Dr. Antonio Gabriel La Viña is a teacher, thinker, lawyer, social entrepreneur, and environmental and human rights advocate. Dean Tony currently serves as the Associate Director for Climate Policy and International Relations of the Manila Observatory. He is the former Dean of the Ateneo School of Government, a position he took in 2006 after eight years at WRI (World Resources Institute). Prior, from 1996-1998, Tony was undersecretary of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources in the Philippines. Tony has been an educator for more than 30 years, starting his career as a philosophy teacher in 1981 as a Jesuit Volunteer in Xavier University, Cagayan de Oro, the Philippines. Subsequently, he taught philosophy in Ateneo de Manila University, Mother of Life Formation Center, and the Holy Apostles Seminary. Tony has also co-taught courses at John Hopkins University, Yale University, and Denver University’s Sturm College of Law. As Dean, he also teaches and lectures at Ateneo’s Schools of Government and Law and Departments of Environmental Science and Political Science. In addition, he also teaches at the University of the Philippines Law Center, De La Salle College of Law, and the Philippine Judicial Academy. Tony is a lead negotiator for the Philippines in the international climate change negotiations under UNFCCC. He played prominent leadership roles in Kyoto in 1997 as the chair of the land use change and forestry negotiations, and in Copenhagen in 2009 where he chaired the Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD+) negotiations. In the Durban Climate Change Conference in December 2011, Tony once again chaired REDD+ negotiations and succeeded in getting 195 countries to agree on how to move forward on finance.Tony currently serves as member of the Board of Directors of several national and international organizations, including the Manila Observatory, Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), Southeast Asia Regional Initiatives for Community Empowerment (SEARICE), Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL), Partnerships in the Environmental Management for the Seas of East Asia, the Institute for Social Entrepreneurship in Asia (ISEA), and Ashoka: Innovators for the Public (Philippines) Inc. Tony has published dozens of textbooks, books, papers and articles on a range of subjects in law and governance, including constitutional law, international and Philippine environmental law, indigenous peoples rights, biodiversity and biotechnology, sustainable agriculture, trade and environment, mining, public ethics, human rights, leadership, local governance, social accountability and social entrepreneurship. His more recen publications includes Philippine Law and Ecology, a textbook on Philippine environmental law.Tony obtained his Masters (LLM) and Doctorate in Law (JSD) from Yale and his first degrees from the University of the Philippines (in law) and the Ateneo de Manila University (in philosophy). He placed third nationally in the 1989 bar examinations. Tony was born and raised in Cagayan de Oro in Mindanao, is married, and has three sons.