Can a river have the same legal rights as a human?
In short: Water is the fundamental requirement for life, yet our current legal systems treat it as a mere commodity. Legal scholar Kelsey Leonard argues that we must shift this paradigm by granting water bodies legal personhood to fundamentally transform how society values and protects our most vital resource.
Currently, water is largely unprotected by the law, a status that leaves many communities struggling without access to safe drinking water. This lack of legal standing means that water bodies are often treated as property rather than entities with inherent value. Kelsey Leonard, a legal scholar and water policy expert, proposes a radical shift: granting lakes and rivers 'personhood.' This would provide water bodies with the same legal rights as humans, creating a framework where they can be defended in court as living entities rather than just resources to be extracted.
The movement toward legal personhood is rooted in a need to protect coastal and freshwater resources from degradation. This viewpoint is shaped by Leonard's experience; she holds a role as Tribal Co-Lead for the Mid-Atlantic Committee on the Ocean and sits on the International Joint Commission's Great Lakes Water Quality Board. McMaster University granted her a PhD in Comparative Public Policy, during which she investigated the governance, territorial, and climatic foundations of water security for Indigenous peoples.
By establishing these rights, the goal is to move beyond reactive conservation toward a proactive, systemic transformation of water governance. It challenges the human-centric view of the environment, suggesting that if we recognize water as a legal person, we can better ensure its survival for future generations. This approach seeks to bridge the gap between the biological necessity of water and its current, often neglected, legal status.
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Sources
- Summary by Intellect · source: Why lakes and rivers should have the same rights as humans | Kelsey Leonard
- Also: Kelsey Leonard: What If Lakes And Rivers Had Legal Rights?
- Also: Why Lakes and Rivers should have the same Rights as Humans - MAHB
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