Fabián Cárdenas is a professor of International Law at Pontificia Universidad Javeriana in Bogota, Colombia and director of the Centre of Studies on Law and Sustainability. He has worked with the Colombian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the International Criminal Court in The Hague.
Rights of Nature laws are becoming a vital tool for addressing environmental injustice. From New Zealand and India to Ecuador and Bolivia, advocates have successfully secured legal rights for rivers, forests, and mountains. Granting rights to nature has the potential to expand environmental protections, strengthen indigenous rights, promote sustainable development, and alter how humans relate to nature. Despite these promises, rights of Nature laws have met with greater resistance in some countries than in others.