Are you an experienced lawyer who wants to use your skills to support environmental campaigns with defensive and proactive legal strategies? Are you ready to work for the planet rather than profit? Then this might be a role for you.
Greenpeace International (GPI) is seeking a Legal Counsel Campaigns to provide independent, campaign-related legal advice and support to GPI, and to advise the independent National and Regional Organisations (NROs) as requested. The role reports to the Senior Legal Counsels Strategic Defence / Strategic Litigation and is likely to focus on food, forests and oil-related campaign issues; this is subject to change.
In this role you will:
- Support or develop and implement strategic litigations for campaigns at the domestic, regional and international levels;
- Conduct legal risk assessments of actions and investigations, advising on how to mitigate risk without compromising campaign impact, and communicating this advice to relevant stakeholders;
- Provide legal support to the Operations Department and the relevant NROs during the unfolding of activities and find opportunities to turn threats into campaigning opportunities;
- Handle campaign-related legal disputes involving GPI or its staff as defendants, including overseeing the development and implementation of legal strategies for defensive litigation;
- Ensuring proper legal representation of GPI and NROs, their staff and volunteers, when facing campaign-related proceedings;
- Support development of strategies that advance fundamental rights conducive to the functioning of a vibrant civil society and the protection of public watchdogs, including freedom of expression & assembly, freedom of association, transparency and accountability of governments and corporations at a systemic level.
For further information about this role, please see the full job description /terms of reference by clicking HERE.
Location
The successful candidate may be based in a country where one of the independent National/Regional Greenpeace organisations (NRO’s) is located. See the locations here. [Please note that we are currently unable to host new staff in a number of NRO's at this present time, due to various restrictions. We are unable to support hosting in the US, in addition to some other NRO locations. The recruitment team may reach out to you to provide an update as necessary, depending on your location].
Job requirements
What we're looking for:
- University degree in law (required)
- Admission and good standing with a bar association that confers attorney-client privilege for advice given by in-house counsel (required)
- Substantial and demonstrable experience working as a professional lawyer (required - ideally at least 5 years), preferably in an international context
- Experience of using law in a campaigning context (preferred)
- Demonstrable knowledge of and experience in one or more of the following fields: international human rights law, criminal law, law of the sea, international environmental law (required)
- Experience in civil, administrative and/or criminal litigation (required), with experience in corporate accountability, climate litigation and/or biodiversity litigation being highly desirable
- Experience in freedom of expression and freedom of peaceful assembly litigation (preferred)
- Ability to develop, implement and manage complex projects and to guide legal project teams
- Outstanding influencing skills, plus strong negotiation, conflict resolution, communication and presentation skills
- Ability to communicate complex legal issues, tailored to targeted audiences
- Strong skills in capacity-building, training and knowledge transfer
- Analytical skills and digital literacy
- Proficient written and spoken English (required), with knowledge/proficiency in additional languages preferred
- Ability to work under pressure, with the flexibility to work with colleagues across multiple time zones and to travel internationally if required
- Demonstrable support for and belief in Greenpeace’s core aims and values.