Jocelyn Stacey

Jocelyn Stacey is Associate Professor at the Peter A. Allard School of Law, University of British Columbia. She researches environmental crises and the visible and invisible ways in which law creates, regulates and prevents these events. Her work focuses on environmental assessment law, disaster law, climate change, emergency powers and the rule of law.  Her first book, The Constitution of the Environmental Emergency (Hart Publishing, 2018) addresses what the rule of law requires in light of our vulnerability to catastrophic environmental harm. A profile of her work on environmental emergencies and the rule of law can be found on the Research Portal.

With funding from SSHRC, Professor Stacey’s current work investigates how law regulates disaster as disconnected and exceptional events, contrary to the experiences of those most vulnerable to disaster and in spite of our current era of climate disruption. You can read about this project on the Research Portal. 

Professor Stacey works closely with First Nations on legal issues related to disasters, emergency powers and Indigenous jurisdiction. She is a member of the leadership team at the UBC Centre for Climate Justice, working to build collaborative research partnerships in service of those most impacted by climate change. She is President of the Pacific Centre for Environmental Law and Litigation, a non-profit society dedicated to training law students and young lawyers in public interest environmental law litigation. She served on the Research Council for the Public Order Emergency Commission (2022-2023), which inquired into the first invocation of Canada’s Emergencies Act.

Professor Stacey supervises graduate students in the areas of disaster law, environmental assessment law, and the intersection between Canadian environmental law and Indigenous legal orders. If you are interested in researching in one of these areas, please send an email with a brief research proposal. Professor Stacey teaches Environmental Law, Administrative Law, and Aboriginal and Treaty Rights at UBC.

You can find Professor Stacey’s publications on the Allard Research Commons and on SSRN.