Dr Ciara Brennan is Director of the Environmental Justice Network Ireland (ENJI).  From 2012 to 2022 she lectured at Newcastle University where she taught environmental law at undergraduate and postgraduate levels.

Ciara’s research focuses on environmental justice, environmental rights, environmental governance and specifically the enforcement of environmental law in Northern Ireland.

Ciara’s publications include:

• Ciara Brennan, Mary Dobbs, Viviane Gravey ‘Out of the frying pan, into the fire? Environmental governance vulnerabilities in post-Brexit Northern Ireland’ (2019) Environmental Law Review 21(2), 84-110.
• Ciara Brennan, Ray Purdy and Peter Hjerp, ‘Political, Economic and Environmental Crisis in Northern Ireland: The True Cost of Environmental Governance Failures and Opportunities for Reform’ (2017) Northern Ireland Legal Quarterly 68(2) 123-157. 
• Ciara Brennan ‘The Enforcement of Waste Regulation in Northern Ireland: Deterrence, Dumping and the Dynamics of Devolution’ (2016) Journal of Environmental Law (28)3, 471-496.
• Sharon Turner and Ciara Brennan ‘Modernising environmental regulation in Northern Ireland: a case study in devolved decision-making’ (2012) Northern Ireland Legal Quarterly 63 (4) 509-32.

In June 2019, Ciara founded and launched the Environmental Justice Network Ireland (EJNI) with project partners from the NGO, activist and academic community. The goal of EJNI is to create a community of practice connecting interdisciplinary academic researchers, NGOs, regulatory staff, environmental lawyers, representatives from industry and government with community activists and the 'barefoot lawyers and planners' who have emerged over the last decade on the island of Ireland in response to serious environmental governance failures. The focus of EJNI activities is to support communities and individuals that are engaged in both promoting environmental justice and challenging environmental injustice.  Ciara is embarking on a Knowledge Exchange and Innovation Sabbatical hosted by Friends of the Earth NI in September 2020. 

Ciara attended Queens University Belfast, and holds an LLB, an MSc (with distinction) in Leadership for Sustainable Development and a PhD.