Rate My Professor Chris Butler

Chris Butler is a Senior Lecturer in the Griffith Law School at Griffith University. He studied law and politics at the University of Queensland and completed his PhD at Griffith University. His doctoral thesis, titled 'Law and the Social Production of Space,' was submitted to the Faculty of Law at Griffith University. Butler's research specializations include social and legal theory, critical approaches to state power and authority, urban political ecology, environmental justice, and the philosophical contributions of Henri Lefebvre. His work investigates how law and regulatory mechanisms contribute to the production of space and nature, particularly within neoliberal contexts.

Butler has an active publication record in critical legal and urban studies. Key publications encompass journal articles such as 'Critical Legal Studies and the Politics of Space' (2009), 'State Power, the Politics of Debt and Confronting Neoliberal Authoritarianism' (2018, Law and Critique), 'Autogestion and ecological politics in the work of Henri Lefebvre' (2023), and 'The Lawful Forest: A Critical History of Property, Protest' (2025). He has also authored book chapters including 'Spatial Abstraction, Legal Violence and the Promise of Appropriation,' 'Forms of Authority Beyond the Neoliberal State,' 'Public housing on The Rocks: brutalism, heritage,' and contributions to edited volumes like Spaces of Justice and The Routledge Handbook of Henri Lefebvre, The City and Urban Everyday Life, where he explores abstraction, appropriation, utopia, and the right to the city. Butler co-edited a special issue of Law and Critique on forms of authority beyond the neoliberal state. In teaching, he serves as convenor for Administrative Law (3017LAW and 7717LAW) and Environmental Justice (5233LAW). He has engaged in professional activities such as conference presentations on urban climate justice and Lefebvre's theories, and signed public statements including an open letter against racism.