Thesis Title

'Obstruction Within the Legal Opportunity Structure: the Role of Fossil Fuel Lobbying in Climate Litigation'

Supervisors

Dr Joana Setzer (Grantham Research Institute) and Dr Michael Blackwell (Law)

Research Interests

Climate litigation, Carbon Major lobbying, lobbying regulation, socio-legal study of climate change and climate justice  

Kaia Turowski is a PhD student in Law at LSE. Her research is cross-departmental, under the guise of LSE’s Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment and the Law department. Her proposed research topic will be ‘Obstruction Within the Legal Opportunity Structure: the Role of Fossil Fuel Lobbying in Climate Litigation’ and will be supervised by Michael Blackwell (LSE Law) and Joana Setzer (Grantham Institute). 

Kaia completed a Bachelor of Arts with a major in Environmental Studies and Political Science at Reed College in the USA before undertaking a Masters in Environmental, Natural Resources and Energy Law at the Northwestern School of Law in Portland, Oregon. There, she was a research assistant for Dr. Lisa Benjamin.

Kaia has been project managing Brown University’s Climate Social Science Network Working Group on climate-washing and net-zero commitments, which is comprised of scholars from various institutions internationally that are committed to researching climate law and politics.

Affiliations / Memberships

Climate Social Science Network, Brown University

Grantham Research Institute, London School of Economics

Awards / Scholarships

LSE Department of Law Studentship (2023-2027)

London Arts & Humanities Research Council Research Grant (2023)

European Consortium for Political Research (ECPR) General Conference Grant (2023)

Northwestern School of Law Environmental Leadership Award (2021-2022)

Reed College Commendation for Excellence for Academic Performance (2018-2019)