Daniel H. Cole earned his A.B. in philosophy from Occidental College in 1980. He continued his education at the University of Chicago where he earned his A.M. in philosophy in 1981. He earned his J.D. from Northwestern School of Law in 1986 and his J.S.D. and J.S.M. from Stanford Law School in 1996 and 1991, respectively. He began teaching at the Indiana University (IU) Law School in Indianapolis in 1991 and has since held numerous appointments within the School of Law, Department of Political Science, and the O’Neill School of Public and Environmental Affairs. Most notably, he earned the additional, honorary titles of R. Bruce Townsend Professor of Law in 2003 and Robert H. McKinney Professor of Law in 2020.
An award-winning teacher, Cole has taught courses including climate law and policy, environmental law, international environmental law, land use, law and economics, natural resources law, property, and property theory.
Cole is the author of five books and more than 30 law review articles, book chapters, and essays. One of his books, “Instituting Environmental Protection: From Red to Green in Poland”, received the prestigious AAASS/Orbis Polish Book Prize in 1999. Cole is a life member of Clare Hall (College for Advanced Study), Cambridge, and has served as a visiting scholar in the Faculties of Law and Land Economy at the University of Cambridge. In the fall of 2001, Cole was the John S. Lehmann Distinguished Visiting Professor of Law at Washington University in St. Louis.