Michael P. Vandenbergh
Professor of Law Co-director, Energy, Environment and Land Use Program Director, Climate Change Research Network
Voice: (615) 322-6763
Fax: (615) 322-6631
Email: michael.vandenbergh@vanderbilt.edu
Office: Room 283
View curriculum vitae (.pdf)
Links
- SSRN Page
- Climate Change Research Network
- Energy, Environment and Land Use Program
- Program in Law and Government
- The Campaign to End American Idle - Vanderbilt Lawyer feature article
- Bibliography
- CLEAR Scholar of the Week
Research Interest(s)
Environmental law and policy, social and behavioral sciences, private governance, climate change, energy law and policy, presidential control of agency decision making
Education
J.D. University of Virginia
B.A. University of North Carolina
Biography
Mike Vandenbergh is a leading scholar in environmental and energy law whose research explores the relationship between formal legal regulation and informal social regulation of individual and corporate behavior. His work with Vanderbilt’s Climate Change Research Network involves interdisciplinary teams that focus on the reduction of carbon emissions from the individual and household sector. His corporate work explores the influence of social norms on firm behavior and the ways in which private contracting can enhance or undermine public governance. Before joining Vanderbilt’s law faculty, Professor Vandenbergh was a partner at a national law firm in Washington, D.C. He served as Chief of Staff of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency from 1993-95. He began his career as a law clerk to Judge Edward R. Becker of the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit in 1987-88. In addition to directing Vanderbilt’s Climate Change Research Network, Professor Vandenbergh serves as co-director of the law school’s Energy, Environment and Land Use Program. A recipient of the Hall-Hartman Teaching Award, he teaches courses in environmental law, energy, and property. Professor Vandenbergh has been a Visiting Professor at the University of Chicago Law School and at Harvard Law School.
Representative Publications
Articles
"Time to Try Carbon Labelling," 1 Nature Climate Change 4-6 (2011) (with Tom Dietz and Paul C. Stern)
"Household Actions Can Provide a Behavioral Wedge to Rapidly Reduce U.S. Carbon Emissions," 106 Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 18452 (2009) (with Tom Dietz, Gerald Gardner, Paul Stern and Jonathan Gilligan)
"Climate Change: The China Problem," 81 So. Cal L. Rev. 905 (2008)
"Climate Change: The Low-Hanging Fruit," 55 UCLA L. Rev. 1701 (2008)
"Climate Change: The Equity Problem," 30 Virginia Environmental Law Journal (2007) (with Brooke Ackerly) (symposium issue)
"The Carbon-Neutral Individual," 82 New York University Law Review 1673 (2007) (with Anne Steinemann)
"The New Wal-Mart Effect: The Role of Private Contracting in Global Governance," 54 UCLA Law Review 913 (2007)
"Inside the Administrative State: A Critical Look at the Practice of Presidential Control," 105 Michigan Law Review 1 (2006) (with Lisa Bressman)
"The Private Life of Public Law," 105 Columbia Law Review 2029 (2005)
“Order Without Social Norms: How Personal Norm Activation Can Protect the Environment,” 99 Northwestern University Law Review 1101 (2005)
"From Smokestack to SUV: The Individual as Regulated Entity in the New Era of Environmental Law," 57 Vanderbilt Law Review 515 (2004)
Working Papers
"Adaptation as Mitigation"
"Reframing Recycling"
"Failures of Imagination"
Presentations
"Humans can take actions to reduce climate change and its impacts," a Webinar hosted by Climate Literacy & energy Awareness Network, April 17, 2012
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