Wetlands Regulation in the United States Article
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Royal C. Gardner, Wetlands Regulation in the United States, 10 Sarovar 15 (2026)Clicking on the button will copy the full recommended citation.
Royal C. Gardner
Biography Edited publications2026
2025
Sackett and the Five Stages of Grief Article
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Royal C. Gardner, Sackett and the Five Stages of Grief, 38 Tulane Envtl. L. Journal 263 (2025)Clicking on the button will copy the full recommended citation.
The Ramsar Convention and the Concept of Consensus Book Chapter
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Royal C. Gardner, The Ramsar Convention and the Concept of Consensus, in Wetlands and International Environmental Law: The Evolution and Impact of the Ramsar Convention (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2025)Clicking on the button will copy the full recommended citation.
Ramsar Sites and Their Ecological Character: A Cornerstone of the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands Book Chapter
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Royal C. Gardner et al., Ramsar Sites and Their Ecological Character: A Cornerstone of the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands, in Wetlands and International Environmental Law: The Evolution and Impact of the Ramsar Convention (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2025)Clicking on the button will copy the full recommended citation.
Introduction: Wetlands and International Law Book Chapter
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Royal C. Gardner et al., Introduction: Wetlands and International Law, in Wetlands and International Environmental Law: The Evolution and Impact of the Ramsar Convention (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2025)Clicking on the button will copy the full recommended citation.
2024
Waters of the United States: POTUS, SCOTUS, WOTUS, and the Politics of a National Resource Book
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Royal C. Gardner, Waters of the United States: POTUS, SCOTUS, WOTUS, and the Politics of a National Resource (Island Press, 2024)Clicking on the button will copy the full recommended citation.
In 2023, the Supreme Court made one of its most devastating rulings in environmental history. By narrowing the legal definition of ‘waters of the United States’ (WOTUS), the court opened the floodgates to unregulated pollution. But while tremendously consequential, the decision was also simply the latest in a long series of battles over WOTUS, and which rivers, streams, lakes, ponds, wetlands, and perhaps even farm fields were to be protected by the Clean Water Act of 1972.
Waters of the United States is an unprecedented exploration of this history—and its importance for today’s efforts to conserve a critical natural resource. The book not only examines how bodies of water are legally defined (and therefore protected), but who gets to decide on these definitions. The result is a fascinating look at the ongoing power struggle between the president and federal agencies, the courts, the states, and Congress, over water quality.
Waters of the United States offers the detailed analysis necessary for any lawyer or environmental advocate to understand the nuances of water policy, while spinning a compelling narrative for readers who have never cracked a law book. The unique mix of insights into environmental law, history, and politics is required reading for anyone who cares about the future of the nation’s water.
Closing the Driver–Response Loop for Halting and Reversing Wetland Degradation and Loss from Agriculture Article
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C. Max Finlayson et al., Closing the Driver–Response Loop for Halting and Reversing Wetland Degradation and Loss from Agriculture, 75 Marine & Freshwater Research MF24050 (2024)Clicking on the button will copy the full recommended citation.
Context. The Ramsar Convention on Wetlands has considered agriculture–wetland interactions, but without linking policy responses to agricultural drivers of change.
Aims. Assess the disconnect between the rhetoric of analysing and reporting on the role of agriculture in wetland loss and degradation (the ‘drivers’) with actions on the ground (the ‘responses’).
Methods. An analysis of almost 400 Convention documents was undertaken to understand how the Convention has addressed agriculture and what
responses were identified. The documents were filtered through a word search for their relevance to the direct and indirect drivers of degradation in wetlands.
Key results. Although there was a focus on issues and problem framing and generic responses, they were insufficient to address the range of drivers
underpinning agriculture–wetland interactions. They also present a generic and partial viewof agriculture and broader food systems.
Conclusions. We make the following four recommendations for addressing the driver–response gap: deepening our understanding of the drivers in agriculture that affect wetlands; exploring and exploiting windows of opportunities within agriculture that are aligned with wetland use; enhancing our ability to work with indirect drivers; and ensuring that resolutions agreed through the Convention are more specific on key drivers of adverse change in wetlands.
Implications. The current impetus for ‘agriculture transformation’ creates an opportunity for the Convention to broaden its engagement in wetland–agriculture interactions and close the driver–response loop.
2023
Unpacking the Revised WOTUS Rule Dialogue Article
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Rebecca L. Kihslinger et al., Unpacking the Revised WOTUS Rule Dialogue, 53 Envtl. L. Reporter 10887 (2023)Clicking on the button will copy the full recommended citation.
On August 29, 2023, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers issued a direct final rule that revised the "waters of the United States" (WOTUS) definition rule. This rule amended the final WOTUS rule, previously published in January 2023, to be consistent with the Supreme Court's May decision in Sackett v. Environmental Protection Agency. On September 14, the Environmental Law Institute hosted a panel of experts to analyze the new rule and discuss its regulatory and policy consequences. Below, we present a transcript of that discussion, which has been edited for style, clarity, and space considerations.
Waters of the United States: An Urgent Call for Action by Fisheries and Aquatic Science Professionals Article
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Robert M. Hughes et al., Waters of the United States: An Urgent Call for Action by Fisheries and Aquatic Science Professionals, 48 Fisheries Magazine 465 (2023)Clicking on the button will copy the full recommended citation.
The Initial Response of Biodiversity Conventions to the COVID-19 Pandemic Article
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Royal C. Gardner et al., The Initial Response of Biodiversity Conventions to the COVID-19 Pandemic, 48 William and Mary Envtl. L. and Policy Review 1 (2023)Clicking on the button will copy the full recommended citation.
The COVID-19 pandemic disrupted the operations of global biodiversity conventions, requiring virtual meetings in place of in-person events. Yet the pandemic also highlighted the importance of biodiversity conservation as a mechanism to reduce the risk of zoonotic diseases, as the October 2020 report issued by the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services ("IPBES") emphasized. Now that in-person, international meetings have resumed, this Article examines the extent to which four biodiversity conventions-the Agreement on the Conservation of African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbirds, the Ramsar Convention, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, and the Convention on Biological Diversity-considered the nexus between biodiversity conservation and human health in the context of zoonotic disease. While the biodiversity conventions have taken several steps, individually, to emphasize the importance of biodiversity conservation to human health, this cross-cutting issue could be used for
greater coordination among the conventions.