Claudia de Windt
American University and Inter-American Institute on Justice and Sustainability, Faculty
Founder and Executive Director of the Inter-American Institute on Justice and Sustainability (IIJS), and Adjunct Associate Professor at American University’s Washington College of Law (Human Rights and the Environment). She teaches international environmental law in globally recognized law schools, as well as in judicial and prosecutorial academies.
She is a member of the Steering Committee of the World Commission on Environmental Law of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), serves on the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) expert group on crimes with serious environmental impacts, and acts as Expert (Chairperson non-national of the Parties) in environmental law and dispute resolution under the Association Agreement between the European Union and Central America.
Claudia provides expertise to high-level international policy forums and UN entities and committees. She is affiliated with the Center of Constitutional Studies of the Supreme Court of Mexico and was designated Visiting Scholar at the Environmental Law Institute (ELI) in 2020.
For nearly two decades, she served at the Organization of American States (OAS) in the Department of Sustainable Development and the Secretariat for Multidimensional Security. There, she directed initiatives linking environmental law to public policy, rule of law, human rights, business and investment, conflict prevention, security, gender, and the rights-based approach in the 2030 Agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
She has led joint efforts with executive, legislative, and judicial branches to advance environmental and social governance (ESG) alongside security and justice, contributing significantly to legislation, enforcement, compliance, and jurisprudence in Latin America and the Caribbean. From 2015 to 2017, she co-chaired the Green Growth and the Law Working Group of the Green Growth Knowledge Partnership (GGKP).
Author of several books and expert publications, Claudia holds a Doctor of Law degree from Universidad Iberoamericana (UNIBE) and a Master’s Degree (LLM) in International Legal Studies from American University Washington College of Law, where she also serves on the Program on Energy and Environmental Law Alumni Advisory Council. She completed a Certificate in Negotiations at Harvard Law School. Before joining the OAS in 2001, she practiced corporate law at Headrick Rizik Alvarez & Fernández.
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