Skip to main content

Prof Patricia Kameri-Mbote

Professor

Biography

Professor Patricia Kameri-Mbote is a Founding Research Director of (IELRC), and the Programme Director for Africa. She studied law at the University of Nairobi, the University of Warwick, the University of Zimbabwe and earned her doctorate from Stanford Law School (Stanford University). She is currently a Professor of Law at the School of Law, University of Nairobi where she has taught for over 30 years and served as Chair of Department and Dean. She led the team that planned, initiated, launched and implemented Strathmore Law School between 2009 and 2012. She is an Advocate of the High Court of Kenya and was conferred the rank of Senior Counsel in 2012. She has contributed to policymaking in the areas of environment, land, agriculture and gender and was awarded the national honour in the order Elder of the Burning Spear (EBS) in 2015. She has also taught in many universities around the world and published widely. Her latest work Contending Norms in a Plural Legal System: The Limits of Formal Law was the basis of her Higher Doctorate award from the University of Nairobi in 2019. She was awarded an honorary degree in law by the University of Oslo (UiO) in 2017 for her work cutting across established fields of Women’s Law, Natural Resources Law, Human Rights and Law and Development and  was also among 21 women honoured by Harvard Law School on International Women’s Day 2019 for being powerful voices inspiring change globally. She is a member of the Governing Board of the IUCN Commission on Environmental Law (ICEL) and the Chair of the Association of Environmental Law Lecturers in African Universities (ASSELLAU).