Do we have a right to night? Dana thinks so. We also have a right to health and there is more and more evidence that light at night can be detrimental to our health, and to the environment. Dana applies her legal expertise to her books, articles, essays, and speaking engagements to change people’s ideas around the environment and light pollution. Dana Zartner is a teacher, lawyer and writer whose work centers on the use of international, and comparative law as tools for social justice advocacy with an emphasis on environmental justice, the right to a healthy environment, Indigenous rights, sustainable development, and the rights of Nature. A professor at the University of San Francisco, she has published numerous articles and essays on these topics, including the recent “The Right to the Night: New Legal Advocacy Strategies to Address Terrestrial Light Pollution” in Environs. She also has a book coming out with Island Press on March 4, 2025 entitled Standing for Nature: Legal Strategies for Environmental Justice, which examines existing rights of Nature laws around the world with an eye to cresting legal advocacy strategies for future endeavors. In addition to her academic work, Dana has served as an accredited representative at various UN meetings, including the Committee on Women’s Rights in New York and the Expert Mechanisms on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in Geneva. She has also done pro bono work with the One Million Tree campaign in Cambodia and in support of the Amah Mutsun Tribal Band’s efforts to protect their traditional lands in Santa Clara County. Outside of her day job, Dana enjoys the natural beauty of Northern California, writes travel essays with an environmental theme, plays with her cats, and is working on a novel.
Connect with Dana: linkedin.com/in/dana-zartner-5a112b102
https://www.facebook.com/dana.zartner
https://www.instagram.com/dana.zartner/
BlueSky: dazart5.bsky.social
Substack: Roaming Wild
Check out Dana’s book, Standing for Nature: Legal Strategies for Environmental Justice, with Fabian Cardenas and Mohammad Golam Sarwar (Island Press) https://islandpress.org/books/standing-nature#description
Articles: The Right to the Night: New Legal Advocacy Strategies to Address Terrestrial Light Pollution, Environs: Environmental Law and Policy Journal (2024) The Tangled Web We Weave: Exploring Cambodia through the story of a spider … a really big spider, Medium (March 26, 2024) Big Oil’s day in court is coming – and it’s long overdue, The Hill (October 11, 2023) Watching Whanganui and the Lessons of Lake Erie: Effective Realization of Rights of Nature Law, Vermont Journal of Environmental Law (2021) Justice for Juristac: Using International and Comparative Law to Protect Indigenous Lands, Santa Clara Journal of International Law (2020)
Connect with The Soft Lights Foundation: www.softlights.org