Former President of Ireland, Mary Robinson, will deliver a Wege Lecture on Sustainability on March 13th.
Robinson leads the Mary Robinson Foundation – Climate Justice, a center of thought leadership, education and advocacy for communities around the world disproportionately threatened by climate change. She previously served as the UN Secretary-General’s Special Envoy on Climate Change, sounding alarm bells as extreme weather events dramatically affected the world’s most vulnerable people.
Robinson is a founding member and current chairman of The Elders, an independent group of global leaders founded by Nelson Mandela working for peace, justice, human rights and a sustainable planet. Her book, Climate Justice, has received positive reviews from former world leaders and the environmental and human rights communities.
Robinson’s talk will focus on “Climate Justice: Hope, Resilience and Fighting for a Sustainable Future”. Rory McAuley Provost will host.
The event kicks off at 6pm at the Rackham Auditorium and is free and open to the public. Registration is required and seats are limited.
Now in its 21st year, the event is hosted by the School for Environment and Sustainability and Center for Sustainable Systems (CSS) with additional support from the Frederick A. and Barbara M. Erbe Institute at A. Alfred Taubman College. increase. Faculty of Architecture and Urban Planning, College of Literature, Science and Arts, and School of Public Health.
From 1990 to 1997, Robinson was Ireland’s first female president and helped shape the country during a period of unprecedented rapid economic growth. From 1997 to her 2002, she served as the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Robinson has received honorary doctorates from over 40 elite universities around the world and has been awarded the Indira Gandhi Award and the Sydney Peace Prize. She was also awarded the US Presidential Medal of Freedom by Barack Obama.
Early in her career, Robinson was a lawyer who fought for women and human rights, filing landmark lawsuits in European and Irish courts. She has taught at Trinity College and Columbia University, where she served as an Irish Senator for 20 years, and at Trinity College where she co-founded the European Law Center for Ireland.
The Wege Lecture Series honors Peter M. Wege’s outstanding contributions to the CSS and environment fields.
The Wege Lecture will address the critical issues facing society in the 21st century, from energy security and fossil resource depletion, to global climate change, freshwater scarcity, ecosystem degradation, biodiversity loss, and sustainable development strategies. We have tackled sustainability challenges.
