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Cristy Clark

@cristyclark.bsky.social

2.9K followers 1.9K following 1.5K posts

Associate Professor (human rights & environmental law). I’m interested in legal geography, and water, climate & spatial justice. Co-author of The Lawful Forest (2022), author of Legal Geographies of Water (June 2025). Australian living in UK. She/her

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Cristy Clark @cristyclark.bsky.social · Jun 17

My new book arrived! I even posted a deeply cringy‘unboxing’ video on LinkedIn.

www.taylorfrancis.com/books/mono/1...

A women with long brown hair holding a copy of a book, ‘Legal Geographies of Water’. She is smiling and wearing a white striped shirt.

https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/mono/10.4324/9781003273219/legal-geographies-water-cristy-clark

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Cristy Clark @cristyclark.bsky.social · 30m

In praise of rejection and, particularly, of the academic risk taking that is mostly likely to lead to it.

I love this.

I had a very blunt and forthright PhD supervisor and am now almost immune to the sting of critique. It’s almost always super useful.

Catherine E. de Vries @catherinedevries.bsky.social · 7h

Every academic career is built on rejection, but we don’t show it.
 CVs list publications, grants & awards, not rejected manuscripts, unfunded proposals, or failures.
 But those invisible rejections shape us more than our successes ever do.

👉 catherineeunicedevries.substack.com/p/fail-bette...

🧵

Fail Better: Why Your Rejections Will Shape You More Than Your Publications

The Art of Learning from Rejection

catherineeunicedevries.substack.com

Cristy Clark @cristyclark.bsky.social · 19h

So annoying.

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Cristy Clark @cristyclark.bsky.social · 19h

The Paris Commune also completely defied this assumption (although it was very short lived…)

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Cristy Clark @cristyclark.bsky.social · 19h

In a manner of speaking, yes. But the reality of how it was conceived by early theorists & activists is far messier. This (long) article gives a decent impression of some of the nuances of the early debates (and the personality, context factors that skewed them).

www.leftcom.org/en/articles/...

150 Years On: The Split in the First International

The Hague Congress of the International Workingmen’s Association (aka the First International) took place in September 1872. After a tumultuous session, Bakunin was expelled by a majority vote and fro...

www.leftcom.org

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Cristy Clark @cristyclark.bsky.social · 20h

Oh sorry. I can send it if like. You’d just need to DM me your email.

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Cristy Clark @cristyclark.bsky.social · 21h

Apologies for the deluge. This is a current focus of my research…

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Cristy Clark @cristyclark.bsky.social · 21h

Yep. I think that’s the classic example. People have also described sovereign citizens and other right wing movements in this way.

anthrosource.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1...

PoLAR: Political and Legal Anthropology Review | AAA Journal | Wiley Online Library

Much contemporary research on prefigurative legality turns to left-leaning activists for ethnographic insights into practices that call forward an alternative legal world. We turn instead to a right-...

anthrosource.onlinelibrary.wiley.com

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Cristy Clark @cristyclark.bsky.social · 22h

My sense was is that you have to believe that humans are actually good to think utopia is a positive idea.

Cristy Clark @cristyclark.bsky.social · 22h

For #2, utopia been framed as inherently prone to totalitarianism due the belief that people would not agree to the strictures of utopian societies (#4) without totalitarian rule (similar to arguments against communism). ‘Humans are selfish so capitalism is the best we can hope for…’

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Cristy Clark @cristyclark.bsky.social · 22h

(I like 1 and 3.)

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Cristy Clark @cristyclark.bsky.social · 22h

Ruth Levitas, Utopia as method (2013) xii-xiii.

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Cristy Clark @cristyclark.bsky.social · 22h

3. Everyday utopias created through prefigurative practice (intentional communities…)
4. A ‘more holistic outline of an alternative society…’

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Cristy Clark @cristyclark.bsky.social · 22h

Well… Ruth Levitas argued there are four main ways of thinking about utopia as a concept.
1. The expression of the desire for a better way of being or of living…
2. The kind that is ‘dismissed as an irrelevant fantasy or traduced as a malevolent nightmare leading to totalitarianism’.

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Cristy Clark @cristyclark.bsky.social · 22h

Me: yay I was super productive all day!

Two seconds later: oh no, I didn’t even get through all of the most urgent tasks on my to do list…

😞

Cristy Clark @cristyclark.bsky.social · 23h

It was great that you finished with system change but it would have been more powerful if this was added to the table.

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Cristy Clark @cristyclark.bsky.social · 23h

Yes. I’m Australian.

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Reposted by Cristy Clark

Elaine Johnson @elainejohnson.bsky.social · 1d

Johnson Legal is proud to be representing Friends of Australian Rock Art in their challenge to Woodside’s North West Shelf extension project.

FARA is taking the case to uphold the law and protect the ancient Murujuga Rock Art from harm.

www.abc.net.au/news/2025-10...

Two groups launch Federal Court appeals against Woodside gas extension

Two separate appeals are launched in the Federal Court in a bid to overturn Environment Minister Murray Watt's approval of Woodside's gas hub extension on the North West Shelf.

www.abc.net.au

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Reposted by Cristy Clark

Liz Hicks @lizhicks.bsky.social · 1d

“Global warming from Woodside’s massive Scarborough gas project off Western Australia would lead to 484 additional heat-related deaths in Europe alone this century… our new research has revealed.”

theconversation.com/for-the-firs...

For the first time, we linked a new fossil fuel project to hundreds of deaths. Here’s the impact of Woodside’s Scarborough gas project

The results challenge claims that the climate risks posed by an individual fossil fuel project are negligible or cannot be quantified.

theconversation.com

Reposted by Cristy Clark

Aoife Nolan @aoifenolan.bsky.social · 2d

Conor Gearty died a month ago yesterday. He was deeply committed to human rights law without idealising it. He recognised its power & value while acknowledging its limitations (& those of the people engaging with it). He was also an exceptional lawyer. This is a fitting final piece in the @lrb.co.uk

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Cristy Clark @cristyclark.bsky.social · 2d

The Australian ‘mate’ can mean at least ten different things depending on tone

www.tiktok.com/@montyfrankl...

How Australians use the word MATE. #australia #america #silly #accent #mate #montyfranklin

TikTok video by Monty Franklin

www.tiktok.com

Cristy Clark @cristyclark.bsky.social · 3d

“Innocent people have no issue with being recorded — they know it keeps them and our staff safe,” said one executive.

Yep, so happy to trade my privacy rights for your corporate profits. Seems legit.