Dr Birsha Ohdedar

Birsha Ohdedar is a Lecturer in Climate Change and Environmental Law and is the Deputy Director at the Law, Environment, and Development Centre (LEDC).

Birsha's present research centres broadly on environmental justice, the human right to water, climate and water law, and post-growth approaches. His work critically assesses the role of law within the broader political economy of the environmental and climate crisis, engaging primarily with political ecology and critical geography. He works on these issues across international and domestic law levels and has a regional focus on India.

Within SOAS, Birsha teaches across the specialised Masters in Environmental Law and Sustainable Development and undergraduate modules on environmental law. He is also the director of the SOAS Environmental Policy Clinic, working with students on projects partnering with NGOs and charities. Birsha also serves as an editor for the Law, Environment, and Development (LEAD) Journal.

Birsha is a trustee of Legal Response International, an organisation that gives legal advice on climate change law to small island developing states, least-developed countries, and civil society actors. He has an interest in writing-based pedagogy, holding a Fellowship at the Centre for Liberal Arts and Science Pedagogies (CLASP), affiliated with Bard College, USA.

Birsha holds a BA/LLB from the University of Auckland, New Zealand and an LLM and PhD from SOAS. Before academia, Birsha practised law for many years. He started his career at a large law firm in New Zealand before working with human rights lawyers' collectives and NGOs in India, on land rights and labour issues. He subsequently worked in London law firms providing legal advice on renewable energy and climate change law.

Presently, Birsha is working on an edited collection on Law and Post-Growth Approaches (Edward Elgar, forthcoming), a project on climate adaptation law, and a monograph on the human right to water in the context of climate change.