Cymie Payne, J.D., Associate Professor
Cook Office Building, Room 208
848-932-9258
payne@sebs.rutgers.edu
Biography: Cymie R. Payne is Associate Professor and teaches in the Department of Human Ecology and the School of Law. She studies global governance of the environment and natural resources and the evolution of international law, with a focus on climate change, ocean resources and protection of the environment in relation to armed conflict.
She has appeared as legal counsel before the Seabed Disputes Chamber of the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea and previously practiced natural resource and environmental law with the United Nations, the U.S. Department of the Interior and the law firm of Goodwin, Procter. For six years she participated in landmark decisions on the legal responsibility of aggressor states for the restoration and remediation of damage to the environment from armed conflict as legal counsel to the United Nations Compensation Commission in Geneva, Switzerland. As Director of the Global Commons Project at University of California Berkeley’s Center for Law, Energy and the Environment, she focused on the linkage of state and international climate policy, particularly with respect to emissions trading systems; conflicts of state law with international trade; and regulating risks of new technologies such as carbon sequestration.
Professor Payne is currently the Chair of the Steering Committee of the American Society of International Law’s Signature Topic Beyond National Jurisdiction
. She is the Chair of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) World Commission on Environmental Law (WCEL) Specialist Group for Ocean, Coasts and Coral Reefs. She is also a member of the International Law Association, Committee on Sustainable Resources Management, and a member of the International Council of Environmental Law.
She holds a Master’s degree in international relations from The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy and a Juris Doctor from the University of California, Berkeley.
Graduate Faculty Affiliations: School of Law; Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy; Institute of Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences.
Biography |
Current Research |
Selected Publications |
Teaching/Taught
In the book “Gulf War Reparations and the UN Compensation Commission: Environmental Liability” (CR Payne & PH Sand, eds., Oxford University Press 2011), I argue that the UN Security Council created a need for legal concepts that were almost unknown in previous eras when it introduced environmental damage and natural resource depletion directly resulting from the 1991 Gulf War as one of the categories of losses within the jurisdiction of the Commission. These decisions, the first in international law to recognize state responsibility for war damage to the environment, have contributed fundamentally to the evolution of international norms and legal principles. With Peter H. Sand and other contributors to the book, I identify several principles—polluter pays, the public trust doctrine and compensability of non-market environmental damage—that emerged from their origin as soft law principles, evolved into applied rules, and resulted in the real-world consequence of financial awards by the UNCC. I also show how the flexibility of the UNCC as an international institution enabled it to accommodate special needs of the environment and respond to the shared vision of the participants on behalf of the transboundary environment.
In the “Strengthening Peacebuilding” project for UNEP/Environmental Law Institute/University of Tokyo, I take a different perspective on the UN Compensation Commission and its decisions. I evaluate the UNCC as an instrument of reparations and post-conflict restoration. While noting the limitations on re-establishing peace and environmental integrity in the conflict zone, I conclude that the UNCC demonstrates that states can be held accountable for war-time damage to the environment under international law, and that it illustrates the benefits of multilateral engagement and long-term commitment to environmental restoration. Future work will further explore the effectiveness of such formal legal institutions in strengthening peace building.
Current Research
As an international lawyer, I study the demand (or lack thereof) for global governance of the environment and natural resources and the consequent evolution of international law. My research focuses on the problems faced in addressing climate change, building peace after armed conflict, and managing ocean resources.Legal Liability Rules as Orders, Disincentives, Punishment, and Compensation
I provided written and oral submissions to the Seabed Disputes Chamber of the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea (the Chamber) on behalf of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), proposing an approach to a new international governance problem: the management of deep seabed resources. The International Seabed Authority asked the Chamber to address certain aspects of state responsibility and liability for deep seabed mining in the areas of the ocean beyond national jurisdiction. I argued that the Law of the Sea Convention itself had contributed to the developmental shift from treatment of high seas resources as res nullius (a thing belonging to no one) to being considered the common heritage of humanity. This status requires the international community to manage the marine environment for the benefit of all. The Chamber’s Advisory Opinion agreed that the international community has a shared interest in the ocean’s resources. Further work will continue to examine how liability rules function to set expectations of behavior, discourage risky activities, punish bad actors and compensate injured parties.Judges Facing Complexity
Recent cases support the contention that international courts are failing to give adequate consideration to complex scientific evidence, and in consequence their decisions may be inconsistent with principles such as the equitable use of transboundary water resources. For example, some International Court of Justice judges criticized their colleagues’ handling of expert testimony in a dispute between Argentina and Uruguay over industrial development on a shared river. Providing the assistance of experts to judges is a possible solution, but efforts to provide such assistance have not been particularly successful so far. This project examines the experience of other international courts, the U.S. federal courts and the efforts of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and looks at the views, training and experience of the judges themselves to better define the problem and identify effective measures that could be taken.Legal Institutions and Post-Conflict Environmental Restoration
I evaluate the United Nations Compensation Commission as a landmark example of the evolution that is taking place in international law. The United Nations Compensation Commission (UNCC) reviewed almost 3 million claims for war reparations from more than 80 countries. Of that, the Commission awarded over $5 billion for the restoration of the environment: oiled shorelines, loss of wildlife and livestock, damage to desert ecologies and and harm to public health.In the book “Gulf War Reparations and the UN Compensation Commission: Environmental Liability” (CR Payne & PH Sand, eds., Oxford University Press 2011), I argue that the UN Security Council created a need for legal concepts that were almost unknown in previous eras when it introduced environmental damage and natural resource depletion directly resulting from the 1991 Gulf War as one of the categories of losses within the jurisdiction of the Commission. These decisions, the first in international law to recognize state responsibility for war damage to the environment, have contributed fundamentally to the evolution of international norms and legal principles. With Peter H. Sand and other contributors to the book, I identify several principles—polluter pays, the public trust doctrine and compensability of non-market environmental damage—that emerged from their origin as soft law principles, evolved into applied rules, and resulted in the real-world consequence of financial awards by the UNCC. I also show how the flexibility of the UNCC as an international institution enabled it to accommodate special needs of the environment and respond to the shared vision of the participants on behalf of the transboundary environment.
In the “Strengthening Peacebuilding” project for UNEP/Environmental Law Institute/University of Tokyo, I take a different perspective on the UN Compensation Commission and its decisions. I evaluate the UNCC as an instrument of reparations and post-conflict restoration. While noting the limitations on re-establishing peace and environmental integrity in the conflict zone, I conclude that the UNCC demonstrates that states can be held accountable for war-time damage to the environment under international law, and that it illustrates the benefits of multilateral engagement and long-term commitment to environmental restoration. Future work will further explore the effectiveness of such formal legal institutions in strengthening peace building.
Biography |
Current Research |
Selected Publications |
Teaching/Taught
Selected Publications
- Cymie R. Payne, 2012,
Argentina’s ICSID Arbitrations and the UNCC Experience: Consistency and Capability in Mass Claims.
World Arbitration and Mediation Review. 6(3):427-61.
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2066821 - Cymie R. Payne, 2011,
Mastering the Evidence: Improving Fact Finding by International Courts.
Environmental Law 41(4):1191-1220.
http://law.lclark.edu/live/files/10602-414corrected7tojcipaynepdf - Donald K. Anton, Robert A. Makgill, Cymie R. Payne, 2011,
Seabed Mining: Advisory Opinion on Responsibility and Liability.
Environmental Policy and Law 41(2): 60-65.
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/cf_dev/AbsByAuth.cfm?per_id=877338 - Cymie R. Payne, 2011,
Pulp Mills on the River Uruguay (Arg. v. Uru.),
American Journal of International Law 105(1):94-101.
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/cf_dev/AbsByAuth.cfm?per_id=877338 - Gulf War Reparations and the UN Compensation Commission: Environmental Liability (CR Payne, Peter H. Sand, eds, Oxford University Press March 2011)(CR Payne sole author: chapter 1, The UNCC Program: Environmental Claims in Context; chapter 5, Tracking and Follow-Up Programmes for Environmental Awards; Guidance for Researchers).
- CR Payne, Legal Liability for Environmental Damage: The United Nations Compensation Commission and the 1990-1991 Gulf War, in Strengthening Post-Conflict Peacebuilding through Natural Resource Management, Volume 6: Governance, Natural Resources, and Postconflict Peacebuilding (C. Bruch, C. Muffett, and S. Nichols, eds, forthcoming 2011).
- CR Payne,
State Responsibility and Liability for Deep Seabed Mining in International Waters,
Environmental Policy and Law (co-authored with Donald Anton and Robert Makgill, 2011). (peer-reviewed) - CR Payne,
Pulp Mills on the River Uruguay (Arg. v. Uru.),
105 American Journal of International Law 94 (January 2011). (peer-reviewed) - CR Payne,
Environmental Impact Assessment as a Duty under International Law: The International Court of Justice Judgment on Pulp Mills on the River Uruguay,
3 Eur. J. of Risk Regulation 317 (2010). (peer-reviewed) - Statement for International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources, Commission on Environmental Law, Advisory Opinion, Case No. 17: Responsibilities and obligations of States sponsoring persons and entities with respect to activities in the International Seabed Area (filed with International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea on August 18, 2010).
- CR Payne,
Balancing the Risks: Choosing Climate Alternatives,
IOP Conf. Ser.: Earth Envtl. Sci. 8 (2009). (peer-reviewed) - CR Payne,
State of Play: Changing the Climate in Copenhagen,
13 Am. Soc. Int’l L. Insights (2009). - CR Payne,
Local Meets Global: The Low Carbon Fuel Standard and the WTO,
34 North Carolina Journal of International Las & Commercial Regulation 891 (2009). - CR Payne,
Guide to Sources
inThe Iran-United States Claims Tribunal and the Process of International Claims Resolution
with D. Caron, Crook, J., Caplan, L. (David D. Caron and John R. Crook eds., Transnational Publishers 2000) - CR Payne,
Local Regulation of Natural Resources: Efficiency, Effectiveness, and Fairness of Wetlands Permitting in Massachusetts,
28 Environmental Law 519 (1998). - CR Payne,
Foreword to Symposium: The Ecosystem Approach: New Departures for Land and Water,
24 Ecology Law Quarterly 619 (1997).
Biography |
Current Research |
Selected Publications |
Teaching/Taught
Teaching/Taught
Spring 2018
11:374:426 Climate Change Policy (3 credits)
11:374:462 International Environmental Law & Policy (3 credits)
Fall 2017
11:374:460 Environmental Law 1: Nature, Law and Society (3 credits)
Spring 2017
11:374:462 International Environmental Law & Policy (3 credits)
Fall 2016
11:374:460 Environmental Law 1: Nature, Law and Society (3 credits)
Spring 2016
34:833:686:02 Climate Governance (3 credits)
11:374:462 International Environmental Law & Policy (3 credits)
Fall 2015
11:374:460 Environmental Law 1: Nature, Law and Society (3 credits)
Spring 2015
11:374:460 Environmental Law 1: Nature, Law and Society (3 credits)
11:374:462 International Environmental Law & Policy (3 credits)
Spring 2014
34:833:686:02 Climate Governance (3 credits)
11:374:462 International Environmental Law & Policy (3 credits)
Fall 2013
11:374:460 Environmental Law 1: Nature, Law and Society (3 credits)
Spring 2013
34:833:686:02 Climate Governance (3 credits)
11:374:462 International Environmental Law & Policy (3 credits)
Fall 2012
11:374:460 Environmental Law 1: Nature, Law and Society (3 credits)
Spring 2012
11:374:460 Environmental Law 1: Nature, Law and Society (3 credits)
Faculty Emeriti
Cymie Payne, J.D., Associate Professor
Cook Office Building, Room 208
848-932-9258
payne@sebs.rutgers.edu
Biography: Cymie R. Payne is Associate Professor and teaches in the Department of Human Ecology and the School of Law. She studies global governance of the environment and natural resources and the evolution of international law, with a focus on climate change, ocean resources and protection of the environment in relation to armed conflict.
She has appeared as legal counsel before the Seabed Disputes Chamber of the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea and previously practiced natural resource and environmental law with the United Nations, the U.S. Department of the Interior and the law firm of Goodwin, Procter. For six years she participated in landmark decisions on the legal responsibility of aggressor states for the restoration and remediation of damage to the environment from armed conflict as legal counsel to the United Nations Compensation Commission in Geneva, Switzerland. As Director of the Global Commons Project at University of California Berkeley’s Center for Law, Energy and the Environment, she focused on the linkage of state and international climate policy, particularly with respect to emissions trading systems; conflicts of state law with international trade; and regulating risks of new technologies such as carbon sequestration.
Professor Payne is currently the Chair of the Steering Committee of the American Society of International Law’s Signature Topic Beyond National Jurisdiction
. She is the Chair of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) World Commission on Environmental Law (WCEL) Specialist Group for Ocean, Coasts and Coral Reefs. She is also a member of the International Law Association, Committee on Sustainable Resources Management, and a member of the International Council of Environmental Law.
She holds a Master’s degree in international relations from The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy and a Juris Doctor from the University of California, Berkeley.
Graduate Faculty Affiliations: School of Law; Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy; Institute of Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences.
Biography |
Current Research |
Selected Publications |
Teaching/Taught
In the book “Gulf War Reparations and the UN Compensation Commission: Environmental Liability” (CR Payne & PH Sand, eds., Oxford University Press 2011), I argue that the UN Security Council created a need for legal concepts that were almost unknown in previous eras when it introduced environmental damage and natural resource depletion directly resulting from the 1991 Gulf War as one of the categories of losses within the jurisdiction of the Commission. These decisions, the first in international law to recognize state responsibility for war damage to the environment, have contributed fundamentally to the evolution of international norms and legal principles. With Peter H. Sand and other contributors to the book, I identify several principles—polluter pays, the public trust doctrine and compensability of non-market environmental damage—that emerged from their origin as soft law principles, evolved into applied rules, and resulted in the real-world consequence of financial awards by the UNCC. I also show how the flexibility of the UNCC as an international institution enabled it to accommodate special needs of the environment and respond to the shared vision of the participants on behalf of the transboundary environment.
In the “Strengthening Peacebuilding” project for UNEP/Environmental Law Institute/University of Tokyo, I take a different perspective on the UN Compensation Commission and its decisions. I evaluate the UNCC as an instrument of reparations and post-conflict restoration. While noting the limitations on re-establishing peace and environmental integrity in the conflict zone, I conclude that the UNCC demonstrates that states can be held accountable for war-time damage to the environment under international law, and that it illustrates the benefits of multilateral engagement and long-term commitment to environmental restoration. Future work will further explore the effectiveness of such formal legal institutions in strengthening peace building.
Current Research
As an international lawyer, I study the demand (or lack thereof) for global governance of the environment and natural resources and the consequent evolution of international law. My research focuses on the problems faced in addressing climate change, building peace after armed conflict, and managing ocean resources.Legal Liability Rules as Orders, Disincentives, Punishment, and Compensation
I provided written and oral submissions to the Seabed Disputes Chamber of the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea (the Chamber) on behalf of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), proposing an approach to a new international governance problem: the management of deep seabed resources. The International Seabed Authority asked the Chamber to address certain aspects of state responsibility and liability for deep seabed mining in the areas of the ocean beyond national jurisdiction. I argued that the Law of the Sea Convention itself had contributed to the developmental shift from treatment of high seas resources as res nullius (a thing belonging to no one) to being considered the common heritage of humanity. This status requires the international community to manage the marine environment for the benefit of all. The Chamber’s Advisory Opinion agreed that the international community has a shared interest in the ocean’s resources. Further work will continue to examine how liability rules function to set expectations of behavior, discourage risky activities, punish bad actors and compensate injured parties.Judges Facing Complexity
Recent cases support the contention that international courts are failing to give adequate consideration to complex scientific evidence, and in consequence their decisions may be inconsistent with principles such as the equitable use of transboundary water resources. For example, some International Court of Justice judges criticized their colleagues’ handling of expert testimony in a dispute between Argentina and Uruguay over industrial development on a shared river. Providing the assistance of experts to judges is a possible solution, but efforts to provide such assistance have not been particularly successful so far. This project examines the experience of other international courts, the U.S. federal courts and the efforts of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and looks at the views, training and experience of the judges themselves to better define the problem and identify effective measures that could be taken.Legal Institutions and Post-Conflict Environmental Restoration
I evaluate the United Nations Compensation Commission as a landmark example of the evolution that is taking place in international law. The United Nations Compensation Commission (UNCC) reviewed almost 3 million claims for war reparations from more than 80 countries. Of that, the Commission awarded over $5 billion for the restoration of the environment: oiled shorelines, loss of wildlife and livestock, damage to desert ecologies and and harm to public health.In the book “Gulf War Reparations and the UN Compensation Commission: Environmental Liability” (CR Payne & PH Sand, eds., Oxford University Press 2011), I argue that the UN Security Council created a need for legal concepts that were almost unknown in previous eras when it introduced environmental damage and natural resource depletion directly resulting from the 1991 Gulf War as one of the categories of losses within the jurisdiction of the Commission. These decisions, the first in international law to recognize state responsibility for war damage to the environment, have contributed fundamentally to the evolution of international norms and legal principles. With Peter H. Sand and other contributors to the book, I identify several principles—polluter pays, the public trust doctrine and compensability of non-market environmental damage—that emerged from their origin as soft law principles, evolved into applied rules, and resulted in the real-world consequence of financial awards by the UNCC. I also show how the flexibility of the UNCC as an international institution enabled it to accommodate special needs of the environment and respond to the shared vision of the participants on behalf of the transboundary environment.
In the “Strengthening Peacebuilding” project for UNEP/Environmental Law Institute/University of Tokyo, I take a different perspective on the UN Compensation Commission and its decisions. I evaluate the UNCC as an instrument of reparations and post-conflict restoration. While noting the limitations on re-establishing peace and environmental integrity in the conflict zone, I conclude that the UNCC demonstrates that states can be held accountable for war-time damage to the environment under international law, and that it illustrates the benefits of multilateral engagement and long-term commitment to environmental restoration. Future work will further explore the effectiveness of such formal legal institutions in strengthening peace building.
Biography |
Current Research |
Selected Publications |
Teaching/Taught
Selected Publications
- Cymie R. Payne, 2012,
Argentina’s ICSID Arbitrations and the UNCC Experience: Consistency and Capability in Mass Claims.
World Arbitration and Mediation Review. 6(3):427-61.
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2066821 - Cymie R. Payne, 2011,
Mastering the Evidence: Improving Fact Finding by International Courts.
Environmental Law 41(4):1191-1220.
http://law.lclark.edu/live/files/10602-414corrected7tojcipaynepdf - Donald K. Anton, Robert A. Makgill, Cymie R. Payne, 2011,
Seabed Mining: Advisory Opinion on Responsibility and Liability.
Environmental Policy and Law 41(2): 60-65.
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/cf_dev/AbsByAuth.cfm?per_id=877338 - Cymie R. Payne, 2011,
Pulp Mills on the River Uruguay (Arg. v. Uru.),
American Journal of International Law 105(1):94-101.
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/cf_dev/AbsByAuth.cfm?per_id=877338 - Gulf War Reparations and the UN Compensation Commission: Environmental Liability (CR Payne, Peter H. Sand, eds, Oxford University Press March 2011)(CR Payne sole author: chapter 1, The UNCC Program: Environmental Claims in Context; chapter 5, Tracking and Follow-Up Programmes for Environmental Awards; Guidance for Researchers).
- CR Payne, Legal Liability for Environmental Damage: The United Nations Compensation Commission and the 1990-1991 Gulf War, in Strengthening Post-Conflict Peacebuilding through Natural Resource Management, Volume 6: Governance, Natural Resources, and Postconflict Peacebuilding (C. Bruch, C. Muffett, and S. Nichols, eds, forthcoming 2011).
- CR Payne,
State Responsibility and Liability for Deep Seabed Mining in International Waters,
Environmental Policy and Law (co-authored with Donald Anton and Robert Makgill, 2011). (peer-reviewed) - CR Payne,
Pulp Mills on the River Uruguay (Arg. v. Uru.),
105 American Journal of International Law 94 (January 2011). (peer-reviewed) - CR Payne,
Environmental Impact Assessment as a Duty under International Law: The International Court of Justice Judgment on Pulp Mills on the River Uruguay,
3 Eur. J. of Risk Regulation 317 (2010). (peer-reviewed) - Statement for International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources, Commission on Environmental Law, Advisory Opinion, Case No. 17: Responsibilities and obligations of States sponsoring persons and entities with respect to activities in the International Seabed Area (filed with International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea on August 18, 2010).
- CR Payne,
Balancing the Risks: Choosing Climate Alternatives,
IOP Conf. Ser.: Earth Envtl. Sci. 8 (2009). (peer-reviewed) - CR Payne,
State of Play: Changing the Climate in Copenhagen,
13 Am. Soc. Int’l L. Insights (2009). - CR Payne,
Local Meets Global: The Low Carbon Fuel Standard and the WTO,
34 North Carolina Journal of International Las & Commercial Regulation 891 (2009). - CR Payne,
Guide to Sources
inThe Iran-United States Claims Tribunal and the Process of International Claims Resolution
with D. Caron, Crook, J., Caplan, L. (David D. Caron and John R. Crook eds., Transnational Publishers 2000) - CR Payne,
Local Regulation of Natural Resources: Efficiency, Effectiveness, and Fairness of Wetlands Permitting in Massachusetts,
28 Environmental Law 519 (1998). - CR Payne,
Foreword to Symposium: The Ecosystem Approach: New Departures for Land and Water,
24 Ecology Law Quarterly 619 (1997).
Biography |
Current Research |
Selected Publications |
Teaching/Taught