Anneke Smit

Director, Centre for Cities
Associate Professor

Anneke Smit is Associate Professor, and the founder and inaugural Director of the Centre for Cities (C4C) at Windsor Law.  

Prior to joining Windsor Law, Dr. Smit held a Lectureship at the School of Law, University of Reading (UK).  She holds a PhD from the University of Reading, an LLB from McGill University, and a Bachelor of Music from the University of Alberta.  She has held visiting positions at Oxford University;  the Université d'Aix-Marseille; and the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam. 

At the core of Dr. Smit's research and teaching is a long-standing interest in spatial justice and the intersection of people and place.  This includes a deep interest in municipal law and policy, land use planning (including expropriation), and property law.  Public Interest, Private Property: Law and Planning Policy in Canada (UBC Press, 2016, co-edited with M. Valiante), continues to be required reading for both law and planning courses in numerous Canadian universities.    

Through the Centre for Cities, Dr. Smit's focus has honed in on the legal and policy tools related to equitable and sustainable city-building.  Under Dr. Smit's leadership, and with a team of 15 affiliated faculty members, several visiting scholars and a team of student research associates, C4C takes a creative, interdisciplinary, collaborative and outcome-focussed approach to addressing the "wicked" global problems of our time at the local level. States of Emergency: Democracy and participatory governance in Canadian municipalities during COVID-19 (Centre for Cities, 2020), was co-authored with several current and former C4C Student Research Associates and received wide media coverage.  

Dr. Smit has a proven record of creating and attaining external funding for, and successfully implementing, innovative citybuilding research and teaching projects with a wide range of public and private sector partners.  These include the Cities and Climate Action Policy Clinic (Environment and Climate Change Canada Climate Action Fund, $125,000, 2019), the McDougall Street Corridor equitable placemaking project (FedDev Canada My Main Street Community Activator Fund, $250,000, 2022, with the Essex County Black Historical Research Society, Parallel 42 Systems and other community/campus partners), and most recently the National Urban Park Hub (NUPH) (Parks Canada, $1.2 million, 2023, with Dr. Catherine Febria and Professor Clint Jacobs).  

Dr. Smit's interest in people and place has also fostered a long engagement with both domestic and global refugee law and policy, including work with government, intergovernmental and non-governmental organisations in Canada, the Balkans and the South Caucasus.  She has been engaged as external consultant with organizations and projects including the Jerusalem Old City Initiative (JOCI) and UNHCR Europe.

Dr. Smit was one of four founding members of the national Scholars at Risk Canada steering committee, on which she served two terms (2016-2020).  In 2015 she established the Windsor-Essex chapter of the Refugee Sponsorship Support Programme (Refugee SSP) from 2016-18. 

She is a regular commentator in English and French-language media. 

She has been the recipient of numerous awards including the Windsor Law Students Law Society (SLS) Faculty Award, the University of Windsor Alumni Association Excellence in Mentoring Awardthe Windsor-Essex Local Immigration Partnership Welcoming Communities Award, the University of Windsor Humanities Research Group Fellowship, and the Government of Canada Peacekeeping Medal for civilian service in Kosovo.

Dr. Smit is currently teaching Property Law (Fall 2023, single JD and Dual Canadian and American JD), and the Cities and Climate Action Policy Clinic (CCAPC) (Winter 2024).  Inquiries from students about potential Master of Laws (LLM) supervision, research assistantships, and applications to CCAPC are welcome at asmit@uwindsor.ca.