mr.dr. JA (Jacko) van Ast

Biography

Jacko A. van Ast is researcher at the Department of Public Administration with a special focus on institutional and legal aspects of international water management in multi-disciplinary teams that tackle complex processes of institutional change.

He graduated in Dutch law in 1986 at the Erasmus University of Rotterdam (EUR) with a triple specialisation: civil law, business law and environmental regulation. His Masters thesis about enforcement of environmental policy resulted from an internship at the Environmental Federation of the Province of South-Holland. From 1987 Van Ast joined the staff of the Erasmus Studiecentrum voor Milieukunde (ESM). Teaching concerned (social) environmental science and environmental policy. Research concentrated on institutional and legal aspects of international water management in multi-disciplinary teams that tackle complex processes of institutional change. International projects concerned South African and Polish water law and Dutch-French-German water regulation. As a senior researcher he published on policy aspects of international water and flood management and on various other subjects in environmental science (partly for the Dept. of Economics of Infrastructure, TBM of Delft University of Technology) and developing studies.

Concerning management, Van Ast has been the responsible member for education in the Daily Management Team of the Erasmus Centre for Sustainability and Management (ESM, Faculty of Social Sciences), has lead the Interfacultary Committee for Developing Studies of the EUR and is a member of IHS Academic Board and Examination Committee. Being associate staff at the Institute for Housing and Urban Development Studies (IHS-EUR) he is coordinating the environmental and infrastructure specialisation of the Master on Urban Development (UMD). Furthermore, he is coordinator of the education programme of the pre-master year of For Public Administration (Bestuurskunde). He regularly teaches courses for Public Administration (Introduction to law, Public Law, Dutch Constitutional and Administrative Law) and IHS (Introduction to Environmental Science, Water Policy). As an invited professor Van Ast offered courses at master and bachelor studies in various national and international universities.