Afshin Akhtar-Khavari is an international law scholar who studies and writes about the ontologies of environmental law, and is interested in legal responses to damage, destruction and extinction. He uses a range of disciplines and approaches to explore how the natural world is socially, culturally, and politically significant for the way that environmental law functions and prioritises itself. His more recent work has been shaped by thinking about recovery and restoration of ecosystems as techniques for dealing with damage but also in helping human beings to develop and train themselves to establish more cooperative relationships with the natural world. He is currently working on a book studying the potential role for the law in helping socio-ecological landscape to flourish.