Environmentally-conditioned human rights: a good idea?

Abstract

The emergence of the rights of nature is a clear response to the current environmental crisis. But such trend is not to walk alone: it is to be espoused to the many still remaining human rights issues, otherwise the power and credibility of both are at danger. This chapter focuses on one of the many possible points of encounter between the rights of nature and human rights. It explores how they may be combined within biocultural rights—the basket of rights of indigenous peoples and local communities necessary to maintain their role as ecosystem stewards—and tries to understand what the consequences of combining nature and human interests as their foundations may be. In particular, the chapter questions: can biocultural rights be considered a satisfying and self-standing merge of indigenous peoples and the rights of nature? Or do they come with a price to be paid for such a sui generis conflation of interests? In order to put in context such analysis, the chapter explores the Colombian Constitutional Court case on the Atrato river, the first case to explicitly mention biocultural rights. It also looks at the future elaborations of environmentally-conditioned rights, exploring the idea of Rights for Ecosystem Services.