Matthew C. Allen is a Senior Research Fellow at the Tulane Institute on Water Resources Law & Policy. Originally from Bogotá, Colombia, via Houston, Texas, he has lived in several Latin American countries and many U.S. states.

He served in the U.S. Navy for eight years prior to law school and was honorably discharged in 2020, having achieved the rate of Gunner’s Mate, First Class (Surface Warfare) and earned two Navy and Marine Corps Achievement Medals, among other personal and unit awards.

Matt earned his B.S. in Political Science with a minor in International Studies, summa cum laude, from Old Dominion University in 2020 while still on active duty. He then earned his J.D. with concentrations in Environmental and Water Law from Texas A&M University in 2023. Most recently, he earned his LL.M in Environmental, Natural Resource, and Energy Law, summa cum laude, from Lewis & Clark College in 2026. He is admitted to the bar in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania in addition to the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania and practiced law in Pennsylvania for two years prior to joining the Institute.

The focus of Matt’s scholarship is on the intersection of international human rights law with international and domestic water governance, comparative natural resources law of Latin America, and transboundary water issues.