Wouldn't You Say? - Saving the Economy Means Not Saving Nature
At the risk of expediting the die-off of most life on the…
Blogs, Rights of Nature
Important Updates
At the risk of expediting the die-off of most life on the…
Blogs, Rights of Nature
A new system of law based on respect for Nature and the…
Issues, News, Resources, Rights of Nature
Protecting Water and Life: Frontline Stories from Ohioans fighting corporate and state…
Publications
Apr 13, 2015
Just over a year ago, the International Tribunal for the Rights of Nature and Mother Earth sat for the first time in Quito, Ecuador. Here, Michelle Maoney of the Australian Earth Laws Alliance shares the powerful, alternative narrative that emerged from the Tribunal, whereby Rights of Nature are recognized, codified, and enforced.
Read More | UncategorizedFeb 16, 2014
CELDF, a founding member of the Global Alliance for the Rights of Nature, joined in an international gathering hosted by the Alliance in Octavalo, Ecuador, in January. Read more here.
Read More | UncategorizedDec 6, 2013
CELDF partner, Fundacion Pachamama, was shut down this week by the Ecuadorian government. Learn more on how you can help.
Read More | UncategorizedAug 5, 2013
Community Rights and the Rights of Nature are changing our western legal paradigm, and are tools to protect Santa Barbara, CA, from fracking.
Read More | Community Wires, In The NewsMar 14, 2013
Santa Monica City Council introduces California’s first community rights ordinance, recognizing the right to self-governance, clean air and water, sustainable food and energy systems, and the rights of nature.
Read More | UncategorizedFeb 10, 2013
Slideshow Narrated by Thomas Linzey
Read More | UncategorizedJan 21, 2013
Presentation by Dr. Stephen Cleghorn, a sociologist and an organic farmer from Jefferson County, PA, and was recorded at the Epic No Frack Event at Ithaca College.
Read More | UncategorizedJun 19, 2012
The Global Alliance for the Rights of Nature is….calling for global recognition and acceptance of Rights of Nature. They say an essential step for achieving this is to introduce a system of jurisprudence that sees and treats Nature as a fundamental, rights bearing entity and not as mere property to be exploited at will.
Read More | UncategorizedAug 5, 2011
CELDF Projects Director Ben Prices talks with Simon Kaiwai of New Zealand, sharing knowledge of how communities have overcome such things as fracking, mining, water rights, human rights, GE, GMO, corporate personhood and unwanted state plans for their local environment.
Read More | UncategorizedMay 3, 2011
The Rights of Nature, The Case for a Universal Declaration on the Rights of Mother Earth. Co-produced by Global Exchange, the Council of Canadians, The Pachamama Alliance, and Fundación Pachamama.
Read More | UncategorizedMay 3, 2011
Rights of Nature panel at Global Alliance for Rights of Nature, San Francisco.
Read More | UncategorizedSep 28, 2008
By an overwhelming margin, the people of Ecuador today voted for a new constitution that is the first in the world to recognize legally enforceable Rights of Nature, or ecosystem rights.
Read More | Community Wires, Press Releases & Blogs, Success StorySep 10, 2021
A new ordinance seeks to place a Climate Bill of Rights on the 2022 ballot, which explicitly challenges North Carolina’s infamous state preemption scheme and privileges afforded private corporations.
Read More | Blogs, Community Wires, Corporate 'Rights', Extraction & Pollution, News, Rights of NatureMay 28, 2021
On May 28, 2021, CELDF’s Lindsey Schromen-Wawrin joined Rebecca Tsosie (constitutional and Indigenous law scholar of Yaqui descent and regents professor of law at the University of Arizona) and Carol Van Strum (Lincoln County Community Rights) on the nationally syndicated Climate One podcast.
Read More | In The News, NewsSep 10, 2019
An analysis of Rights of Nature laws as a path forward to protecting ecosystems in the face of continuing environmental harms.
Read More | Community Wires, In The NewsJul 10, 2019
Jun 26, 2019
Community Rights and Rights of Nature continue to grow in Ohio as Williams County residents submit their citizen initiative to protect themselves from corporate water withdrawals.
Read More | Community Wires, News, Press Releases, Success StoryAug 7, 2018
Toledo, OH, community members submit petitions to place a Lake Erie Bill of Rights citizen initiative on the November ballot. The measure recognizes the right of Lake Erie to exist and flourish, protecting it from major pollutors.
Read More | Community Wires, In The News, Success StoryMay 23, 2018
As the recognition of Rights of Nature grows globally, we must move beyond thinking of nature as having legal personhood rights. We must recognize rights of ecosystems to existence, regeneration and restoration.
Read More | Community Wires, In The NewsMay 14, 2018
Check out the stories being submitted as evidence this week at the international Permanent People’s Tribunal, where the PPT is considering fracking, climate change, and the violation of the rights of people and nature.
Read More | In The NewsJun 30, 2016
In Medina County, OH, residents gather over 6,500 signatures, qualifying for the November ballot a Community Rights County Charter banning fracking activities. They join six other Ohio cities and counties advancing similar measures.
Read More | Community Wires, In The NewsJun 5, 2016
Portage County, OH, residents gather signatures to place a Community Rights County Charter on the November ballot to ban fracking activities. Residents are advancing rights to protect themselves from the oil and gas industry.
Read More | Community Wires, In The NewsJan 16, 2014
At the Global Rights of Nature Summit in Otavalo, Ecuador, CELDF representatives and other organizations gather to call for the advancement of the Rights of Nature to protect the planet.
Read More | In The NewsApr 22, 2011
Considering the rights of ecosystems dates to 1972 with Christopher Stone, and has evolved today to local laws establishing Rights of Nature as a means to protect against destructive activities.
Read More | In The NewsJan 25, 2011
Why 1 in 3 Children is Chronically Ill, and Wild Weather and Media Silence on Climate Connections.
Read More | UncategorizedDec 5, 2010
Sep 28, 2008
Ecuador makes history with the people’s adoption of a new Constitution recognizing the Rights of Nature to exist and flourish.
Read More | Community Wires, In The NewsJan 19, 2023
At the risk of expediting the die-off of most life on the planet, including most humans, judges continue to turn a blind eye toward the rights of natural communities – where humans live in harmony with their environment – while giving full-throated support for legal rights vested in corporate property.
Read More | Blogs, Rights of NatureJan 5, 2023
We must think about our history- the Revolutionaries were proposing an alternative to being a colony of England, abolitionists were fighting for an alternative to slavery, the suffragists for an alternative to patriarchy and on and on.
Read More | Blogs, Democratic RightsDec 10, 2022
Mangroves, according to the Ramsar definition, are considered wetlands – an area that CELDF is also helping to evolve coming out of the Declaration of the Rights of Wetlands.
Read More | Community Rights, Extraction & Pollution, In The News, Rights of NatureNov 16, 2022
Human and ecosystem viability come when we figure out how to orient our culture to be connected to all four parts: Living from, with, in, and as Nature.
Read More | News, Rights of NatureNov 8, 2022
Lakota advocate and water protector Debra White Plume (Wioweya Najin Wina), upon being introduced to the history of municipal subjugation in the United States during a Democracy School hosted by residents of the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota, remarked that “municipalities are the white man’s reservations. The only difference is, we know we’re on reservations.”
Read More | Blogs, Community Rights, Democratic Rights, In The News, Rights of NatureSep 28, 2022
We at CELDF want to recognize and celebrate the 14-year anniversary of this historic date when the country of Ecuador codified Rights of Pachamama into their national Constitution.
Read More | In The News, News, Rights of NatureSep 12, 2022
You wouldn’t think, in a rational society, that anyone would have to be told this, but reality doesn’t care what anybody believes is true; it just is. And what isn’t, isn’t.
Read More | Blogs, In The News, Issues, News, Rights of NatureJul 6, 2022
CELDF’s Ben Price wrote this article, featured in Truthout, about a mining corporation’s scam plan, pushed as an environmentally friendly investment opportunity.
Read More | In The News, News, Rights of NatureMar 16, 2022
CELDF’s Tish O’Dell is speaking on Panel #4, “Contamination of Water.” This Panel will take place on Friday, March 25 from 11:40 AM – 12:45 PM.
Terry Lodge, activist attorney with CELDF, is speaking on Panel #2, “Contamination of Land.” This panel will take place on Thursday, March 24 from 11:50 AM – 12:55 PM
American University Washington College of Law’s Program on Environmental and Energy Law and Sustainable Development Law & Policy Brief, in association with the Animal Law Society, Energy Law & Policy Society, Environmental Law Society, and Native American Law Students Association are excited to host this year’s annual Symposium, “Lucrative Losses & Poisonous Profits: An Overview of the Domestic and Global Exploitation of Nature and the Way Forward” over Zoom from 10 AM – 1 PM on March 24 and 25, 2022. Over the course of four panels—activists, professors, legal and policy experts, climate scientists, and professors will discuss the international and domestic contamination and overuse of water and land from modern environmental law, indigenous, and rights of nature perspectives. The panelists will explore the devastating impacts of some of nature’s biggest threats, including pollution, deforestation, and industrial fishing.
Read More | Chemical Trespass, Corporate 'Rights', Events, Extraction & Pollution, News, Rights of Nature, Water PrivitizationMar 2, 2022
The bill paves the way for litigation against polluters on behalf of the ecosystem Press ReleaseThursday, February 24th, 2022 NYS Assemblymember Patrick B. Burke Office Contact: Brendan Keany, Communications Director716-608-6099 | keanyb@nyassembly.gov CELDF Contacts: Tish O’Dell, Organizer440-552-6774 tish@celdf.org Ben Price, Organizer717-254-3233 benprice@celdf.org Buffalo, NY – New York State Assemblyman Patrick Burke has introduced legislation… Read more »
Read More | Press ReleasesFeb 14, 2022
“The Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund (CELDF) is helping build a decolonial movement for Community Rights and the Rights of Nature to advance democratic, economic, social, and environmental rights – building upward from the grassroots to the state, federal, and international levels.”
Read More | Press ReleasesAug 24, 2021
The General Synod of the United Church of Christ has become the first mainline Protestant body to publicly proclaim that nature has rights.
Read More | Community Wires, In The News, News, Rights of Nature, Success StoryJul 15, 2021
The Court of Appeals of the State of Oregon issued a one-page decision in late June upholding a trial court decision overriding the will of voters and siding with corporate timber. The court has allowed for the continued use of aerially sprayed pesticides.
Read More | News, Press ReleasesJul 8, 2021
Petitioners in Reading, Pennsylvania have officially kicked off a campaign to amend the Reading City Charter to outlaw “toxic trespass,” the poisoning of people and the environment within the city. The ballot initiative is in response to unaddressed toxic waste and environmental racism in the post-industrial city.
Read More | Chemical Trespass, News, Press ReleasesJun 3, 2021
Toledo residents in a lawsuit to enforce the Lake Erie Bill of Rights (LEBOR) filed a memorandum of opposition to the State of Ohio’s motion for summary judgment in their case. Last August, after the trial court granted the State of Ohio’s motion to dismiss, the plaintiffs presented oral arguments in the Ohio Sixth District Court of Appeals to enforce LEBOR.
Read More | Corporate Agriculture, Democratic Rights, News, Press Releases, Rights of NatureMay 5, 2021
By Barbara Peterson Nottingham, New Hampshire is fighting for a clean and healthy community Energy democracy works for local control of our energy sources. The global movement for energy democracy works with communities for local control of renewable sources of energy to help ensure equity, reliability, availability, and affordability. As stated by Denise Fairchild and… Read more »
Read More | Blogs, NewsFeb 21, 2021
CELDF officially endorsed a proposal for a Universal Declaration of the Rights of Wetlands, organized by lawyers and scientists with the Society of Wetland Scientists’ Rights of Wetlands and Climate Change and Wetlands initiatives. The group is planning to share the Declaration with the 171 signatory countries of the Convention on Wetlands (Ramsar Convention), and inviting them to work with others to move toward a framework that ensures the rights of wetlands are understood, respected, and upheld.
Read More | Issues, Press Releases, Rights of NatureDec 26, 2020
Virginia joins the growing network of state Community Rights Networks.
Read More | Blogs, Community Rights, News, Rights of NatureDec 21, 2020
A group of authors organized through the Society of Wetland Scientists have developed a proposal for a Universal Declaration of the Rights of Wetlands. CELDF is excited to endorse the efforts as a step toward recognizing and enforcing the rights of wetlands.
Read More | News, Press Releases & Blogs, Rights of NatureDec 2, 2020
Save the Date! Join the Oregon Community Rights Network in this upcoming event on corporate constitutional rights.
Read More | Community Wires, EventsOct 9, 2020
Plaintiffs from seven Ohio counties, representing Rights of Nature and corporate control ballot measures, sued the Ohio Secretary of State and Boards of Election officials in trial court for repeatedly keeping binding citizen-proposed laws and charters off the ballot. Several national organizations have filed amicus briefs in support of the appeal.
Read More | Press Releases, Press Releases & BlogsOct 5, 2020
A new documentary, “THE PEOPLE vs. AGENT ORANGE”, follows the primary component of the notorious chemical Agent Orange. The film follows resistance in the United States, France, and Vietnam, and features Carol Van Strum, an active participant in Community Rights and Rights of Nature organizing in Oregon. Join the premiere virtually for Oregon audiences at the Eugene Environmental Film Festival, October 2-11. It will be available on PBS in April 2021.
Read More | Community Wires, Press Releases & Blogs