Episode 10: Educating Climate Conscious Lawyers | with Julia Dehm
Educating Climate Conscious Lawyers
Julia Dehm speaks about what it means to work, teach, and think as a lawyer in the midst of the climate crisis. Julia reflects on the relationship between theoretical research and real-world impact, the importance of collaborative and community-engaged scholarship, and the need to make climate change central rather than peripheral to legal education and legal practice. The conversation also explores how historical approaches can help lawyers better understand the structures that have produced ecological harm, while also opening space for more just and imaginative legal futures.
The episode further discusses the practical and personal dimensions of doing climate-related work: avoiding burnout, balancing academic life with family responsibilities, and building supportive communities. The episode offers an invitation to think about law not only as a tool for responding to environmental crisis, but as a field that must itself be transformed by ecological awareness, responsibility, and care.
Julia Dehm is an Associate Professor and ARC DECRA Fellow in the School of Law, La Trobe University Australia. Her research addresses issues of international and domestic climate change and environmental law, natural resource governance and human rights, economic inequality and social justice. She visited the UvA as participant in the Decolonial Futures Scholars in Residence Programme 2026.
References
Becoming a climate conscious lawyer: Climate change and the Australian legal system, edited by Julia Dehm, Nicole Graham and Zoe Nay
Scorecard — Law Students for Climate Accountability
Julia Dehm and Erin Fitz-Henry, ‘Climate Reparations in Australia’ Alternative Law Journal
Youth Verdict v. Waratah Coal – The Climate Litigation Database
ASRA Network | Waratah Coal v. Youth Verdict
Home – The Australian Climate Case
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About
Editing: Martyna Durlik
Music: “Delayed Flight” by Michael Ramir C. via mixkit
Recorded at the University of Amsterdam, May 2026
The LitDem Project
This project has received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon Europe research and innovation programme (grant agreement n° 101125511).
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