Professor Rowena Maguire

Biography

Professor Rowena Maguire is Director of the QUT Centre for Justice. Rowena is an active research leader and interdisciplinary scholar who undertakes research in collaboration with industry, community, and interdisciplinary university partners. She enjoys work that is connected to ground, and which has the potential to influence change.

Rowena is currently working on two original programs of work: climate governance work focusing on gender, social inclusion, and effectiveness; and just transition to a circular economy. In her work on climate governance, she draws upon her legal background to analyse how climate laws, policies and climate financing structures produce unintended consequences increasing inequality and vulnerability in a changing climate. Her scholarship on this topic draws upon intersectional feminist theory and methods, which is used to critically evaluate the law and in doing so identify the privileged knowledges, voices and agendas driving legal reform. Rowena has completed several projects for the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research drawing upon this knowledge and is working on a QUT Centre for Justice project focused on disaster justice.

Rowena’s work on just transition to circular and sustainable economy draws upon regulatory and feminist theories to explore the institutional barriers and social implications of transitioning to a circular economy. Work on this topic explores the social and environmental issues across supply chains including waste, carbon emissions, modern slavery, and the role of regulatory mechanisms in the transition. Rowena’s project on this topic is funded by the Cotton Research Development Corporation, Australian Retailers Association and the Department of Agriculture, Water, and the Environment, the United Nations Environment Program and the End Food Waste Cooperative Research Centre.

Rowena coordinates the units ‘Environmental and Sustainability Law’ in the undergraduate program within the School of Law and supervises higher degree research students working on projects in the areas of environmental law, climate governance, circular economy, decarbonisation and feminist and critical theories.