Dr. Hong Sik Cho is a professor of law teaching and learning environmental Law, Administrative Law, and General Theory of Law and Policy at Seoul National University, School of Law. Before joining SNU faculty in 1997, he was a district court judge from 1989 to 1991. After resigning judgeship to practice law at a law firm, he went to Boalt Hall School of Law, University of California, Berkeley to advance his studies in 1992. After finishing his LL.M and J.S.D degree at Boalt Hall in 1995, he was appointed as the first law professor in Korea to teach environmental law. He is considered the authority on environmental and energy law in Korea. He worked as the Associate Dean in charge of academic affairs and student affairs at SNU, School of Law, as Faculty Director for the Graduate Program in Public Law, and as Associate Director of the American Studies Institute of SNU. He is currently the Chief Director of the Center for Energy and Environmental Law and Policy at SNU. He was elected as the 28th Dean of SNU, College of Law, and 5th Dean of SNU, School of Law. He began his deanship on June 1, 2016. He has been a visiting professor of law at Boalt Hall, Duke Law School, and the University of Tokyo, and a visiting scholar at Boalt Hall and Freiburg University in Germany. He also worked with the Korean government as a member of the Regulatory Reform Subcommittee of the Ministry of Environment of Korea and as a member of Committee on Green Growth, the Sustainable Development Committee, and a few other governmental committees. Since being appointed in May 2020, he has been working as an Ambassador for Environment as well. He is a member of the Seoul Bar and the New York State Bar.
He has published a large number of articles in various prestigious law journals. His books published recently include Democracy and Market Economy (2007), The Justifiability and Limits of Judicial Governance (2010), Climate Change and the Rule of Law (2010), Case Book on Environmental Law (2012), Energy Law and Policy in the Age of Climate Change (2013), Principles of Environmental Law (2nd ed. 2020).