Dana Zartner is a professor in the International Studies Department and adjunct professor at the School of Law at the University of San Francisco.
Latest by this author
From the sacred peaks of Aotearoa to the rivers of Colombia and the contested waters of Lake Erie, a global movement is emerging to grant the natural world legal personhood, driven by Indigenous worldviews and a growing call for environmental justice.
By Dana Zartner, Fabian Cardenas and Mohammad Golam Sarwar in Environment | Island Press and Earth Food Life Project | English
Dana Zartner is a professor in the International Studies Department and adjunct professor at the School of Law at the University of San Francisco, where she specializes in international and comparative law, with a focus on the intersection of environmental justice and human rights. She has served as an accredited representative at UN meetings, including the Committee on Women’s Rights in New York and the Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in Geneva.
Zartner’s first book Courts, Codes, and Custom: Legal Tradition and State Policy Toward International Human Rights and Environmental Law was published by Oxford University Press in 2014. Her second book, Thrive & Survive: Environmental Advocacy and the Rights of Nature, is forthcoming. She has also published articles on the rights of nature, using international law as a tool for advocacy, and Indigenous efforts to stop extractivist industries on sacred lands in the Vermont Journal of Environmental Law, the Santa Clara Journal of International Law, and The Conversation.
In addition to her academic work, Zartner has served as an accredited representative at various UN meetings, including the Committee on Women’s Rights in New York and the Expert Mechanisms on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in Geneva. She has also done pro bono work with the One Million Tree campaign in Cambodia and in support of the Amah Mutsun Tribal Band’s efforts to protect their traditional lands in Santa Clara County, California.External
The Tangled Web We Weave
Exploring Cambodia Through the Story of a Spider… a Really Big Spider
Medium | March | 2024
Travelling in Cambodia, Zartner finds fried tarantulas on the menu. The spider is not only considered a tasty snack, but also a cultural symbol, a historical necessity and an environmental marker.
Using International and Comparative Law to Protect Indigenous Lands
Santa Clara Journal of International Law | June | 2020
Justice for Juristac: Using International and Comparative Law to Protect Indigenous Lands
The Conversation | September | 2019
Zartner spent time in New Zealand researching the impacts of a 2017 law giving the Whanganui River its own legal identity. What she saw there convinced her that providing legal standing to a natural entity is a viable method of environmental protection. In her view, however, the processes that advocates use to enact Rights of Nature law critically influence whether these efforts will succeed.
Publications by this author
Legal Strategies for Environmental Justice
Co-authors: Fabian Cardenas and Mohammad Golam Sarwar | Island Press | April | 2025
Rights of Nature laws are becoming a vital tool for addressing environmental injustice. From New Zealand and India to Ecuador and Bolivia, advocates have successfully secured legal rights for rivers, forests, and mountains. Granting rights to nature has the potential to expand environmental protections, strengthen indigenous rights, promote sustainable development, and alter how humans relate to nature. Despite these promises, rights of Nature laws have met with greater resistance in some countries than in others.
Standing for Nature offers advocates a blueprint for creating, implementing, and safeguarding rights of Nature laws. This book looks closely at four examples—New Zealand, Colombia, Bangladesh, and the United States—to explain why these laws have been successful in some places but not others. Through this comparative exploration, the authors highlight key strategies for advancing rights of Nature laws in the United States and around the world. These lessons include an examination of different legal traditions to better understand which is the best form of law—judicial, legislative, or regulatory—for advocates to target; how to ensure effective implementation once a law is passed; and how to shift communal perspectives on the human-Nature relationship for better implementation and enforcement.
This book is essential for environmental lawyers, policy makers, and advocates interested in gaining new knowledge and tools for championing rights of Nature laws in their own communities.Legal Tradition and State Policy Toward International Human Rights and Environmental Law
Oxford University Press | April | 2014
A novel cultural-institutional theory of legal tradition to explain state policy toward international human rights and environmental law. Zartner brings in the concept of legal culture to a comprehensive study of state policy toward norms.
Media by this author
Interview | March | 2025
Do we have a right to night? Dana thinks so. We also have a right to health and there is more and more evidence that light at night can be detrimental to our health, and to the environment. Dana applies her legal expertise to her books, articles, essays, and speaking engagements to change people's ideas around the environment and light pollution.
Retrieved from "https://observatory.wiki/w/index.php?title=Dana_Zartner&oldid=7486"
