"When I use the term 'rights' I mean the freedom of people to fulfill their destiny, their responsibility and their basic nature, and by analogy, that other natural entities also have the right to fulfill their role within the Earth community."
Thomas Berry
Cultural historian, philosopher, cosmologist, and Earth advocate Thomas Berry is widely considered the father of the current burgeoning natural rights movement. In his writings and books (see Great work. Malvern 2021) repeatedly pointed out that today's legal and political systems legitimize and encourage the exploitation of the Earth. He emphasized the importance of redefining our ideas about law and public administration and creating a basis for the development of laws and political institutions that will strengthen mutually beneficial relationships between humans and the rest of the Earth's community.
Berry called for this process at a conference at the Arlie Center in Virginia in April 2001, convened for this purpose by the London-based Gaia Foundation, which brought together deep-sea ecologists, lawyers, and Earth advocates, including South African lawyer Cormac Cullinan. At this meeting, Thomas Berry gave his seminal paper "The Origin, Differentiation and Role of Rights" (“The Origin, Distinction, and Role of Rights”), in which he placed governance and human rights in a new context. In it, he formulated ten new principles for understanding rights. Most important is his claim that rights do not originate in or belong exclusively to the human sphere. “Rights arise where existence arises.” The natural world derives its rights from the same source as humans: the universe that brought it into existence. It follows that human rights are a subset of the constellation of rights that belongs to every member of the earthly community; in other words, the rights of members of the earthly community are indivisible.
With these ideas, Thomas Berry laid the foundation for the philosophy of the new Earth Jurisprudence, which was subsequently developed by South African environmental lawyer Cormac Cullinan in his book Wild Law (Wild Law, 2002), Australian lawyers Peter D. Burdon and Michelle Melonyová and numerous others; this new legal philosophy has also been embodied in a broad global people's movement for the rights of nature - in the Universal Declaration of the Rights of Mother Earth, the activities of the Global Alliance for the Rights of Nature and other activities. Translation: Jiří Zemánek
- Rights arise where existence arises. What determines existence determines rights.
- Because the universe in the phenomenal order has no other context of existence, it is self-referential in its being and self-normative in its action. It is also the primary frame of reference for the being and action of all derived modes of being.
- The universe is a community of subjects, not a collection of objects. As subjects, the parts of the universe are capable of having rights.
- The natural world on planet Earth derives its rights from the same source as humans, namely from the universe that brought it into being.
- Every part of the earthly community has three rights: the right to be, the right to a home, and the right to fulfill one's role in the ever-renewing process of the earthly community.
- All rights are species-specific and limited. Rivers have river rights. Birds have bird rights. Insects have insect rights. Humans have human rights. The difference in rights is qualitative, not quantitative. Insect rights would be of no use to a tree or a fish.
- Human rights do not infringe on the rights of other modes of being to exist in their natural state. Human property rights are not absolute. Property rights simply represent a special relationship between a particular human "owner" and a particular piece of "property" for the benefit of both.
- Species exist as individuals and as groups – herds, flocks, schools of fish, and so on. Rights apply to individuals and groups, not just to species in general.
- These rights, as presented here, establish the relationships that the various components of the Earth have with one another. Planet Earth is one community, bound together by interdependent relationships. Each component of the Earth community is directly or indirectly dependent on every other member of the community for the nourishment and assistance it needs for its own survival. This mutual nourishment, which includes a predator-prey relationship, is an integral part of the role that each component of the Earth plays within the complex community of existence.
- In a special way, humans have not only a need but also a right to access the natural world, not only to satisfy their physical needs, but also to provide them with the wonder that human intelligence needs, the beauty that human imagination needs, and the intimacy that our human feelings need.
