Centre Staff

Karin Mickelson joined the Faculty as Assistant Professor in 1991 and was promoted to Associate Professor in 1998. She has taught in the areas of international law, international environmental law, real property, environmental law and legal theory, and has supervised and co-supervised graduate students in a wide range of areas including international environmental law, international legal theory and international human rights. She has also served as the faculty advisor to UBC teams participating in the Jessup International Law Moot Court Competition.

Professor Mickelson research activities have focused on the South-North dimension of international law; for example, she has explored the possibility of identifying a distinctive Third World approach to international law in "Rhetoric and Rage: Third World Voices in International Legal Discourse" (1998) 16 Wisconsin International Law Journal 353-419, and has analyzed the failure of international environmental law to respond to the concerns of the South in "South, North, International Environmental Law, and International Environmental Lawyers" (2000) 11 Yearbook of International Environmental Law 52-81.

Her current research focuses on the impact of developing countries on the evolution of international environmental law. She is also a contributor to leading Canadian casebooks on international law and environmental law.

Professor Richardson joined the UBC Faculty of Law in January 2011, and held the Senior (tier 1) Canada Research Chair in Environmental Law & Sustainability. Previously, he was a Professor at Osgoode Hall Law School of York University (2003-10) and earlier was a Senior Lecturer at the law faculties of the University of Manchester and University of Auckland. Prior to working in academia, Professor Richardson was a policy advisor to the NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service in Australia, and a legal consultant to the IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature) in Nepal and Kenya. He completed his undergraduate studies in law and political science with honours at Macquarie University and his PhD at the Australian National University.

Professor Richardson's principal research area is socially responsible investment and its regulation, as a means of promoting environmentally sustainable development. His scholarship also includes Aboriginal peoples and the environment, and climate change law. His recent publications include the books Climate Law and Developing Countries (Edward Elgar, 2009), Indigenous Peoples and the Law (Hart Publishing, 2009), Socially Responsible Investment Law (Oxford University Press, 2008), and Environmental Law for Sustainability (Hart Publishing, 2006).

Avery was a second-year law student. Prior to attending UBC, she studied at Western University, where she obtained a BA in International Relations and an HBA from Ivey Business School.

She is interested in the intersection between law, environmental regulations, and corporate accountability for environmental and human rights violation.