Climate Law. He also edited special issues of Sustainability, titled 'Governance for climate smart agriculture' (2017/2018) and 'Regulatory Innovations for Reducing Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Agriculture and Food' (2022/2024)