Rate My Professor Nicola Wheen

Professor Nicola Wheen is a professor in the Faculty of Law at the University of Otago, where she teaches and convenes Public Law, Environmental Law, and International Environmental Law. She holds a BA and an LLM from the University of Otago. Wheen joined the university as a student in 1984 and the academic staff in 1989. Her research examines how law responds to environmental problems, including international whaling, rights to use freshwater, wildlife conservation, climate change, fishing-related mortalities of marine mammals, genetically modified organisms, conservation of Māori-owned indigenous forests, and the regulation of sex work using planning law. She also researches public law and Te Tiriti o Waitangi / Treaty of Waitangi. Wheen has particular expertise in collaborative research, having co-edited books on the Waitangi Tribunal and Treaty of Waitangi settlements, contributed to multi-disciplinary publications and research centres at Otago that bridge social and physical sciences, served on editorial boards including for Otago University Press, and supervised more than 50 postgraduate and Honours research students. Her work informs her teaching and has supported conservation organisations and political parties in advocating for improvements in New Zealand’s environmental law. In 2023, she delivered her inaugural professorial lecture on law’s response to environmental issues.