tag:theconversation.com,2011:/fr/topics/whanganui-river-6231/articlesWhanganui River – The Conversation2022-10-13T12:18:31Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1813892022-10-13T12:18:31Z2022-10-13T12:18:31Z‘Animism’ recognizes how animals, places and plants have power over humans – and it’s finding renewed interest around the world<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/489173/original/file-20221011-13-9ius2b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=7%2C7%2C4697%2C2680&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Shamans from the organization Tengeri conduct an offering ritual in 2013 to Bukhe Bator, the spirit master of the Selenga River, Republic of Buryatia, Russian Federation.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Roberto Quijada</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">CC BY-NC</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>A movement known as “<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/nov/02/trees-have-rights-too-robert-macfarlane-on-the-new-laws-of-nature">new animism</a>,” which seeks to secure personhood rights for nonhuman beings through legal means, <a href="https://www.invisiblehandfilm.com/">is gaining a following around the globe</a>. </p>
<p>New animist environmental activists are not the only ones using the term. Animism itself has become fashionable. Some <a href="https://omyourenergy.com/articles/what-is-animism/">spirituality bloggers</a> talk about animism as <a href="https://www.awecology.eco/animism/">a way to deepen one’s spiritual relationship to nature</a>. Scholars – from <a href="https://wesleyan.on.worldcat.org/oclc/1030446324">anthropologists</a> to <a href="https://wesleyan.on.worldcat.org/oclc/934194942">philosophers</a> – have taken a renewed interest in the concept.</p>
<p>Most of these people are using animism in a very general, and inaccurate, way, to mean the belief that everything in nature has a soul. The renewed interest in animism stems from the hope that people will behave in more ecologically sustainable ways if they believe that the natural world around them is alive. </p>
<p>However, as an <a href="https://jquijada.faculty.wesleyan.edu/">anthropologist of religion</a> who works with people whose religious practices were traditionally described as animist, I believe the reality is both more interesting and more complicated. Animism is not a religion or even a set of beliefs about nature having a soul. It’s a term used by scholars to classify religious practices through which human beings cultivate relationships with more powerful beings that reside in the world around us.</p>
<h2>A history of the term</h2>
<p>The term animism was coined by an early anthropologist, <a href="https://wesleyan.on.worldcat.org/oclc/239623">Edward Burnett Tylor, in 1870</a>. Tylor argued that Darwin’s ideas of evolution could be applied to human societies; he classified religions according to their level of development. </p>
<p>He defined animism as a belief in souls: the existence of human souls after death, but also the belief that entities Western perspectives deemed inanimate, like mountains, rivers and trees, had souls. </p>
<p>Animism was, in Tylor’s view, the first stage in the evolution of religion, which developed from animism to polytheism and then to monotheism, which was the most “civilized” form of religion. From this perspective, animism was the most primitive kind of religion, while European, Protestant Christianity was seen as the most evolved of all religions. </p>
<p>Tylor was not the first to make this argument. Scottish philosopher David Hume, for example, made a very similar argument in the “<a href="https://wesleyan.on.worldcat.org/oclc/2964940">Natural History of Religion,” in 1757</a>. Tylor was, however, the first to use the term animism and the classification scheme as part of what was then the nascent field of anthropology, the scientific study of human society.</p>
<p>Animism is therefore not a religion but a term for classifying a type of religion, one which was, in the 1870s at least, deemed by European and American scholars to be less civilized. The racist conception that some groups of people were less civilized than others was integral to the initial definition.</p>
<p>Around the turn of the 19th century, scholars used Tylor’s term to classify a wide array of rituals. <a href="https://wesleyan.on.worldcat.org/oclc/1196044364">James Frazer</a> and <a href="https://wesleyan.on.worldcat.org/oclc/3448213">Geza Roheim</a>, for example, used animism to argue for similarities among the practices of Indigenous populations, ancient Greeks and European peasants. Animism was used to describe <a href="https://wesleyan.on.worldcat.org/oclc/910695719">the psychology of Native Americans</a> and Siberian shamans asking spirit masters to <a href="https://wesleyan.on.worldcat.org/oclc/671863176">offer up game to hunters</a>. By the 1940s, however, the term, and the practice of classifying cultures by their level of development, had fallen out of favor. </p>
<p>Why, then, are environmental activists embracing a term with this complicated history?</p>
<h2>An alternative to ‘dominion’</h2>
<p>In 1967, historian Lynn White Jr., himself a devout Christian, argued that the world’s environmental <a href="https://www.doi.org/10.1126/science.155.3767.1203">problems came from Christian dominion theology</a>. In this reading of the biblical account of Genesis, humans are the only part of creation that is made in the image of God, which is usually interpreted to mean that humans, unlike all else in creation, have souls.</p>
<p>This theology gives humans – through Adam and Eve – dominion over the Earth. White argued that through its creation story, Christianity set up a dichotomy between inanimate matter and animate spirit that lifts humans above creation and turns the rest of the world – from animals and plants to rocks, soil and water – into “resources” to be used. </p>
<p>It is important to note that this is only one of many Christian interpretations of Genesis. On the other hand, White’s argument was that this idea of dominion is what makes environmental exploitation under capitalism possible, and that argument was compelling to many environmentalists, who began to <a href="https://milkweed.org/book/braiding-sweetgrass">develop an interest in Indigenous belief systems</a> as a way to fix environmental problems. </p>
<h2>Relationships of power and obligation</h2>
<p>What is important to understand about animism is that it is not a religion per se, nor is it a matter of merely believing that a mountain or a glacier has a soul. Animism describes practices that establish a relationship between places and people, usually one that recognizes places, animals and plants have power over people.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="A tall tree with fabric bands tied around it grows by the edge of a lake." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/489174/original/file-20221011-22-kd1mbe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/489174/original/file-20221011-22-kd1mbe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=902&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/489174/original/file-20221011-22-kd1mbe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=902&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/489174/original/file-20221011-22-kd1mbe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=902&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/489174/original/file-20221011-22-kd1mbe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1134&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/489174/original/file-20221011-22-kd1mbe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1134&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/489174/original/file-20221011-22-kd1mbe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1134&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The fabric offerings tied to this tree mark the location where people can make offerings to a being that resides in the landscape. Olkhon Island, Irkutsk Oblast, Russian Federation.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Roberto Quijada</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">CC BY-NC</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p><a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/buddhists-shamans-and-soviets-9780197536421?lang=en&cc=us">I study the way urban Buryats</a>, members of an Indigenous population of Siberia, are reviving pre-Soviet forms of animism and shamanism. Many of their rituals involve asking for blessings and protection from beings such as rivers, lakes and mountains, and from ancestors who are located in the landscape – all practices that create relationships of obligation between people and place. </p>
<p>There is a wide range of practices that contemporary scholars consider to be animist, ranging from <a href="https://www.ubcpress.ca/do-glaciers-listen">rules about what you can and cannot do</a> near a glacier and <a href="https://doi.org/10.4000/emscat.2589">making offerings to the spirit masters of Lake Baikal</a> to representing the <a href="https://www.dukeupress.edu/earth-beings">will of mountains in political negotiations</a>. </p>
<p>In all these instances, rituals establish relationships of obligation that tie humans to the land, and the land to the humans who live on it. Instead of human dominion over the landscape, in animist cosmologies, humans live under the dominion of the landscape around them. </p>
<h2>No magic bullet</h2>
<p>Animism is not a religion one can convert to but rather a label used for worldviews and practices that acknowledge relationships between nature and the animal world that have power over humans and must be respected. </p>
<p>These practices can be religious rituals, but they can also be forms of environmental care, farming practices or protests, such as those conducted by the water protectors at Standing Rock, <a href="https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/military-force-criticized-dakota-access-pipeline-protests">known as the No Dakota Access Pipeline, also called by the hashtag #NoDAPL</a>. Protests like the #NoDAPL aren’t what most people are used to thinking of as “religion,” and, as a result, media accounts often miss <a href="https://www.resilience.org/stories/2019-04-30/standing-rock-three-years-and-still-fighting/">the obligations to place and land that motivate protesters</a>.</p>
<p>New Zealand’s 2017 act <a href="https://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/2017/0007/latest/whole.html">recognizing the Whanganui River as a legal person</a>, the culmination of decades of Maori activism, could be described as <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/video/index/587689/river-me/">animism taking a legal form</a>. Additionally, when Indigenous practices are labeled animist religion, it is easy to overlook the very real biological and ecological scientific knowledge of these communities.</p>
<p>Animist practices are as variable as the peoples and places engaging in such relationships. Indigenous and animist perspectives illustrate that there are many different relationships possible between humans and the world around them, and many environmentalists are finding these alternatives instructive, despite the troubled history of the term.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/181389/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Justine Buck Quijada has received research funding from the University of Chicago, IREX, Fulbright-Hays, The Institute for Citizens and Scholars (previously the Woodrow Wilson Foundation), the Max Planck Institute for Religious and Ethnic Diversity, NCEEER and Wesleyan University, including Wesleyan University's College of the Environment.</span></em></p>Animism describes religions in which humans are connected to the landscape around them but do not dominate it.Justine Buck Quijada, Associate Professor, Department of Religion, Wesleyan UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1604382021-06-07T22:01:58Z2021-06-07T22:01:58ZWhat would sustainable tourism really mean for New Zealand? Let’s ask the river<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403902/original/file-20210602-27-18zonps.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C5958%2C3969&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The Whanganui River.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">www.shutterstock.com</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Excitement among Cook Islands tourism operators and officials at the <a href="https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/442778/covid-19-excitement-builds-as-cook-islands-travel-bubble-begins">opening of quarantine-free travel</a> with Aotearoa New Zealand was understandable. The impact of the pandemic on the island nation’s economy has been massive and will be felt for a long time.</p>
<p>But it wasn’t long before a local environmental organisation <a href="https://www.rnz.co.nz/international/pacific-news/443141/cook-islanders-considering-how-much-tourism-is-too-much?fbclid=IwAR1zmWcgMKWlfcYDvg4NNA4eScNoza9S5ElBqWA-yQqMt2Trrj5TlL-psPg">sounded a warning</a> about the risks of a return to high-volume tourism. </p>
<p>The popular Muri lagoon area has already suffered from pollution. There is also pressure on sacred sites such as Avana harbour, legendary departure place of the seven canoes that sailed to Aotearoa around 700 years ago.</p>
<p>On the other side of the world, there is a renewed movement to <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jun/02/mick-jagger-and-tilda-swinton-join-calls-for-new-law-to-protect-venice">save Venice</a> from pre-pandemic threats of over-tourism and cruise ships damaging its ancient canals.</p>
<p>In Aotearoa New Zealand, too, people have been given pause to think about whether a return to tourism as usual is viable. </p>
<p>One iwi, Tūhourangi Ngāti Wahio at <a href="http://www.maramatanga.co.nz/project/privileging-whanau-voices">Whakarewarewa</a> in Rotorua, has seriously considered whether to allow tourism to resume in their village. Virtually synonymous with the birth of tourism in Aotearoa, the iwi now questions just what benefits its people are receiving from tourist activity.</p>
<p>Everywhere, it seems, there are debates about what tourism will look like in the post-COVID era.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Whakarewarewa Thermal Village" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/404141/original/file-20210603-13-8ki1r6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/404141/original/file-20210603-13-8ki1r6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/404141/original/file-20210603-13-8ki1r6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/404141/original/file-20210603-13-8ki1r6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/404141/original/file-20210603-13-8ki1r6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/404141/original/file-20210603-13-8ki1r6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/404141/original/file-20210603-13-8ki1r6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Questioning the benefits of mass tourism: the legendary Whakarewarewa, Rotorua’s ‘thermal village’ attraction.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">www.shutterstock.com</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>No return to mass tourism</h2>
<p>As regular flights between Aotearoa and Australia resume, the issue of <a href="https://www.stuff.co.nz/travel/destinations/nz/118322701/we-can-no-longer-afford-to-be-complacent-about-tourism-growth">high-volume tourism and its environmental impact</a> is now front and centre.</p>
<p>Significantly, the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment has <a href="https://www.pce.parliament.nz/publications/not-100-but-four-steps-closer-to-sustainable-tourism">advocated</a> for using the disruption caused by COVID-19 to transform the local tourism industry. </p>
<p>This would be based on the industry being accountable for its environmental costs, and involving local communities and mana whenua in decision-making — echoing other calls to recalibrate tourism within “<a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/342463861_Socialising_tourism_for_social_and_ecological_justice_after_COVID-19">sustainable bounds</a>”.</p>
<p>Few people would argue for a return to unsustainable practices, but what does this really mean? And who might we turn to for solutions? </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/nz-tourism-can-use-the-disruption-of-covid-19-to-drive-sustainable-change-and-be-more-competitive-155370">NZ tourism can use the disruption of COVID-19 to drive sustainable change — and be more competitive</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Listening to Indigenous voices</h2>
<p>We argue Indigenous philosophies of <a href="https://chelliespiller.com/attachments/docs/wise-up-creating-organizational-wisdom-through.pdf">enterprise</a> and <a href="https://sites.massey.ac.nz/teaurangahau/about-te-au-rangahau/nga-panui-projects/whai-rawa-economy/">economy</a> have the potential to provide those answers — if we are bold enough to allow such voices to be heard.</p>
<p>In Māori philosophy, people and the environment are kin. As such, they depend on one another for their well-being. Consequently, some of the voices we need to hear are those of Papatūānuku (Earth mother) and her elements, the rivers, mountains and seas. </p>
<p>What is more natural than wanting to have a conversation with your relations in times of trouble or joy? This can be an alien concept for many, but the Māori practice of karakia (incantation) is essentially about communicating as kin with the natural elements. </p>
<p>In fact, these ideas have already found expression in <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/epub/10.1080/09669582.2021.1912056?needAccess=true">Māori tourism operations on the Whanganui River</a>. Te Awa Tupua, an ancestor of the iwi of the river, has been <a href="https://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO1703/S00187/te-awa-tupua-passes-in-to-law.htm">recognised as a person in law</a> through a <a href="https://www.govt.nz/assets/Documents/OTS/Whanganui-Iwi/Whanganui-River-Deed-of-Settlement-Ruruku-Whakatupua-Te-Mana-o-Te-Iwi-o-Whanganui-5-Aug-2014.pdf">settlement</a> of past wrongs under Te Tiriti o Waitangi between Whanganui iwi and the Crown. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Te Urewera National Park showing hills and lake" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/404391/original/file-20210603-21-1ly5y20.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/404391/original/file-20210603-21-1ly5y20.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/404391/original/file-20210603-21-1ly5y20.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/404391/original/file-20210603-21-1ly5y20.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/404391/original/file-20210603-21-1ly5y20.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/404391/original/file-20210603-21-1ly5y20.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/404391/original/file-20210603-21-1ly5y20.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Te Urewera: legal personhood was established in 2014.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">www.shutterstock.com</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Ask the river</h2>
<p>While relatively novel, the granting of <a href="https://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/2014/0051/latest/whole.html">legal personhood to Te Urewera</a> in 2014 and Te Awa Tupua in 2017 enacts a fundamental idea of indigeneity — that all things, human and non-human, are interrelated. </p>
<p>For the iwi of Te Awa Tupua, this sense of unity is captured in the tribal saying: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Ko au te awa, ko te awa ko au — I am the river and the river is me.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Perhaps those wanting a conversation about what sustainable tourism might look like could begin by asking the river. </p>
<p>This is not a fanciful suggestion. Te Awa Tupua has been given a human face in the form of <a href="https://www.ngatangatatiaki.co.nz/our-story/ruruku-whakatupua/te-pou-tupua/">Te Pou Tupua</a>, a single role held by two people appointed to speak on behalf of Te Awa Tupua and to uphold <a href="https://www.govt.nz/assets/Documents/OTS/Whanganui-Iwi/Whanganui-River-Deed-of-Settlement-Ruruku-Whakatupua-Te-Mana-o-Te-Awa-Tupua-5-Aug-2014.pdf">Tupua te Kawa</a>, the natural law and values of the river.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Marae meeting house and carving" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/404393/original/file-20210603-27-1e7ghmq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/404393/original/file-20210603-27-1e7ghmq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/404393/original/file-20210603-27-1e7ghmq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/404393/original/file-20210603-27-1e7ghmq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/404393/original/file-20210603-27-1e7ghmq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/404393/original/file-20210603-27-1e7ghmq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/404393/original/file-20210603-27-1e7ghmq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Te Papaiouru Marae in Rotorua: smaller-scale cultural experiences could be the future.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">www.shutterstock.com</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Low growth, high quality</h2>
<p>Our <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09669582.2021.1912056">research</a> has exposed social and ecological tensions between conventional industry ideas and Māori tourism operators’ attitudes to commercial growth. Māori tourism enterprises will more readily opt for lower growth in favour of environmental and community well-being. </p>
<p>One Māori-owned jet boating enterprise, for example, would forgo tours beyond a desired daily maximum to help minimise the environmental footprint of the operation on the awa (river) and surrounds. They preferred to focus on quality of experience, not quantity of visitors.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/a-green-tax-on-long-haul-flights-favours-rich-tourists-nz-needs-a-fairer-strategy-156847">A green tax on long-haul flights favours rich tourists. NZ needs a fairer strategy</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Another Māori operator prioritised job opportunities for whānau to harness their cultural knowledge and deepen their connection to the awa. As the owner reflected:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I think the biggest aspiration is for my kids to know and identify themselves with the river.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Similarly, a marae-based tourism experience has avoided catering for busloads of visitors in favour of smaller groups. Tribal narratives of the awa are linked to discussions about climate change, all within a culturally unique space that allows time to reflect on the human connection to Te Awa Tupua.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/freedom-camping-needs-new-regulations-and-foreign-tourists-arent-the-only-villains-155621">Freedom camping needs new regulations and foreign tourists aren’t the only villains</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Tourism and the Treaty</h2>
<p>These examples of Māori tourism demonstrate there are other ways of thinking beyond
a return to the old mode of accentuating growth at the expense of the environment and local communities. </p>
<p>Given the impact of COVID-19 now and likely into the future, the tourism industry can’t ignore the innovative potential of Māori world views. </p>
<p>A sustainable tourism model also recognises the essential purpose of treaty settlements such as those agreed in Whanganui — to allow people to live a good life in peaceful co-existence with each other and the land for all time.</p>
<p>In practice, this means a homegrown Indigenous framework for discussing and building sustainable tourism is already at our doorstep. We need only ask the rivers, the mountains, the seas – our ancestors – for guidance on what that means for coming generations.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/160438/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jason Paul Mika receives funding from Massey University to conduct research on Māori tourism on the Whanganui River.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Regina Scheyvens does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The Māori world view provides a viable framework for building a new tourism model that prioritises quality over quantity.Jason Paul Mika, Senior Lecturer, School of Management, Massey UniversityRegina Scheyvens, Professor of Development Studies, Massey UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1571172021-06-03T17:07:24Z2021-06-03T17:07:24ZRights for nature: How granting a river ‘personhood’ could help protect it<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/400084/original/file-20210511-23-1trxi8o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=69%2C40%2C3790%2C2266&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">In February, the Innu Council of Ekuanitshit and the Minganie Regional County Municipality declared the Muteshekau Shipu (Magpie River) a legal person, a move that may provide greater certainty for this majestic river's future. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Boreal River)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The Muteshekau Shipu (Magpie River) runs nearly 300 kilometres in Québec’s Côte-Nord region. The river is culturally significant for the Innu and it is popular with white water paddlers and rafters. </p>
<p>Despite efforts to protect the river, Muteshekau Shipu continues to be threatened by potential new <a href="https://www.nationalobserver.com/2017/12/19/news/emails-reveal-internal-government-dispute-quebec-over-hydro-expansion">hydroelectric dam development</a>. But, in February, the Innu Council of Ekuanitshit and the Minganie Regional County Municipality declared the <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/4/3/this-river-in-canada-now-legal-person">Muteshekau Shipu (Magpie River)</a> a <a href="https://theconversation.com/when-a-river-is-a-person-from-ecuador-to-new-zealand-nature-gets-its-day-in-court-79278">legal person</a>, a move that may provide greater certainty for this majestic river’s future. </p>
<p>While a first in Canada, granting legal personhood to natural entities is part of a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kuFNmH7lVTA&t=642s">global movement</a> to recognize the rights of nature in law. Indigenous communities around the world are leading the way in upholding the rights of sacred and ancestral rivers, forests and mountains. Recognizing the rights of nature is an opportunity to elevate the power of Indigenous Peoples’ laws and worldviews to benefit all peoples.</p>
<p>Extractive values — the belief that natural entities are resources that can be used for human benefit with little regard for their well-being and longevity — are deeply embedded in Canada’s legal and economic systems.</p>
<p>These values influence the ideologies at the root of our biodiversity and climate crises. These ideologies justify the transformation of rivers, forests and the atmosphere into commodities and private property at our own peril. Recognizing natural entities as legal persons and enshrining their rights in law is a promising legal innovation.</p>
<h2>Rights of nature</h2>
<p>On <a href="http://files.harmonywithnatureun.org/uploads/upload1070.pdf">Feb. 23</a>, the Alliance for the Protection of the Magpie River/Muteshekau Shipu recognized <a href="http://files.harmonywithnatureun.org/uploads/upload1072.pdf">nine rights</a> of the river. These include the rights to evolve naturally and be protected, to be free of pollution and to sue. </p>
<p>The members of the Innu Council of Ekuanitshit, part of the alliance, will now be the river’s guardians. This means that those with long-standing relationships to Muteshekau Shipu will be formally entrusted with the river’s care for future generations. </p>
<p>“Designating the river as a legal person was the clearest message we could send,” Chief Jean-Charles Piétacho of the Innu Council of Ekuanitshit told us in an interview. “There will never be dams in this river. The river protects herself, we protect the river, we’re all protected. I think the message is very clear.” </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A river winding through lush green valley" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/401391/original/file-20210518-13-grmxxu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/401391/original/file-20210518-13-grmxxu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/401391/original/file-20210518-13-grmxxu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/401391/original/file-20210518-13-grmxxu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/401391/original/file-20210518-13-grmxxu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=565&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/401391/original/file-20210518-13-grmxxu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=565&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/401391/original/file-20210518-13-grmxxu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=565&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">In 2017, the New Zealand Parliament recognized what Māori leaders had been saying for generations, that the Whanganui River is a living being and should have the rights, duties, powers and liabilities of a person.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Galvanized by widespread environmental degradation and rising Indigenous rights movements, Indigenous communities around the world are leading the way in upholding the rights of sacred and ancestral rivers. This includes Māori tribal relationships with the <a href="https://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/2017/0007/latest/whole.html#DLM6831461">Whanganui River</a> in Aotearoa New Zealand, the role of Indigenous and Afro-Colombian communities in the <a href="https://www.iucn.org/news/world-commission-environmental-law/201909/tour-save-world-colombia-wins-yellow-jersey-rights-nature">Atrato River</a> in Colombia, and the Yurok Tribal Council’s granting legal rights of personhood to the <a href="https://www.culturalsurvival.org/news/yurok-nation-just-established-rights-klamath-river">Klamath River</a> through an ordinance in the United States. </p>
<p>The idea that nature is a sentient being isn’t new to Indigenous and other traditional peoples. “The vision of the Innu is that Nature is living. Everything is alive,” said Chief Piétacho. </p>
<h2>Indigenous laws: Relationships and responsibilities</h2>
<p>Recognizing the rights of nature are modern expressions of long-practised Indigenous laws. Indigenous laws are as diverse as Indigenous cultures yet share an understanding that humans are an integral part of the natural world. These laws emphasize respect for all beings and responsibilities to care for lands and waters. Trees, mountains and plants are relatives, not commodities that can be privately owned and exploited. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A dam controls the flow of a river" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/401392/original/file-20210518-21-j4ud0t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/401392/original/file-20210518-21-j4ud0t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=395&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/401392/original/file-20210518-21-j4ud0t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=395&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/401392/original/file-20210518-21-j4ud0t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=395&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/401392/original/file-20210518-21-j4ud0t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=497&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/401392/original/file-20210518-21-j4ud0t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=497&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/401392/original/file-20210518-21-j4ud0t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=497&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Four dams along the Klamath River, which flows through Yurok Territory, are set to be removed to begin the restoration of the river that runs from Oregon to northern California.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Gillian Flaccus)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The rights-of-nature movement may seem radical to some people. It challenges Eurocentric values such as human dominance over the natural world, which is considered largely inanimate. The conservation movement itself is founded on a worldview that sees <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/cag.12600">“wilderness” as something separate</a> to be protected from humans. The “fortress” conservation movement is ideologically non-commensurate with Indigenous ways of thinking about being a part of nature. This belief was used to justify the forced <a href="https://static1.squarespace.com/static/57e007452e69cf9a7af0a033/t/5ab94aca6d2a7338ecb1d05e/1522092766605/PA234-ICE_Report_2018_Mar_22_web.pdf">relocation of many Indigenous Peoples</a> from their territories to establish parks and protected areas. </p>
<p>Rights understood through a western, liberal and individualistic lens overlook collective responsibilities to the natural world. “I sincerely think Québec and Canada missed their responsibility; they aren’t protecting the river from development,” said Chief Piétacho. </p>
<p>Bridging western and Indigenous legal systems through a rights-of-nature approach is one tool for encouraging a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1890/1051-0761(2000)010%5B1327:KEIPOT%5D2.0.CO;2">kincentric view</a> of the world, which sees humans as “part of an extended ecological family that shares ancestry and origins.”</p>
<p>Indigenous laws mirror and reinforce relational worldviews that view living entities as relatives, not resources. This in turn shapes social conduct that emphasizes respect and responsibility to the natural world. Innovative governance arrangements are one means through which distinct worldviews and associated laws can be woven together. </p>
<h2>Innovative governance models</h2>
<p>Rivers speak but since western laws and institutions are not designed to listen, people must act as intermediaries voicing perspectives on their behalf. Indigenous laws are well positioned to conceptualize the decision-making structures needed to breathe life into legal personhood. </p>
<p>In 2014, Tūhoe iwi (Māori) and the New Zealand government granted legal personhood to <a href="http://www.environmentguide.org.nz/regional/te-urewera-act/">Te Urewera</a>, an ancestral forest and former national park. They created a board responsible for making decisions in the best interests of Te Urewera. Tūhoe, as children of Tu Urewera, give expression to her through the board. </p>
<p>In Northern Canada, Łutsël K’é Dene First Nation established Thaidene Nëné as an Indigenous Protected Area under Dene law. It is also protected as a park and conservation area under Canadian and territorial (Northwest Territories) legislation. The management board, <a href="http://www.landoftheancestors.ca/thaidene-neumlneacute-xa769-da769-ya769322t305.html">Thaidene Nëné Xá Dá Yáłtı</a>, is composed of members of Łutsël K’é Dene First Nation, the Government of Canada and the Government of the Northwest Territories. Once appointed, members no longer represent their organizations, they speak for Thaidene Nëné.</p>
<h2>Indigenous-led initiatives</h2>
<p>Examples like Thaidene Nëné are the exception and not the norm in Canada, although this may be changing. <a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/environment-climate-change/services/nature-legacy/indigenous-leadership-funding.html">There is a national mandate</a> to support Indigenous-led conservation initiatives and advance reconciliation. This support combined with Indigenous leadership and accompanying legal innovations present new opportunities for caring for the land and waters. </p>
<p>Many similar Indigenous-led initiatives are currently underway, supported by programs including the <a href="https://bioneers.org/indigeneity-program/">Bioneers Indigeneity Program</a>, <a href="https://www.weareriver.earth/">RIVER</a> (Revitalizing Indigenous Values for Earth’s Regeneration), the <a href="https://conservation-reconciliation.ca/">Conservation through Reconciliation</a> partnership, <a href="https://www.wcel.org/program/relaw">RELAW</a> (Revitalizing Indigenous Law for Land, Air and Water) and the <a href="https://www.therightsofnature.org/">Global Network for the Rights of Nature</a>. </p>
<p>The Muteshekau Shipu river declaration — and the legal guardianship role for Innu — is an example governments can learn from. “If the government wants to effectively protect Nature, they should consider this option so protected areas would be protected along with our rights,” said Chief Piétacho. </p>
<p>To create just and liveable futures for all our relatives (human and otherwise), Canadian laws and policies need further innovation. Vesting legal personhood in natural entities is a promising intervention when Indigenous Peoples represent these entities. It elevates the standing of nature for all peoples and respects the laws of Indigenous Peoples.</p>
<p><em>Georgia Lloyd-Smith, a lawyer with West Coast Environmental Law, co-authored this article. The authors are grateful to Chief Jean-Charles Piétacho for the interview.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/157117/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Justine Townsend receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Bioneers//Collective Heritage Institute receives external funding from foundations and individuals to support Bioneers Rights of Nature tribal governance initiative. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Catherine Iorns and Lindsay Borrows do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A recent declaration of a river as a legal person in Canada recognizes Indigenous laws and governance, and champions people as the guardians of nature.Justine Townsend, PhD Candidate, Department of Geography, Environment and Geomatics, University of GuelphAlexis Bunten, Co-Director, Bioneers Indigeneity Program and ConsultantCatherine Iorns, Professor of Law, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of WellingtonLindsay Borrows, PhD Candidate in Law, University of AlbertaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/853022017-10-08T23:13:02Z2017-10-08T23:13:02ZFor Native Americans, a river is more than a ‘person,’ it is also a sacred place<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/189240/original/file-20171006-25784-vg0uzv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Colorado River.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Julie Jacobson, File</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The environmental group <a href="https://deepgreenresistance.org/en/">Deep Green Resistance</a> recently <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/26/us/does-the-colorado-river-have-rights-a-lawsuit-seeks-to-declare-it-a-person.html?mcubz=0&_r=0">filed a first-of-its-kind legal suit</a> against the state of Colorado asking for personhood rights for the Colorado River.</p>
<p>If successful, it would mean lawsuits can brought on behalf of the river for any harm done to it, as if it were a person.</p>
<p>In the past, several environmental groups in <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/mar/21/ganges-and-yamuna-rivers-granted-same-legal-rights-as-human-beings">India</a>, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2011/apr/10/bolivia-enshrines-natural-worlds-rights">Bolivia</a>, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2008/sep/24/equador.conservation">Ecuador</a>, <a href="http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/40786-colombia-grants-legal-rights-to-the-polluted-atrato-river">Colombia</a> and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/14/world/what-in-the-world/in-new-zealand-lands-and-rivers-can-be-people-legally-speaking.html?">New Zealand</a> have successfully sought protection for rivers and landscapes based on this argument. As a <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-makes-a-mountain-hill-or-prairie-a-sacred-place-for-native-americans-73169">Native American scholar</a> of environment and religion, I seek to understand the relationship between people and the natural world. </p>
<p>Native Americans view nature through their belief systems. A river or water does not only sustain life – it is sacred.</p>
<h2>Why is water sacred to Native Americans?</h2>
<p>In the past year, the Lakota phrase “Mní wičhóni,” or “Water is life,” became a new national protest anthem. </p>
<p>It was chanted by 5,000 marchers at the <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/american-indians-to-march-on-white-house-in-rally-for-rights/2017/03/10/8b327e84-04e3-11e7-ad5b-d22680e18d10_story.html?utm_term=.af983e52c1a2">Native Nations March</a> in Washington, D.C. this spring, and during protests last year as the anthem of the struggle to stop the building of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-will-native-tribes-fight-the-dakota-access-pipeline-in-court-72839">Dakota Access Pipeline</a> under the Missouri River in North Dakota. </p>
<p>There was a reason: For long years, the Lakota, the Blackfeet and the other Native American tribes understood how to live with nature. And it was based on the knowledge of how to live within the restrictions of the limited water supply of the “<a href="http://www.lib.msu.edu/branches/map/US/800-c-reg4-D-1823-400/">Great American desert</a>” of North America. </p>
<h2>Water as sacred place</h2>
<p>Native Americans learned both through observation and experiment, arguably a process quite similar to what we might call science today. They also learned from their religious ideas, passed on from generation to generation in the form of stories.</p>
<p>I learned from my grandparents, both members of the Blackfeet tribe in Montana, about the sacredness of water. They shared that the Blackfeet believed in three separate realms of existence – the Earth, sky and water. The Blackfeet believed that humans, or “Niitsitapi,” and Earth beings, or “Ksahkomitapi,” lived in one realm; sky beings, or “Spomitapi,” lived in another realm; and underwater beings, or “Soyiitapi,” lived in yet another. The Blackfeet viewed all three worlds as sacred because within them lived the divine.</p>
<p>The water world, in particular, was held in special regard. The Blackfeet believed that in addition to the divine beings, about which they learned from <a href="http://www.nebraskapress.unl.edu/product/Invisible-Reality,677467.aspx">their stories,</a> there were divine animals. The divine beaver, who could talk to humans, taught the Blackfeet their most important religious ceremony. The Blackfeet needed this ceremony to reaffirm their relationships with the three separate realms of reality.</p>
<p>The Soyiitapi, divine water beings, also instructed the Blackfeet to protect their home, the water world. The Blackfeet could not kill or eat anything living in water; they also could not disturb or pollute water.</p>
<p>The Blackfeet viewed water as a distinct place – a sacred place. It was the home of divine beings and divine animals who taught the Blackfeet religious rituals and moral restrictions on human behavior. It can, in fact, be compared to Mount Sinai of the <a href="https://www.kingjamesbibleonline.org/Exodus-Chapter-1/">Old Testament</a>, which was viewed as “holy ground” and where God gave Moses the Ten Commandments.</p>
<h2>Water as life</h2>
<p>Native American tribes on the Great Plains knew something else about the relationship between themselves, the beaver and water. They learned through observation that beavers helped create an ecological oasis within a dry and arid landscape. </p>
<p>As Canadian anthropologist R. Grace Morgan hypothesized in her dissertation “<a href="https://era.library.ualberta.ca/files/df65vb64j#.WMxDHW_yvX4">Beaver Ecology/Beaver Mythology</a>,” the Blackfeet sanctified the beaver because they understood the natural science and ecology of beaver behavior. </p>
<p>Morgan believed that the Blackfeet did not harm the beaver because <a href="http://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/leave-it-to-beavers-leave-it-to-beavers/8836/">beavers built dams</a> on creeks and rivers. Such dams could produce enough of a diversion to create a pond of fresh clean water that allowed an oasis of plant life to grow and wildlife to flourish.</p>
<p>Beaver ponds provided the Blackfeet with water for daily life. The ponds also attracted animals, which meant the Blackfeet did not have to travel long distances to hunt. The Blackfeet did not need to travel for plants used for medicine or food, either. </p>
<p>Beavers were part of what ecologists call a <a href="https://www.britannica.com/science/trophic-cascade">trophic cascade</a>, or a reciprocal relationship. Beaver ponds were a win-win for all concerned in “the Great American desert” that <a href="https://theconversation.com/give-beavers-permanent-residence-wed-be-dam-stupid-not-to-55256">modern ecologists and conservationists</a> are beginning to study only now. </p>
<p>For the Blackfeet, Lakota and other tribes of the Great Plains, water was “life.” They understood what it meant to live in a dry arid place, which they expressed through their religion and within their ecological knowledge.</p>
<h2>Rights of rivers</h2>
<p>Indigenous people from around the world share these beliefs about the sacredness of water. </p>
<p>The government of New Zealand recently recognized the ancestral connection of the Maori people to their water. This past spring, the government passed the “Te Awa Tupua <a href="http://www.legislation.govt.nz/bill/government/2016/0129/latest/DLM6830851.html?src=qs">Whanganui River Claims Settlement</a> Bill,” which provides “personhood” status to the Whanganui River, one of the largest rivers on the North Island of New Zealand. This river has come to be recognized as having “all the rights, powers, duties, and liabilities of a legal person” – something the Maori believed all along. </p>
<p>The United States does not have such laws. This new lawsuit hopes to change that and give the Colorado River “personhood” status. Indigenous people would add, a river is more than a “person” – it is also a sacred place.</p>
<p><em>This is an updated version of an article <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-is-water-sacred-to-native-americans-74732">originally published</a> on March 21, 2017.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/85302/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Rosalyn R. LaPier does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>On Indigenous Peoples’ Day, a Native American scholar explains why water means more than just sustenance for life and how it’s the place of the divine.Rosalyn R. LaPier, Associate Professor of Environmental Studies, University of MontanaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/749832017-03-23T19:13:47Z2017-03-23T19:13:47ZThree rivers are now legally people – but that’s just the start of looking after them<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/162124/original/image-20170323-25762-15za1xp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The Whanganui River: now a legal person.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AWhanganui_River_Aerial_Photo.jpg">Joerg Muller/Ulanwp/Wikimedia Commons</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In the space of a week, the world has gained three notable new legal persons: the <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-03-16/nz-whanganui-river-gets-legal-status-as-person-after-170-years/8358434">Whanganui River</a> in New Zealand, and the <a href="http://www.thenewsminute.com/article/ganga-and-yamuna-are-now-legal-entities-what-does-mean-and-it-good-move-58999">Ganga and Yamuna Rivers</a> in India. </p>
<p>In New Zealand, the government passed legislation that recognised the Whanganui River catchment as a <a href="https://crawford.anu.edu.au/news-events/news/4098/river-personified">legal person</a>. This significant legal reform emerged from the longstanding <a href="https://www.waitangitribunal.govt.nz/">Treaty of Waitangi</a> negotiations and is a way of formally acknowledging the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/mar/16/new-zealand-river-granted-same-legal-rights-as-human-being">special relationship</a> local Māori have with the river.</p>
<p>In India, the Uttarakhand high court ruled that the <a href="http://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/uttarakhand-hc-says-ganga-is-india-s-first-living-entity-grants-it-rights-equal-to-humans/story-VoI6DOG71fyMDihg5BuGCL.html">Ganga and Yamuna Rivers have the same legal rights as a person</a>, in response to the urgent need to reduce pollution in two rivers considered sacred in the Hindu religion. </p>
<h2>What are legal rights for nature?</h2>
<p>Legal rights are not the same as human rights, and so <a href="http://www.bloomsbury.com/au/laws-meaning-of-life-9781841138664/">a “legal person” does not necessarily have to be a human being</a>. Take corporations, for example, which are also treated in law as “legal persons”, as a way to endow companies with particular legal rights, and to treat the company as <a href="http://www.bailii.org/uk/cases/UKHL/1896/1.html">legally distinct</a> from its managers and shareholders. </p>
<p>Giving nature legal rights means the law can see “nature” as a legal person, thus creating rights that can then be enforced. Legal rights focus on the idea of <a href="https://isites.harvard.edu/fs/docs/icb.topic498371.files/Stone.Trees_Standing.pdf">legal standing</a> (often described as the ability to sue and be sued), which enables “nature” to go to court to protect its rights. Legal personhood also includes the right to enter and enforce contracts, and the ability to hold property. </p>
<p>There is still a big question about whether these types of legal rights are relevant or appropriate for nature at all. But what is clear from the experience of applying this concept to other non-human entities is that these legal rights don’t mean much if they can’t be enforced. </p>
<h2>Enforcing nature’s legal rights</h2>
<p>What does it take to enforce the legal personhood of a river or other natural entity? First, there needs to be a person appointed to act on its behalf. </p>
<p>Second, for a right to be enforceable, both the “guardians” and users of the resource must recognise their joint rights, duties, and responsibilities. To possess a right implies that someone else has a commensurate duty to observe this right. </p>
<p>Third, if a case requires adjudication by the courts, then it takes time, money, and expertise to run a successful legal case. Enforcing legal rights for nature therefore requires not only legal standing, but also adequate funding and access to legal expertise.</p>
<p>And finally, any actor seeking to enforce these rights will need some form of legislative independence from state and national governments, as well as sufficient real-world power to take action, particularly if such action is politically controversial. </p>
<p>Both New Zealand and India face considerable challenges in ensuring that the new legal rights granted to the rivers are successfully enforced. At present, New Zealand seems significantly better prepared than India to meet these challenges.</p>
<p>In New Zealand, the new system for managing the river will slot into existing systems of government, whereas India will need to set up completely new organisations in a matter of weeks.</p>
<p>Granting legal rights to New Zealand’s Whanganui River catchment (Te Awa Tupua) has taken eight years of careful negotiation. The new legislation, introduced at the national level, transfers ownership of the riverbed from the Crown to Te Awa Tupua, and assigns a guardian the responsibility of representing Te Awa Tupua’s interests. </p>
<p>The guardian will consist of two people: one appointed by the Whanganui Iwi (local Māori people), and the other by the New Zealand government. <a href="https://www.national.org.nz/whanganui_river_settlement_passes_third_reading">Substantial funds</a> have been set aside to maintain the health of the Whanganui River, and to establish the legal framework that will be administered by the guardian, with support from independent advisory groups. </p>
<p>In contrast, almost overnight, the High Court in India has ruled that the Ganga and Yamuna Rivers will be treated as minors under the law, and will be represented by three people – the <a href="http://www.newshub.co.nz/home/world/2017/03/india-follows-new-zealand-grants-legal-rights-to-rivers.html">director general of Namami Gange project, the Uttarakhand chief secretary, and the advocate general</a> – who will act as guardians for the river. The court has requested that within eight weeks, new boards should be established to oversee the cleaning and maintenance of the rivers. Few further details of the proposed institutional framework are available.</p>
<h2>Big questions remain</h2>
<p>In both cases, there are <a href="http://www.thenewsminute.com/article/ganga-and-yamuna-are-now-legal-entities-what-does-mean-and-it-good-move-58999">still big questions</a> about the roles and responsibilities of the rivers’ guardians. </p>
<p>How will they decide which rights to enforce, and when? Who can hold them to account for those decisions and who has oversight? Even in the case of the Whanganui River, there remain biting questions about water rights and enforcement. For instance, despite (or perhaps because of) longstanding concerns about levels of water extraction by the <a href="https://www.genesisenergy.co.nz/tongariro-power-scheme">Tongariro Power Scheme</a>, the legislation specifically avoids creating or transferring proprietary interests in water.</p>
<p>Ultimately, both of these examples show that conferring legal rights to nature is just the beginning of a longer legal process, rather than the end. Although legal rights can be created overnight, it takes time and money to set up the legal and organisational frameworks that will ensure these rights are worth more than the paper they’re printed on.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/74983/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>New Zealand’s Whanganui River and the Ganga and Yamuna Rivers in India have been given the right to ‘sue’ over issues like pollution. The challenge now is to ensure these legal rights are enforced.Erin O'Donnell, Senior Fellow, Centre for Resources, Energy and Environment Law, The University of MelbourneJulia Talbot-Jones, PhD candidate, Environmental/Institutional Economics, Australian National UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/153802013-07-01T20:38:53Z2013-07-01T20:38:53ZArtificial photosynthesis could extend rights to nature<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/26419/original/j78sbsj6-1372397868.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C1%2C1000%2C652&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Artificial photosynthesis may lead to a world that no longer bludges off the environment and accords nature its own rights.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Should ecosystems have <a href="http://therightsofnature.org/">legally enforceable rights</a>? It might sound like a ridiculous idea, but a global debate on this is in full swing. The Constitution of Ecuador now recognises <a href="http://therightsofnature.org/ecuador-rights/">rights of nature</a>. Environmental activists have <a href="http://therightsofnature.org/useful/united-natures/">called for</a> a “United Natures” to replace the “United Nations”. And New Zealand has given “<a href="http://ens-newswire.com/2012/09/13/new-zealands-whanganui-river-gets-personhood-status/">personhood</a>” to the Whanganui River to help protect it. </p>
<p>In the great conflicts about abolition of slavery, child labour or enfranchisement of women, new economically valuable technology played a critical role in converting humanitarian ideals against such oppression into enforceable legal obligations. It did this in large part by replacing the need for manual labour in fields, factories and the home.</p>
<p>The same is likely to prove true for ideals about giving natural ecosystems legally enforceable rights. This is primarily because new technology may replace our need to exploit the environment, allowing us to grant ecosystem rights without fear of economic ruin.</p>
<p>But timing will be crucial. As a result of human exploitation and indifference, our supporting ecosystems are close to collapse; yet calls to legislate <a href="http://www.nature.com/news/specials/planetaryboundaries/index.html">“safe” boundaries for planetary “physiological” processes</a> like biodiversity, access to water, land use, atmospheric carbon dioxide, nitrogen, phosphorus and pollution levels are considered economically impractical.</p>
<h2>When a river can sue</h2>
<p>As a “rightless” object, the environment has few if any legal remedies to protect its interests. Nonetheless, already new governance models are emerging to challenge this understanding.</p>
<p>In August 2012, the New Zealand Government <a href="http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2235935">announced</a> it would grant legal standing and personality to the Whanganui River (“Te Awa Tupua”). The decision was part of a settlement with certain Maori tribes, and guardians were appointed under a trust to act in the river’s interests. Te Awa Tupua can now lodge an objection to a mining or hydroelectric dam proposal, initiate proceedings in the Land and Environment Court, and apply for a mandatory injunction requiring remediation of pollution or financial compensation.</p>
<p>In 1972, Christopher Stone presented the case for conferring legal personality and rights on the environment, in the article <a href="http://heinonline.org/HOL/LandingPage?collection=journals&handle=hein.journals/scal45&div=17&id=&page="><em>Should Trees Have Standing?</em> </a> The natural object would have a legally recognised worth and dignity in its own right; it would not merely serve as a means to benefit present or future generations of humans. </p>
<p>To achieve rights-holder status, the natural object had to satisfy three criteria: </p>
<ul>
<li>that the thing can institute legal actions at its behest</li>
<li>that in determining the granting of legal relief, the court must take injury to it into account</li>
<li>that relief must run to the benefit of it. </li>
</ul>
<p>It is ironic that just as steps are being taken to expand legal personhood to include ecosystems, measures are being introduced to <a href="http://reclaimdemocracy.org/corporate-personhood/">strip that status</a> from the artificial persons - particularly multinational corporations - who in their single-minded quest to increase shareholder profit and directorial bonuses bear much responsibility for harming local communities and the environment. </p>
<p>In contrast to the ceaseless march of corporate rights, recent proposals to confer legal standing on natural objects seem innocent and innocuous. But this beneficient transformation of our collective conscience requires a technological revolution that reduces the economic and societal need for human over-exploitation of nature. That technological revolution may be artificial photosynthesis.</p>
<h2>Why will artificial photosynthesis make the difference?</h2>
<p>Photosynthesis can be viewed as the planet breathing: taking in carbon dioxide, releasing oxygen and making hydrogen by using sunlight to split water. Hydrogen is a great fuel for a sustainable future because when burnt it makes fresh water. Most people today are <a href="http://www.wfs.org/futurist/2013-issues-futurist/may-june-2013-vol-47-no-3/powering-world-artificial-photosynthesis">locked into the old idea that only plants can “do” photosynthesis</a>. But scientists are on the verge of not only replicating photosynthesis, but improving it through nanotechnology and material sciences approaches in <a href="http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2235961">large national projects</a>, such as Caltech’s Joint Center on Artificial Photosynthesis, the European Solar H2 network, the Dutch and South Korean solar fuels projects, Dan Nocera’s work at Harvard and Wasielewski’s work at Northwestern. </p>
<p>Such research needs just a <a href="http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2235958">little more funding and coordination</a> to make a transformative global breakthrough that will alleviate our need to over-use, pollute and destroy nature. Once the new technology of artificial photosynthesis becomes as ubiquitous as the mobile phone or internet, human societies will no longer be constrained by fears of collapse and ruin if they give rights to ecosystems. </p>
<h2>The Sustainocene</h2>
<p>Imagine a world where every road, vehicle and building ceases to “bludge off” nature and “pays its way” by <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1877705812048047">doing photosynthesis more efficiently than plants</a> including producing its own hydrogen fuel and making its own basic starches from absorbed carbon dioxide. This is a world ripe to allow the emergence of environmental sustainability as social virtue at the heart of legal systems, alongside the more traditional, human-centred justice and equity. </p>
<p>Such a multimillion-year era of stewardship has been termed the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sustainocene">Sustainocene</a>. It may need to last for millions of years if humanity is to morally repay its debt to nature. In the Sustainocene, instead of the cargo-cult ideology of perpetual economic growth through corporate pillage of nature, globalised artificial photosynthesis will facilitate a steady state economy and further technological revolutions such as domestic nano-factories and e-democratic input to local communal and global governance structures. In such a world, humans will no longer feel economically threatened, but rather proud, that their moral growth has allowed them to uphold rights of nature. </p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/15380/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Prof. Thomas Faunce receives funding from the Australian Research Council under a Future Fellowship focused on nanotechnology and global public health. He has also awarded funding from the Hooke Committee of the UK Royal Society to conduct a residential meeting of leaders of all the national artificial photosynthesis projects in 8-9 July 2014.</span></em></p>Should ecosystems have legally enforceable rights? It might sound like a ridiculous idea, but a global debate on this is in full swing. The Constitution of Ecuador now recognises rights of nature. Environmental…Thomas Faunce, ARC Future Fellow, Australian National UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.