Professor Geneviève Dufour, who joined the Faculty of Law’s Civil Law Section this past July, has been awarded the University Research Chair in Sustainable, Responsible and Inclusive Trade Law. With this new chair, Professor Dufour endeavours to study whether and how trade law can enable greater respect for human rights, environmental protection and the promotion of inclusion.
Increasingly, free trade and our modes of production are being called into question as states are turning to trade to achieve their sustainable development goals. Through this chair, Professor Dufour aims to study this phenomenon in order to propose structuring solutions to ensure that trade law contributes to the achievement of sustainable, responsible and inclusive trade. While economic growth was once seen as the sole driver of international trade, a new movement to take greater account of the environment and people in trade seems at last to be taking shape. Professor Dufour’s research will seek to study and guide how governments can take action at regional, national and international levels to pursue trade that is more respectful of the environment and the rights of people involved along the supply chain.
Professor Dufour is an internationally renowned scholar, with an impressive research network that includes collaborations within academia as well as with international organizations, NGOs and businesses. Prior to coming to uOttawa, she was a faculty member at the Université de Sherbrooke. Her previous research has examined the modernization of international economic law, proposing a progressive, solidarity-based and sustainable interpretation of trade.
The Faculty of Law is pleased to have Professor Dufour as part of our research community, and congratulates her on this impressive recognition.
Click here to read about other research chairs recently awarded by the University of Ottawa.
