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Earth Law: Emerging Ecocentric Law--A Guide for Practitioners, Second Edition

Authors
  • Grant Wilson
  • Rachelle Adam
  • Herman F. Greene
  • Missy Lahren
Series / Aspen Coursebook Series
Teaching Materials
NO
Description
Table of contents
Preface

Buy a new version of this textbook and receive access to the Connected eBook on Casebook Connect, including academic lifetime access to the online ebook with highlight, annotation, and search capabilities. Access also includes an outline tool and other helpful resources. Connected eBooks provide what you need most to be successful in your law school classes.

The second edition of Earth Law: Emerging Ecocentric Law—A Guide for Practitioners thoroughly expands and updates the world’s leading coursebook on Earth law, the rapidly emerging body of ecocentric law that seeks to recognize Nature’s intrinsic value and rights and advances other innovative legal approaches to living in harmony with the Earth.

Earth Law is for students, practicing lawyers, community advocates, and policymakers who seek to preserve a habitable planet and question whether current environmental law is sufficient for the task. Through explorations of constitutional, statutory, common law, and customary law, this book covers the many ways that Nature and human environmental rights can have seats at the table of law—in courts, legislatures, administrative bodies, enforcement agencies, and civil society. This comprehensively updated second edition includes recent landmark Rights of Nature legislative wins such as legal guardianship for Spain’s Mar Manor and Panama’s national Rights of Nature law, crucial court cases including the one for the rights of Peru’s Marañón River, Indigenous-ledlegal initiatives recognizing Nature as a rights-holder and kin, international court cases supporting the rights of future generations and Nature, and many more.

A groundbreaking and unique coursebook, Earth Law provides:

  • Thorough and up-to-date explorations of critical topics such as rights of future generations, atmospheric trust litigation, the public trust doctrine, ecocide, the climate necessity defense, Indigenous Earth law, bioregional governance, and Rights of Nature laws in their many forms 
  • Expansive examination of the settings in which Earth law is developing and the principles of Earth jurisprudence on which it is based 
  • Practical and theoretical foundations for developing systems of ecological governance and the ethical responsibilities of lawyers, individually and collectively
  • Accumulated knowledge, experience, and perspectives of dozens of lawyers, researchers, and advocates active in the field 

The updated second edition includes: 

  • Nine brand-new chapters, including ones with specific geographical focuses, broader concepts in Earth law, and movement lawyering
  • All chapters heavily revised with the most critical information on novel applications of Earth law in various frameworks, including Indigenous-led Rights of Nature campaigns, national and international legal campaigns, and more
  • Case excerpts and analysis from the many crucial developments that have occurred since the publication of the first edition 
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Table of contents

SUMMARY OF CONTENTS


Contents 
Acknowledgments 
Preface 
Foreword 


INTRODUCTION 
SECTION I
THE EMERGENCE OF EARTH LAW 
CHAPTER 1
Modern Environmental Law 
CHAPTER 2
The Origins of Earth Law 
CHAPTER 3
Conceptual Frameworks of Earth Law 
SECTION II
NATURE’S RIGHTS AND PERSONHOOD 
CHAPTER 4
Rights of Nature in the United States 
CHAPTER 5
Indigenous Earth Law: Turtle Island and Beyond 
CHAPTER 6
Ecuador: Constitutional Rights of Nature 
CHAPTER 7
Panama and Bolivia: National Rights of Nature 
CHAPTER 8
Nature’s Rights in Colombia and Peru: An Emerging Jurisprudence 
CHAPTER 9
South Asia: Rights of Nature in India and Bangladesh 
CHAPTER 10
Earth Law in Europe 
CHAPTER 11
Earth Law in Africa 
CHAPTER 12
Aotearoa New Zealand: Māori Worldviews in Law 
SECTION III
RIGHTS OF FUTURE GENERATIONS 
CHAPTER 13
The Public Trust Doctrine and Atmospheric Trust Litigation 
CHAPTER 14
Rights of Future Generations 
SECTION IV
EXPANDING RIGHTS FOR ALL BEINGS 
CHAPTER 15
Human Rights and Rights of Nature 
CHAPTER 16
Animal Rights and Rights of Nature 
SECTION V
INTERNATIONAL EARTH LAW 393
CHAPTER 17
The United Nations and International Law: From Sustainable Development to Harmony with Nature and Beyond 
CHAPTER 18
Ecocide as a Crime 
CHAPTER 19
Ocean Governance and Earth Law in the Twenty-First Century 
SECTION VI
ECOCENTRIC GOVERNANCE 
CHAPTER 20
Ecocentric Governance: A New Ecological Social Contract 
CHAPTER 21
Bioregions and Earth Law 
CHAPTER 22
Indigenous Legalities and Biocultural Rights: Latin America
and Beyond 
SECTION VII
IMPLEMENTING EARTH LAW 
CHAPTER 23
Earth Law Movement Lawyering: Past, Present, and Future 
CHAPTER 24
Frontiers in Earth Law 


Afterword 
Table of Cases 
Index 

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Product Information
Edition
Second Edition
Publication date
2026-02-01
Copyright Year
2026
Pages
704
Connected eBook + Paperback
9798894102580
Connected eBook (Digital Only)
9798894102597
Subject
Environmental Law , Environmental Law, Elective
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