Should rivers have personhood?

River systems around the world are under stress from various factors ranging from pollution, to agriculture, to extractive industries. In some parts of the world there are regulations to help protect rivers, but in a lot of cases these are just preventative measures for a system already seriously degraded.

Another way to protect rivers which has been receiving attention is to give them legal rights, like those we associate with being a person. These rights could include the right to flow freely and the right to regenerate. Corporations have long been recognised as legal persons and increasingly this has been extended to environmental entities. There are different pathways to secure legal personhood, from changing a country’s constitution, to changing local law or to implementing a new ruling on an existing law, but as to whether any of these provide protection in practise, often depends on the way humans respond to the river. If a river can have rights and responsibilities, could they in turn face legal action from humans for failing to meet their own legal duties? Should rivers have personhood?

(Photo: A wide view of the Turag River in Dhaka, Bangladesh, lined with small boats in the foreground and a densely populated riverside settlement on the right bank. Homes and market stalls sit on raised wooden structures above the water, while the shoreline shows piles of debris and exposed earth. The water appears dark with scattered floating vegetation, and trees and buildings fade into a hazy background. Credit: Md Manik/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)

Contributors:
Prof Nick Mount, geographer and river scientist, UK
Dr Erin O’Donnell, author, senior lecturer and ARC research fellow, University of Melbourne Law School, Australia
Pier-Olivier Boudreault, director of conservation for the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society, a founding member of the Alliance Muteshekau-shipu, Quebec, Canada
Author and professor Naveeda Khan, Department of Anthropology, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, USA

Presenter: William Crawley
Producer: Jill Collins
Researcher: Katie Morgan
Technical producer: Craig Boardman
Production co-ordinator: Phoebe Lomas
Production management assistant: Liam Morrey
Editor: Tom Bigwood