Exploring the Earth Law Toolkit with ELC
An exciting new body of law is gaining attention with legislators, activists and legal professionals around the world: Earth law. Earth law takes an ecocentric approach as opposed to a purely anthropocentric one, bringing together diverse legal movements including the legal recognition of Nature’s rights, Indigenous and biocultural rights, the rights of future generations, and the right of humans to a healthy environment, among other legal frameworks.
Earth Law Center (ELC) has been at the center of the Earth law movement from its inception, and provides expert legal advice to governments, activists, litigants and other groups or individuals navigating this relatively new legal ground. In fact, ELC literally wrote the book on Earth law, having recently released the first law school textbook presenting cases and guidance on how to use Earth Law to protect and restore Nature.
To provide an idea of how that work is done, below are some of the key tools and frameworks of Earth law that ELC has helped shape and successfully deployed.
Crafting legislation that codifies Earth law
By writing Earth-centered protections into legal codes, municipalities and regional governments can give Nature a voice within local government and create stronger protections for local ecosystems . However, with a long history of treating Nature as a resource and legislating its use only as it relates to extraction and human benefit, it is not always easy or intuitive to turn from anthropocentric to ecocentric thinking.
This is where ELC’s expertise can be deployed. Most recently, ELC worked with Save the Colorado to draft a legal model that will enable U.S. municipalities to grant rights and protections to local rivers and watersheds and establish local guardianship bodies to protect those rights. Already, several municipalities in Colorado are considering local laws or resolutions that draw from these templates (exciting news soon to follow!).
Molding the models: Creating toolkits, frameworks, guidelines and Nature’s rights declarations
In addition to working on the local or regional level to help codify protections for Nature, ELC has worked on broader reaching, cutting-edge legislation to protect Nature, including co-drafting the Universal Declaration of the Rights of Rivers and launching a standalone website where you can sign on in support, developed with ELC partner International Rivers and others. This declaration serves not only as a legal explanation for the rights of rivers, but as a legislative starting point for governments around the world interested in establishing the rights of rivers within their jurisdiction.
ELC has also played a foundational role in the Rights of Nature movement by creating toolkits and guidelines for those interested in advocating for Nature. For example, Michelle Bender, ELC’s Ocean Campaign Director, has led the creation of various Oceans-related toolkits, such as the Marine Protected Area toolkit and Rights for Coral Reefs toolkit.
ELC’s team of legal experts is writing a new DNA for legal systems around the world based on living in harmony with Nature, and making those legal models replicable and scalable.
Working with Indigenous Peoples to advance both Nature’s rights and Indigenous rights
Much as legal systems provide for guardianships for children or other individuals who cannot adequately represent or advocate for their interests, a key framework of Earth law is the establishment of legal guardianships for Nature. A useful model for this framework comes from New Zealand, which in 1978 granted legal personhood status to the Whanganui River in accordance with Maori beliefs.
While determining “who speaks for Nature” can be challenging, it is clear that it should be an independent body free of government or commercial interest and that it must represent a diversity of viewpoints. The exact guardianship model used can vary widely depending on the local community’s culture, beliefs, and traditions, but creating guardianships is a wonderful opportunity to build an inclusive governing body, and typically includes representation from local Indigenous communities, underrepresented communities, and non-profit and ecosystem protection organizations and local activists.
Advocating for the rights of future generations to a clean and healthy natural environment
In 2019, a district judge in the state of Oaxaca, Mexico, ruled in favor of protecting two of the most contaminated rivers in Mexico, the Atoyac and Salado Rivers. ELC, among others, provided an amicus brief to the court in favor of protection, and was excited to discover that the Court drew from several of the legal arguments presented in the brief, including the argument that both present and future generations have a right to a healthy environment.
Since then, the legal argument that current and future generations have a right to protected, healthy natural environments has gained ground. Most recently, Germany’s highest court ruled in April that the federal government must amend their climate law, drawing up clearer reduction targets for greenhouse gas emissions. The decision came after nine individuals, several of them young people, argued in court that as the climate law stood, it did not do enough to assure their right to a humane future.
The key frameworks outlined here are a few of the ways ELC’s legal experts are using Earth law to advance the protection and rights of Nature. ELC is excited to continue utilizing these tools and developing and advancing Earth law around the world. If you would like to get in touch with ELC’s Earth law experts, email info@earthlaw.org.
