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University Environmental Course Listings
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- Western Public Lands Management
- This seminar is designed as a mixture of lectures by the professors, and seminar presentation and discussion by the students. Our goal
early on is to give students out best insights and experiences in analyzing public lands management issues, drawing on our different expertise: Riebsame: general history and geography of public lands, the roles of environmentalism and environmental perception in management of BLM
grazing lands and National Parks; Lester: public administration/governance theory, outer continental shelf oil, and coal and mineral lands. The class is focused on what could be called the "governance problem" how do we manage public lands in an era of interest group pluralism,
regulatory and agency change, and conceptual and scientific transformation? To make such questions concrete, we focus on three specific issue/problems: (1) Managing Rocky Mountain National Park; (2) California OCS leasing; and (3) BLM rangeland policy reform.
- Western Public Lands Management
- This seminar is designed as a mixture of lectures by the professors, and seminar presentation and discussion by the students. Our goal
early on is to give students out best insights and experiences in analyzing public lands management issues, drawing on our different expertise: Riebsame: general history and geography of public lands, the roles of environmentalism and environmental perception in management of BLM
grazing lands and National Parks; Lester: public administration/governance theory, outer continental shelf oil, and coal and mineral lands. The class is focused on what could be called the "governance problem" how do we manage public lands in an era of interest group pluralism,
regulatory and agency change, and conceptual and scientific transformation? To make such questions concrete, we focus on three specific issue/problems: (1) Managing Rocky Mountain National Park; (2) California OCS leasing; and (3) BLM rangeland policy reform.
- Water Law, Policy, and Institutions
- Contemporary issues in water management based on legal doctrine. Legal issues in water resource problems are identified and
discussed in close relationship with technical, economic, and political considerations.
- Natural Resources and Environment
- The purpose of the course is 1) to provide an overview of traditional and current issues in natural resource and environmental
economics and policy; and 2) to illustrate the methods devised by economists to tackle certain problems (for instance, how to estimate the demand for environmental quality in the absence of a market from which to obtain data on quantity demanded at each price level) along with the
advantages and limitations of these methods or look at interesting economic and policy-relevant issues. The course will have a very practical and policy oriented flavor.
- Environmental Economics
- Environmental Economics considers the efficient and equitable use of society's scarce environmental resource. Environmental resources
include: air, water, land wilderness areas, parks wildlife and genetic diversity, and other scarce ecological systems. Use of these resources will be considered from three perspectives: the market allocation, the optimal allocation, and government attempts to achieve a more efficient and
equitable allocation. Environmental Economics is a course in applied welfare economics and will consider externalities (particularly with respect to pollution) and the economic evaluation of amenities (recreational and environmental) in detail.
- Environmental Impact Analysis
- This seminar in Environmental Impact Analysis is designed to serve the needs of persons interested in the physical, technological and
human impacts of the built environment as they affect the natural environment. Analyzes willcover housing, transportation, institutional and other kinds of proposed development at the local, state and national scale. The course has three major areas of emphasis: 1) the theory, history and
methodology of impact assessment; 2) the contextual and substantive areas, i.e., resources which undergo human intervention such as forests, wetlands, open space, aquatic and atmospheric systems and, of course, the impact of technology and technological developments on individuals,
neighborhoods and communities; and 3) the development or impact reports from empirical situations with the internal review and eventually the public testimony in verbal or written form.
- Public Land Law
- Deals with the legal status and management of federal lands. Explores federal law, policy, and agency practice affecting the use of mineral, timber,
range, water, wildlife, and wilderness resources on public lands.
- Foundations of Natural Resources Law and Policy
- Examines the historical, political, and intellectual influences that created and shaped major areas of law governing land
and natural resources development and conservation, especially in the American West. Readings include books and articles by leading writers as well as the landmark court decisions. Enables students with a passing interest in natural resources to take a single course in the field. Allows
students going on to take other natural resource courses a more advanced treatment of the subject matter.
- Water Resources
- Analysis of regional and national water problems, including legal methods by which water supplies are allocated, and an examination of problems
involved in water resource planning.
- Oil and Gas
- Deals with the legal problems associated with private arrangements forth ownership and development of oil and gas: deeds and leases to oil and gas rights.
trespass, adverse possession, implied covenants in leases, conveyances of fractional interests, and the interaction of private right and conservation regulation.
- Mining Law
- Federal law governing access to and development of hard rock minerals on public lands; location of claims; issues of discovery; assessment work; patents;
and environmental regulation.
- Pollution Law
- Examination and analysis of important federal pollution control statutes, including the National Environmental Policy Act, the Clean Air Act, Clean Water
Act, Solid Waste Act, and Superfund, Related economic theory and policy issues are considered.
- Natural Resources Litigation Clinic
- Offers hands-on experience in the practice of natural resources law in the Rocky Mountain region to a select number of clinic
students. Affords an inside view into both complex environmental litigation as well as alternative dispute resolution. Students participate in traditional litigation as well as alternative dispute resolution. Students participate in traditional litigation, administrative advocacy, legislative
drafting, and the conduct of complex negotiations and settlements.
- Hazardous Waste and Toxic Torts
- Examines statutorily-imposed responsibility and common-law tort and product liability exposure. These are discussed in relation to the
growing problem of the handling and disposal of toxic substances and hazardous waste as they impact public health and the environment. Focuses on federal law and that of several states regulating chemicals and toxic substances, hazardous waste disposal, and clean-up of contaminated
sites.
- Legal Negotiation and Dispute Resolution
- Explores fundamentals of effective negotiation techniques and policies for lawyers. Students engage in mock negotiations of
several legal disputes. Examines a variety of dispute resolution processes such as mediation, arbitration, mini-trials, and court-annexed settlement procedures as alternatives to traditional court adjudication.
- Independent Legal Research: International Environmental Law Journal
- Students participate in the research, writing, and editing activities involved in publishing the
Colorado Journal of Environmental Law and Policy. Standards for the awarding of credit are set and applied by the faculty.
- Seminar: Advanced Natural Resources Law
- For students with a strong interest in natural resources issues in the American West. Coverage is based upon biological and
geographical classifications where numerous resource issues converge. Studies historical, literary, and scientific materials and then moves to an analysis of current problems relating to matters such as federal public lands, wildlife habitat, water quantity, ocean and coastal law, land us
planning, pollution control, Indian law, and state, federal authority as they implicate the topic of the seminar.
- Seminar: Advanced Water Resource Management
- Explores the use of watersheds as geographic and political entities for addressing water- related issues. Introduces the
nature of watersheds and their historical treatment, and looks at the ways in which laws and institutions facilitate or impede watershed-based problem solving or decision-making. Students prepare and present major research papers focusing on a particular water issue and explore solutions
in the context of the entire watershed with its related problems and multiple, interconnected interest.
- Seminar: Biotechnology and Law
- Legal, moral, and economic analysis of problems posed or soon to be posed by advances in biomedical technologies. Examines
problems raised by behavior control through organic intervention, including psychosurgery, psychoactive drugs. and electrical stimulation of the brain; genetic engineering, amplification of human powers and faculties by artificial means, including organ transplantation, man-machine
symbiosis, and pharmacologically induced enhancement of mental functioning; death and dying; and regulation of experimentation with human subjects. Discusses problems in distributive justice posed by limited availability of biotechnological commodities, as well as issues arising from
enforced treatment.
- Seminar: Alternative Dispute Resolution
- A study of alternative dispute resolution (ADR) theory, its application in specific contexts (e. g., civil rights), procedural
approaches to ADR, advantages and disadvantages of using ADR, and the attorney's roles in ADR processes.
- Seminar: International Environmental Law
- Deals with selected issues in environmental law that involve the United States and one or more other countries. Students
prepare research papers on topics dealing with trans-boundary pollution, extraterritorial application of federal water courses, export or disposal of hazardous materials, regulation of foreign aid and investment affecting the environment, options for controlling global climate change, and
the use of treaties to protect the environment.
- Introduction to the Policy Sciences: The Decision Process
- Provides policy sciences frameworks for analyzing policy problems and evaluating policy alternative, and for
analyzing policy processes and designing political strategies to influence those processes in the directions of the preferred alternative. Emphasizes applications to problems selected by students for term projects.
- Policy Analysis/Applications: The Decision Process
- This course provides an introduction to the decision process of public policy: the set of activities that together
define the continuum of public policy decision- making. For the student, the course has two primary goals: 1) to gain a basic conceptual understanding of the public policy decision process; and 2)to become adept at analyzing the various dimensions of the decision process for the
purpose of strategizing and making recommendation about how to realize a set of preferred policy outcomes in applied policy settings. To these ends, the course plan alternates between the intensive consideration of a set of readings about the different phases of the policy decision
process, and the analysis and application of decision process concepts to cases selected by students.
- Public Policy Analysis II: Applications
- This course is designed to teach students interested in public policy a systematic method for analyzing public policy problems.
The emphasis is on learning the method by application to a concrete problem of concern to the student. The objective of the course is to provide policy analysts with the conceptual tools necessary to develop a policy recommendation for a given problem and to develop a political strategy
to implement that recommendation.
- Analyzing Society
- Examines U. S. society in global context, using basic sociological ideas. Focuses on the nature of group life, social and moral order, social
institutions, social disorganization, social problems, and social change. Approved for arts and science core curriculum: contemporary societies.
- Contemporary Social Issues and Human Values
- Explores contemporary societies on a global scale. Focuses on such issues as capitalism , socialism, race and ethnic
problems, sex discrimination, poverty and the concentration of wealth, crime and deviance, human rights and human values, peace and war.
- Sociology of Natural and Social Environments
- Sociological interpretation of the increasingly traumatic interaction of ecological and social systems in the Rocky
Mountain west, where the natural environment is impacted by recreation and energy development.
- Nonviolence and the Ethics of Social Action
- Examines nonviolence as a strategy of social action. Focuses on ethics and dynamics of nonviolent action; racial and
economic justice movements; civil disobedience; and conscientious objection to war.
- U. S. Values, Social Problems, and Social Change
- Examines U. S. society from the perspective of values and theories of social change. Considers such problems as
distribution of power, unemployment, poverty, racism and sexism, the changing role of the family, and drugs. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: ideals and values.
- Sociological Analysis of Revolution
- Comparative analysis of major revolutions emphasizing causation, revolutionary process, and long-term consequences. Attention
given to social stratification, political organization, economic processes, ideological systems, and international relations.
- Sociology of Peacemaking
- Analyzes institutions of war and the forces emerging to counter them, such as negotiation, nonviolent national defense, and peace movements.
- Environmental and Society
- Focuses on influences of both natural and built environments upon human behavior and social organization; microenvironments and their
influence on individuals; the impact of macroenvironments on societal organization; and environmental movements.
- Social Change
- Studies historically and cross-culturally the causes of modernization and its effects upon the individual, the family, and economic and political
institutions.
- Sociology of Language
- More than anything else, it is the fact that humans use language that makes them what they are. Course focuses on language in its social context,
and what happens when people talk.
- Sociology of War
- Considers the questions war raises by applying sociological theory and methods to armed conflicts from the Peloponnesian War to the Gulf War.
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(303)492-2154; E-Mail: crc@colorado.eduCopyright 1997 by Conflict Research Consortium