OpenTEAM In-Depth - Rights of Nature by Terra Ethics

Presenter: Nejma Belarbi, Co-Founder, Terra Ethics The recognition of the rights of nature is an emerging and evolving area of the law. We are inspired as communities around the world, both Indigenous and non-Indigenous, assert an important ecological paradigm to pass laws recognizing the inherent rights of ecosystems. Many of the struggles ecosystems experience emerge from their inability to defend their own health in the presence of land ownership rights and the legal personhood status of corporations. Recognising the ecosystems as rights-bearing entities with legal personhood offers a pathway to reconciling current structural disparities. Damaging resource extraction and the subsequent rush to mitigate the harm has also been difficult for our collective conservation efforts. If ecosystems continue to be recognised as right-bearing entities, they gain the opportunity to negotiate from an equal footing allowing them a voice in negotiations. This global movement has been an impo