Rights of Nature, Legal Personality, and Indigenous Philosophies

Abstract

This article investigates the relationship between legal personality for nature and Indigenous philosophies by comparing two cases: the Ecuadorian Constitution of 2008 and the 2014 Te Urewera Act of Aotearoa, New Zealand. Through these case studies the article considers the nature of Indigenous relations with the concept of rights of nature, arguing that this relation is primarily strategic, not genealogical. The article engages with the concept of legal personality and shows that it is not a direct translation of Indigenous conceptions, but rather a potential straitjacket for Indigenous emancipatory politics. The radical character of Indigenous ontologies is not fully reflected in the concept of legal personality. Furthermore, the way in which rights are granted to the natural environment is an important part of the effect that such rights might have on Indigenous communities. Despite some affinities between rights of the environment and Indigenous philosophies, overstating the connection might constrain the radical political and legal implications of Indigenous thought.

Understanding the Rights of Nature

“…I don't mean to imply that in New Zealand a perfect 'inclusion' of Māori thinking has been achieved. I have presented a much more nuanced view of this in Tănăsescu (2020a). Instead, I do want to suggest that those cases cut a new path, one that has much greater potential for much greater inclusion.…”

Innovate or Perish: Food Policy Design in an Indigenous Context in a Post-Pandemic and Climate Adaptation Era

“…A biosociety is defined as an organized set of individuals who base their lives on learning, managing, and experimenting with the biotic resources of a territory. Nature is perceived as a "somebody", so the relationships that are established are ones of respect [52]. As part of the social structure, rules, and behaviours, a biosociety does not differ from a society based on an anthropocentric approach, but it does have the particularity that needs are satisfied based on the knowledge obtained from its interaction with the biodiversity existing in the territory.…”

Double-Faceted Environmental Civil Liability and the Separate-Regulatory Paradigm: An Inspiration for China

“…Take the practice of Ecuador as an example. It is the world's first country to include RoN in its constitution, but the wide variation in outcomes between its extant RoN cases reveals "the problems inherent in a formulation of nature's rights based on a universal subject" [89], and also indicates that for RoN to produce real environmental impact, certain obstacles such as politicization must be overcome first [90] (p. 138). The utility of the RoN approach in remedying environmental damage is further questioned if one considers the constitutional challenges to the regional and local RoN bylaws in the US [88].…”