Bétaille, Julien (2024) A Human’s Liberty to Protect Wild Animals – Challenging Nature Rights Dogmas and Renewing of European Environmental Legal Culture. Elni review, vol.24. pp. 21-23.

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Abstract

In October 2024, the Conseil d'Etat, France's supreme administrative court, ruled that the State's decision to allow the hunting of the rock ptarmigan, a species protected by the European directive on the conservation of wild birds, constituted a violation of the human right to the environment. This is breaking new ground. This directly contradicts the dogma of nature rights advocates, according to which the personification of nature is the only possible way to protect the intrinsic value of nature, environmental law being vitiated by its pseudo anthropocentric character.