Education
LL.M., George Washington University, 1986
J.D., University of Virginia, 1982

Ph.D., Southern Illinois University, 2006
B.A. with High Honors, University of Virginia, 1979

J.B. Ruhl is the Matthews & Hawkins Professor of Property at Florida State Law, where he teaches courses on environmental law, land use and property. Prior to joining the Florida State Law faculty in 1999, Professor Ruhl taught at Southern Illinois University in Carbondale, Illinois (1994-98), and at the George Washington University Law School (1998-99). He served as Visiting Professor of Law at Harvard Law School in spring 2008 and has also visited for summer teaching at Vermont Law School, the University of Texas School of Law, and Lewis & Clark College of Law.

Professor Ruhl is a nationally regarded expert in the fields of endangered species protection, ecosystem services policy, regulation of wetlands, ecosystem management, environmental impact analysis and related environmental and natural resources fields. His extensive publications in these fields include recent articles in the Stanford Law Review, Georgetown Law Review, Minnesota Law Review, George Washington Law Review, Washington University Law Review, Boston University Law Review, Environmental Law and Ecology Law Quarterly, several of which have been selected by a national peer review committee as one of the 10 best law review articles in environmental law published during the year of their respective releases. He is a co-author of two casebooks, The Law of Biodiversity and Ecosystem Management (Foundation Press, 2nd ed. 2006), which is the first casebook to organize environmental law under these emerging themes, and the Practice and Policy of Environmental Law (Foundation Press 2008), which is the only environmental law casebook incorporating a practice context focus. He also recently published The Law and Policy of Ecosystem Services (Island Press 2007).

Professor Ruhl has served as the Executive Editor of the American Bar Association's environmental, natural resources and energy law quarterly, Natural Resources & Environment, and as the Publications Officer of ABA's Section of Environmental, Energy, and Resources Law. He is a frequent lecturer and presenter, most recently at the law schools of New York University, Georgetown University, Stanford University, the University of Minnesota, the University of Florida, the University of Kansas, the University of Nebraska, Notre Dame, Duke University, University College Cork (Ireland), and Indiana University-Bloomington.

Prior to entering full-time law teaching, Professor Ruhl was a partner in the law firm of Fulbright & Jaworski, L.L.P., practicing environmental and natural resources law in the firm's Austin, Texas, office. He was also an Adjunct Professor of environmental law with the University of Texas School of Law from 1991-94.

Professor Ruhl received his B.A. (1979) and J.D. (1982) degrees from the University of Virginia, his LL.M. (1986) in Environmental Law from the George Washington University Law School, and a Ph.D. (2006) in Geography from Southern Illinois University. He is an elected member of The American Law Institute.