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Biography
Sumudu Anopama Atapattu is a Teaching Professor and Director of the Global Legal Studies Center at UW Law School. She is also the Executive Director of the Human Rights Program at UW-Madison. She teaches in the areas of International Environmental law and climate change and human rights. She is affiliated with UW-Madison’s Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies, Global Health Institute, the Center for South Asia, and the 4W Initiative and was a visiting professor at Doshisha University Law School, Japan (2014), Justus Liebig University, Germany (2016, 2022), Universitat Rovira i Virgili, Tarragona, Spain (2019) and Universidad Diego Portales, Santiago, Chile (2025) and taught in UN Regional training programs on International Law.
A prolific writer, her books include: “UN Human Rights Institutions and the Environment: Synergies, Challenges, Trajectories” (Routledge, 2023); “Cambridge Handbook of Environmental Justice and Sustainable Development (2021, Cambridge)(co-editor); Human Rights and the Environment: Key Issues (Routledge, 2019) (co-author); “Human Rights Approaches to Climate Change: Challenges and Opportunities” (2015, Routledge); “International Environmental Law and the Global South” (2015, Cambridge University Press) (co-editor); and “Emerging Principles of International Environmental Law” (2006, Transnational Publishers, New York). She is currently finishing an edited volume titled “Routledge Handbook on Environmental Law and Sustainable Development in South Asia” (co-editor) which will be published by Routledge in 2026.