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Introduction
The Journal of Property, Planning & Environmental Law (JPPEL) publishes doctrinal, comparative and socio-legal analysis from around the world that explores the interplay of property ownership rights, land use governance and environmental protection regulation.
Environmental advocacy organisations such as International Rivers (2020; 2021), academic commentators (De Vries-Stotijn et al, 2019; O’Donnell, 2020; Jolly & Roshan, 2021) and community groups (e.g. in the UK, www.loveourouse.org) all point to a rapidly emerging ‘Rights for Rivers’ movement, seeking to create new legal protection for specific river systems via conferment of ‘legal personality’ upon them, in order to implement the 2020 declaration by International Rivers and the Earth Law Center of a ‘Universal Declaration on the Rights of Rivers’.
In her recent monograph on Environmental Personhood, Francine Rochford (2024) concludes that the ‘Rights for Rivers’ movement is manifestation of an activist theory of change which assumes that existing legal frameworks of property rights, land use governance and environmental protection regulation are fundamentally incapable of protecting rivers, and that accordingly such modes of legal stewardship and stakeholder-balancing must be replaced (or at least bypassed) by a new – alternative – jurisprudence in which rivers are given the status of ‘legal personhood’. Rochford helpfully opens up a space for clarification, questioning and critique of the ‘Rights for Rivers’ movement, building upon earlier work by Spitz & Peñalver, 2021 and Wesche, 2021).
JPPEL is inviting submission of research articles (maximum 8,000 words in length, inclusive of references) for potential publication in a Rights of Rivers themed issue in late 2025 / early 2026. Potential authors are invited to correspond via [email protected] with JPPEL’s chief editor, Dr Luke Bennett (Sheffield Hallam University, UK) to discuss potential submissions.
References
De Vries-Stotijn, Anne, Van Ham, Ilon & Bastmeijer, Kees (2019) ‘Protection through property: from private to river-held rights’, Water International, 44(6-7), pp 736-751.International Rivers, Earth Law Center, Cyrus R. Vance Center for International Justice (2020) Rights of Rivers: A global survey of the rapidly developing Rights of Nature jurisprudence pertaining to rivers. International Rivers, Oakland, CA.
International Rivers (2021) A Community Guide to River Protections: Rights of Rivers. International Rivers, Oakland, CA.
Jolly, Stellina & Menon, K.S. Roshan (2021) ‘Of Ebbs and Flows: Understanding the legal consequences of granting personhood to natural entities in India’. Transnational Environmental Law, 10(3) pp. 467-492.
O’Donnell, Erin (2020) Legal Rights for Rivers: Competition, collaboration and water governance. London: Earthscan.
Rochford, Francine (2024) Environmental Personhood (New Trajectories in Law Series); London: Routledge.
Spitz, Laura & Peñalver, Eduardo M. (2021) ‘Nature’s Personhood and Property’s Virtues’, Harvard Environmental Law Review, 45, pp. 67-97.
Wesche, Phillipp (2021) ‘Rights of Nature in Practice: A case study on the impacts of the Columbian Atrato River decision’, Journal of Environmental Law, 33, pp. 531-556.
List of topic areas
With its global outlook, and its concern to better understand the contemporary evolution and interaction of property ownership rights, land use governance and environmental regulation, JPPEL is particularly well-placed to be a forum for considering the forms and implications of emerging ‘Rights for Rivers’ advocacy, including examination of:
- What is the legal-philosophical basis for Rights for Rivers jurisprudence?
- This CFP uses the phrase ‘rights for rivers’ whilst others style the movement ‘rights of rivers’ – does this difference of conceptualisation reveal substantive difference of opinion about the origins, nature and durability of these rights?
- How valid is the critique that Rights for Rivers are needed because existing modes of river governance are ineffectual and/or destructive?
- How are Rights for Rivers schemes constituted and implemented?
- Does granting Rights for Rivers lead to any greater level of protection in practice?
- How (and who) can enforce Rights for Rivers?
- What are the disbenefits of the Rights for Rivers approach?
- How do cultural and/or geographical circumstances affect the fate and shape of any particular Rights for Rivers project?
- What other aspects of the natural world could also be protected via a Rights for Rivers-type approach?
Submissions Information
Submissions are made using ScholarOne Manuscripts. Registration and access are available here.
Author guidelines must be strictly followed.
Authors should select (from the drop-down menu) the special issue title at the appropriate step in the submission process, i.e. in response to "Please select the issue you are submitting to".
Submitted articles must not have been previously published, nor should they be under consideration for publication anywhere else, while under review for this journal.
Key deadlines
Opening date for manuscripts submissions: 1st August, 2024
Closing date for manuscripts submission: 12th January, 2025
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