Sidney Williams

Sidney is an environmental law scholar and educator whose work focuses on decolonial approaches to natural resource governance. Her teaching and research explore the intersections of law, policy, and power—examining how these can both enable and constrain more equitable, place-based relationships between communities and lands.

Currently, Sidney serves as a Legal Fellow with the Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education (ORISE), where she works alongside the U.S. Forest Service to study and advance tribal co-stewardship of public lands. She has also worked with Earthjustice International, First Peoples Worldwide, and the Getches-Wilkinson Center, engaging on Colorado River governance, tribal water rights, and climate displacement. Sidney’s work includes collaboration with Indigenous nations around the world , supporting efforts to strengthen sovereignty and integrate Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK) into legal and policy frameworks.

In the classroom, Sidney blends legal analysis with critical theory, cross-cultural perspectives, and field-based case studies, encouraging students to interrogate dominant narratives and engage with multiple ways of knowing. She has taught undergraduate courses in advanced water policy and natural resource management.

Sidney holds a J.D. from the University of Colorado Law School, an M.Sc. in International Relations from the London School of Economics, and a B.A. from New York University.