Wildlife as Property Owners: A New Conception of Animal Rights

Humankind coexists with every other living thing. People drink the same water, breathe the same air, and share the same land as other animals. Yet, property law reflects a general assumption that only people can own land. The effects of this presumption are disastrous for wildlife and humans alike. The alarm bells ringing about biodiversity loss are growing louder, and the possibility of mass extinction is real. Anthropocentric property is a key driver of biodiversity loss, a silent killer of species worldwide. But as law and sustainability scholar Karen Bradshaw shows, if excluding animals from a legal right to own land is causing their destruction, extending the legal right to own property to wildlife may prove its salvation. Wildlife as Property Owners advocates for folding animals into our existing system of property law, giving them the opportunity to own land just as humans do--to the betterment of all.


About the Author
Karen Bradshaw is professor of law and a Williard H. Pedrick Scholar at the Arizona State University Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law. She is also a faculty affiliate scholar with the Classical Liberal Institute at the New York University School of Law and a senior sustainability scientist at the Global Institute of Sustainability at Arizona State University. Bradshaw researches the intersection of property, administrative, natural resources, animal, and environmental law. She is coeditor of Wildfire Policy: Law and Economics Perspectives.