Sistema Regional de Información
en línea para Revistas Científicas de América Latina,
el Caribe, España y Portugal

Last years’ constitutional, legal and jurisprudential experiences point to two paths into the recognition of Rights of Nature in Latin America. This work collects the key features of this process which is over a decade old. First, the path pursued by Ecuador’s Constitution and Bolivian legislation is developed which recognise the rights of nature; in consequence, national, provincial and local law bills were issued across the countries of the region. Second, some cases that recognise rights to certain ecosystems using arguments that revisit the law in an ecocentric way are dealt with. Our thesis holds that this expanding process of rights implies democratization and an ontological pluralisation[1] of environmental justice since it brings back knowledge and practices absent in this field; it establishes new figures such as river guardians and it stops the North-South knowledge and legal tools unidirectional production adding worlds where the institution is not exclusively human. [1] MARISOL DE LA CADENA. “Cosmopolítica indígena en los Andes: reflexiones conceptuales más allá de la «política»”, en Tabula Rasa, núm. 33, 2020, p. 273-311.  

In 2018, the Colombian Supreme Court bestowed rights to the Amazon Region. The growing climate change risks brought the Court to rule this way. The ruling relied on international environmental law, comparative law, and national policies. The discussion of Rights of Nature is not new; various States have relied on this practice to strengthen environmental protection. Constitutional provisions, legal acts and courts’ decisions are the source chosen by States to entitle the environment with rights. Remarkably, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights already identified how rights of nature are applied in certain American States, raising this discussion to international environmental law. The Colombian Court award may cause further discussions: first, it will allow rights of nature as an alternative in environmental litigation processes, included climate ones. Second, concerning international environmental law, it may contribute to the idea of constituting a regional state practice on rights of nature recognition.

Este trabajo apunta a examinar los estándares nacionales sobre la participación ambiental y su  compatibilidad con aquellos provenientes del Acuerdo de Escazú. Nuestra visión entiende que, a pesar de los avances realizados en el orden jurídico nacional, estos estándares deben ser actualizados a la luz de los desarrollos recientes reflejados en el Acuerdo de Escazú. El análisis involucra no solamente el orden jurídico positivo sino también la interpretación que han realizado tanto la Corte Suprema como los Tribunales Ambientales en Chile.

Spanish citizens proposed a law that recognizes the legal personality of the Mar Menor lagoon and its basin and endows this valuable ecosystem with its own rights, based on the serious ecological damage it has suffered, the ineffectiveness of the existing legal regulations, and the empowerment of civil society to make participation in environmental matters effective. The new paradigm of the rights of nature opens a legal stage of universal scope, founded on Ecological Justice and the Earth Jurisprudence, which will condition the dogmatic development of the new legislative proposal. The development of the ILP is an expresión of the international movement in defense of the rights of nature in Spain, initiated in the six continents and which is advancing unstoppably. In this article we study the fiction of the recognition of the legal personality of the Mar Menor and its basin, as a presupposition for legal capacity and capacity to act. In the legal capacity we expose the charter of rights of the lagoon ecosystem and in the capacity to act, the defense of such rights. To confer legal personality and own rights to the Mar Menor can enforce the new ecocentric vision of prioritizing the value and defense of the ecosystems of which we are part.

In February 2021, the Magpie River, also known as Mutehekau Shipu in the Innu language, was legally recognised as a living entity with rights by the Innu Council of Ekuanitshit and the Regional County of Minganie in Côte-Nord, Quebec, Canada. This river plays an integral role in the Innu Indigenous community, and its recognition as a legal person affirms the long-standing biocultural rights that exist between the river and the original people. For the first time in Canada, the introduction of the rights of Nature affirms the importance of Innu cosmology in the Canadian legal context. This paper first explores the path taken to recognise the legal personality and rights of the Magpie River, including the potential effects of this designation. Second, it assesses the dynamics of the legal orders at play and demonstrates how recognition challenges anthropocentric colonial paradigms. Third, we analyse how Canada's legal structure enables a dynamic approach between different legal orders that can give life to new models of nature preservation for generations to come.

The 2030 Agenda and the Paris Agreement, both approved in 2015, have promoted a multitude of programs within the European Union, with the corresponding internal effect on the policies of the Member States. In this context, it seems clear that the European Union has assumed a leading role on an international scale by setting ambitious goals. These initiatives have reached an unusual level that leads us to a new regulatory framework in the environmental field and, specifically, in the field of waste. In this new designed cycle of action, the proper management of forest residues has acquired greater relevance and a gradual role in policies against climate change. In this study, the recent policies of sustainable forest management and recovery of forest residues are analyzed, and their impact on relevant current issues such as climate neutrality and the bioeconomy.

Environmental Law has had a long, arduous journey in India, but has been able to keep up with the many changes that have taken place, around the globe, and has helped shape India’s environmental legal regime. By tracing the growth of environmental law, through different ages, and by highlighting some of those factors which have contributed immensely to its growth, the idea is to identify certain false grounds and figure out ways to make environmental law more effective. By looking at it through a socio-cultural lens, the aim is to examine as to whether culture, tradition and rituals can be imbibed into law or given a legal recognition, and thereby giving more power to law. The development of Earth Jurisprudence principles and the way in which it is sought to be imbibed in India and the challenges that it faces too are discussed.

This paper introduces some of the main concepts and findings of a research study concluded in 2020 for the European Economic and Social Committee on the introduction of an EU Charter for the Fundamental Rights of Nature as a core foundational piece of the EU legislative framework. In that study we introduced new legal concepts designed to implement the principles of Earth Jurisprudence within a modern legal context through reframing how rights are construed and held in society. Since publication, there have been other papers written criticising a rights of Nature approach within the EU context - largely based on assumptions derived from existing rights of nature legislation in other parts of the world, rather than the specifics of our proposal. This paper will summarise the main points and proposals of the Study and address some of the main points raised by the critics.  

Perspectiva del derecho del medio ambiente y de las políticas ambientales de la Unión Europea (Primer semestre 2022)

Legislación básica de protección del medio ambiente (Primer Semestre 2022)