Rate My Professor Sean Whittaker

Dr Sean Whittaker is a Senior Lecturer in the Faculty of Law at the University of Otago. He earned his LLB (Hons) in Scots Law with First Class honours from the University of Dundee, supported by the Carnegie Trust for the Universities of Scotland. He subsequently obtained an LLM in Environmental Law with Distinction from the University of Dundee and a PhD in Environmental Law from University College Cork, supervised by Professor Áine Ryall and funded by the Irish Research Council Postgraduate Scholarship Programme. Prior to joining Otago, Whittaker lectured at the University of Dundee and served as Executive Director of the Centre for Freedom of Information there. At Otago, he coordinates the Bachelor of Laws with Honours (LLB(Hons)) programme and acts as Pride in Law Otago (PiLO) Faculty Liaison.

Whittaker's research specializations centre on the intersections of environmental law, public law, and law and technology. His work explores procedural rights, the integration of technology into state power, public engagement with the state on environmental matters, freedom of information across public and private bodies, and personal data protection. He teaches components of the Public Law paper and the Information and Data Protection elective. Notable publications include 'Dawn of a new information frontier? Artificial intelligence, the Aarhus Convention, and the right of access to environmental information' co-authored with Duncan Weaver (Law, Innovation & Technology, 2025); 'Developing environmental agents of change within the core legal curriculum' co-authored with Andrea Ross (in Teaching and learning climate and environmental justice in law schools, Routledge, 2026); and 'Study on the active publication of "environmental information" by financing entities: Final report' co-authored with Paul Muller and Thomas Head (European Parliament's Directorate-General for Parliamentary Research Services, 2024). Whittaker has presented keynotes such as 'Information flow in Scotland: A legal perspective' at the Scottish Universities Insight Institute Conference (Glasgow, 2024) and 'Pushing back with passion: The role of anger as a response to environmental projects' at the 11th Frontiers of Environmental Law Colloquium (Tauranga, 2025).