Please join us for the virtual launch of Rights of Nature: A Re-examination, edited by Prof Daniel Corrigan and Dr Markku Oksanen. The launch will take place on 7 July 2021 at 9am PDT/12noon EDT/5pm BST/6pm CAT &CEST. You can register in advance for the launch here. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the launch.
About the Book:
Rights of nature is an idea that has come of age. In recent years, a diverse range of countries and jurisdictions have adopted these norms, which involve granting legal rights to nature or natural objects, such as rivers, forests, or ecosystems. This book critically examines the idea of natural objects as right-holders and analyzes legal cases, policies, and philosophical issues relating to this development.
Drawing on contributions from a range of experts in the field, Rights of Nature: A Re-examination investigates the potential for this innovative idea to revolutionize the concepts of rights, standing, and recognition as traditionally understood in many legal systems. Taking as its starting point Stone’s influential 1972 article “Should Trees Have Standing?,” the book examines the progress rights of nature have made since that time, by identifying central themes, unifying principles, and key distinctions in how rights of nature discourse has been operationalized in the disciplines of law, philosophy, and the social sciences. These themes and principles are illustrated through a wide variety of examples, including ecosystem services, indigenous thinking, and ecological restoration, demonstrating how the relationship between humanity and the natural world may be transforming.
Taking a philosophical, political, and legal perspective, this book will be of great interest to students and scholars of environmental law and policy, environmental ethics, and philosophy.
About the Editors:
Daniel P. Corrigan is Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Marymount University. After completing his PhD in philosophy at the University of Miami, he was Arsht Ethics Initiatives Post-Doctoral Associate at the University of Miami Business School. His research focuses on human rights, political and legal philosophy, environmental ethics, and business ethics. He has published on topics such as environmental human rights, business and human rights, and other issues in human rights theory.
Markku Oksanen is Senior Lecturer in philosophy in the department of social sciences at the University of Eastern Finland. After finishing his PhD in philosophy at University of Turku in 1998, Oksanen has been an Academy Research Fellow (2009-14) and Academy Post-Doc Researcher (1999-2002). He also did doctoral studies at Cardiff University (1992-1993) and post-doctoral studies at Lancaster University. Markku’s current research interests include environmental human rights and rights of nature, philosophical aspects of conservation science, philosophy of climate change and the interface of morality and politics in Finnish eduskunta.