Inter-Earth Rights

Abstract

This work aims to give a rudimentary introduction to the concept of 'Inter-Earth Rights', a term used to indicate an inclusive system of justice for all members of and including, the Earth itself. It explores the linkages and interactions between the rights and interests of these stakeholders by highlighting specific examples of how they have been captured and protected in legal systems around the globe. It will conclude that these laws and legal efforts are critical to transforming our society and ensuring a future for all members of our natural world.

It will explore how the concept of ‘separateness’ has defined our legal institutions and society and led to the status quo - a society based on division, control, oppression and injustice. More urgently, however, is how it has placed our very existence under threat - with the reality of mass extinction, global pandemic and an environmental crisis.

Our man-made legal papers guarantee members of the human family certain fundamental rights, based on our inherent dignity. One example of such basic guaranteed right, is the right to environment - frequently captured in international agreements or domestic legislation around the world. The provision itself usually includes concepts such as 'sustainability', and a promise not only for environmental benefits for the present generation - but for future generations too.

Yet, these provisions also come with a number of underlying assumptions, such as that this 'environment' - composed of sentient nonhuman animals and nature - are simply natural resources. As such, they may be exploited, or their use, justified, in the name of development or some other anthropocentric aim. Value is generally attributed based solely on economic considerations, with intrinsic or ecological worth, excluded.

Positively, these assumptions are being challenged and transformed, in a tangible way. The traditional boundaries of law have extended in recent years beyond mere consideration of the relationships among human animals and human-centric approaches - to those recognizing nonhuman animals and nature as living entities, worthy of legal protection in their own right.

Accordingly, while the work of lawyers may have conventionally focused on the relationships among legal subjects – including human animals or even their corporate interests, gradually, it is expanding to include (those traditionally accepted as) legal subjects. However, even with the similarities between these human rights, animal rights and Earth rights-based approaches, efforts remain largely fragmented, disconnected and even opposed. Thus emerges the necessity to connect and integrate this trinity of protections through the concept Inter-Earth Rights.

Keywords: inter-earth rights, justice, animal rights, human rights, earth rights, rights of nature, law