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Caer Smyth

Dr Caer Smyth

Lecturer in Law

School of Law and Politics

Email
SmythC@cardiff.ac.uk
Telephone
+44 29208 74628
Campuses
Law Building, Room 1.25, Museum Avenue, Cardiff, CF10 3AX
Users
Available for postgraduate supervision

Overview

Caer is an interdisciplinary legal researcher who employs socio-legal research methodologies to explore problems of environmental law and procedural environmental justice.

Caer's doctoral research project examined the role of rationalist assumptions in participatory decision-making processes and their impact on the treatment of the environment. For this project, she conducted ethnographic research at a public local inquiry into the M4 Corridor around Newport (M4CAN) scheme.

Her current work builds on thesis findings and investigates obstacles facing effective public participation in environmental decision-making, e.g. the treatment of expertise and the adversarial nature of public local inquiries.

Publication

2023

2022

2021

2020

2018

2017

Articles

Book sections

Thesis

Research

2023

C Smyth, 'Legislating for culture change: the Wellbeing of the Future Generations Act 2015 and planning in Wales' (2023) 27(5/6) Environmental Liability - Law, Policy and Practice 170-180.

2022

C Smyth, 'Marking out the interpretive possibilities of the Aarhus Convention: The Foundations of the Aarhus Convention: Environmental Democracy, Rights and Stewardship, by Emily Barritt (2022) 34(3) Journal of Environmental Law 541-550 (10.1093/jel/eqac009)

C Smyth, 'The Wellbeing of Future Generations Act 2015 and its Impact on Planning in Wales' UKELA elaw newsletter October 2022 Issue 132 (https://www.ukela.org/UKELA/UKELA/ReadingRoom/elaw-home.aspx?hkey=475b7154-db75-4efa-8a52-23d9a9efdd37)

2021

C Smyth, 'Tick the box and move on': compartmentalization and the treatment of the environment in decision-making processes. J Law Soc. 2021;1–24.  https://doi.org/10.1111/jols.12309

2018

C Smyth, 'Being Reasonable: How does Rationality Affect Participatory Environmental Governance?' in HT Anker and BE Olsen (eds), Sustainable Management of Natural Resources: Legal Instruments and Approaches (Intersentia, 2018) 211-228

2017

C Smyth, 'What Counts as Expertise? The Case of Glyphosate and Jasanoff's "Three-Body Problem"', (2017) 19(3) Environmental Law Review 168-182. http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1461452917724137

Teaching

Caer is teaching on the following modules:

  • Public Law (AS)
  • Human Rights Law (AS)
  • Environmental Law and Policy (AS)
  • Themes in Socio-legal Studies (PG)

Biography

Caer completed her PhD at Cardiff University School of Law and Politics and joined the School as a lecturer in January 2020.

Caer is co-director of the Centre for Environmental Law and Politics, a board member of the Centre for Law and Society and a member of the editiorial board for the Journal of Law and Society. Caer is a member of the Ethnography group at Cardiff School of Social Sciences and the Thinking through Feminisms and Colonialisms reading group. Outside of Cardiff University, Caer is also a member of the UK Environmental Law Association, Wales Working Party.

Supervisions

Caer is interested in supervising PhDs on a range of areas in environmental law, including but not limited to:

  • Public participation in environmental decision-making
  • Environmental Justice
  • Ecofeminism
  • Expertise in decision-making
  • Public Local Inquiries

She would be particularly interested in supervising students employing empirical research methods.

Research themes

Specialisms

  • Access to justice
  • Administrative law
  • Environmental law
  • ethnography
  • Public participation and community engagement