Professor of Law
202-994-4641
The George Washington University Law School
2000 H Street, N.W.
Washington, DC 20052 law.gwu.edu
Robert L. Glicksman is the J. B. and Maurice C. Shapiro Professor of Environmental Law at the George Washington University Law School. He is a member of the board of directors of the Center for Progressive Reform.
Professor Glicksman is the J.B. & Maurice C. Shapiro Professor of Environmental Law at the George Washington University Law School, having previously taught at the University of Kansas School of Law. He has expertise in both of the two main branches of environmental law, pollution control and public natural resources law. His research has focused on issues that relate to climate change, public natural resource management, regulatory design, and environmental enforcement. He has taught three different environmental law courses — a survey course covering both of these branches, more specialized courses in regulation of air and water pollution and toxic substances and hazardous waste regulation, and a course on natural resources law. He also regularly teaches property law (including regulatory takings cases involving environmental controls) and administrative law. Professor Glicksman has written on all of these topics for more than 40 years.
Professor Glicksman has published widely in the areas of pollution control, public natural resources management, and administrative law. His book Risk Regulation at Risk: Restoring a Pragmatic Balance (Stanford University Press 2003, with Member Scholar Sidney Shapiro), takes issue with the notion that economic efficiency should be the sole or even principal criterion governing the establishment and implementation of laws and regulations designed to reduce the health and environmental risks attributable to industrial activities. The authors urge instead a pragmatic approach to risk regulation that takes into account other values. His book, Reorganizing Government: A Functional and Dimensional Framework (NYU Press 2019), co-authored with CPR Member Scholar Alejandro Camacho, takes a comprehensive and innovative look at how to best align regulatory authority among multiple government agencies tasked with addressing the same problem. A third book, Pollution Limits and Polluters’ Efforts to Comply: The Role of Government Monitoring and Enforcement (Stanford Economics and Finance 2011), provides empirical findings on the efficacy of various strategies for enforcing the Clean Water Act.
Professor Glicksman is the lead co-author of an environmental law casebook, Environmental Protection: Law and Policy (Aspen Pub.), now in its ninth edition (with co-authors that include CPR Member Scholars William Buzbee, Alejandro Camacho, and Emily Hammond). He is also a co-author (with former KU colleague Richard Levy) of another casebook, Administrative Law: Agency Action in Legal Context (Foundation Press 3d ed. 2020). Professor Glicksman is also now the sole author (previously co-authored with George C. Coggins) of the leading treatise on public land and resource management, Public Natural Resources Law (Thomson Reuters 2d ed., updated regularly), as well of as a student nutshell on the same subject, Modern Public Land Law (West Pub. 5th ed. 2019) He is also the co-editor of the book Next Generation Environmental Compliance and Enforcement (ELI Press 2014).
Professor Glicksman’s nearly 100 law review articles have been published in leading general and specialty journals published at top law schools across the country. Several of those articles have been recognized as among the best published in particular years on environmental law issues.
Professor Glicksman worked in private practice for four years after graduating from the Cornell Law School. He practiced for Cleary, Gottlieb, Steen & Hamilton, a nationally recognized law firm with an office in Washington, D.C., serving clients in the energy and chemical industries. Professor Glicksman returned to private practice in 1993-94 while on leave from the University of Kansas. During that time, he worked for Lowenstein Sandler, a firm in Roseland, N.J. with a thriving environmental law practice, providing advice to clients on hazardous waste-related issues.
In addition to his experiences in private practice, Professor Glicksman served as a consultant to the Secretariat for the Commission for Environmental Cooperation. The CEC is an international organization established by the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation (the environmental side agreement to NAFTA) on issues pertaining to the resolution of international disputes among Canada, Mexico, and the United States on issues of both domestic and international environmental law. Professor Glicksman’s role was to provide advice concerning the proper disposition of submissions by NGOs seeking a finding by the CEC that the signatory parties had failed to effectively enforce their environmental laws.
