Wildlife as Property Owners: A New Conception of Animal Rights
University of Chicago Press | 152 pages | 5-1/4 x 8-1/4 | © 2020
Reviews
“Highly Recommended”
— Forbes, Book Review
“In our time of rapidly shrinking animal habitats and threatened biodiversity, we urgently need new ideas. Karen Bradshaw has written a bold, exhilarating book that mines the traditional concepts of property law for new proposals about how humans can contribute to ethically defensible coexistence. This is the most original contribution to animal law in a long time.”
— Martha C. Nussbaum, Law School and Philosophy Department, The University of Chicago
“The central idea in Professor Bradshaw’s book — that wild animals should, and indeed do, hold natural property rights — initially sounds untenable. But when you hear her speak about the idea with such clarity, depth, and persuasiveness, it’s hard not to become a convert.”
— Doug Kysar, Yale Law School
“Bradshaw's Wildlife as Property Owners is a wonderfully fresh look at how humans impact the lives of nonhuman animals (animals). We are now deeply immersed in the Anthropocene, a period I like to call ‘The Rage of Inhumanity,’ during which we not only rob other animals of their very lives, but also steal their homes when it works for us with little concern for them. When nonhumans are granted the right to own their homes, rather than merely renting them from us, it will be a gamechanger for fostering coexistence in which they and we are partners, rather than adversaries.”
-- Marc Bekoff, University of Colorado, author of "The Animals' Agenda" and "Canine Confidential"
Media
Happy is an Elephant. Is She Also a Person
Jill Lepore, The Atlantic
Wildlife as Property Owners - Book Review
Grrlscientist, Forbes
Wildlife as property owners? An ASU law professor puts the theory to practice in Phoenix
Anton Delgado, Arizona Republic
Marc Bekoff, Psychology Today
Why Wild Animals Should Have Property Rights
Jack McCordick, Yale Law School News
Could Property Law Help Achieve ‘Rights of Nature’ for Wild Animals?
Claire Hamlett, The Revelator
Karen Bradshaw, Nautilus Magazine
Dan Barnette, Chico Enterprise-Record
Bradshaw on the Property Rights of Animals
Chris Odinet, PropertyProf Blog
Biodiversity Loss in a Corporate World, and Rays of Hope Down Under
Jareb Gleckel, One Green Planet
Opinion: The fox running onto the ASU football field symbolizes a larger issue
Alex Marie Solomon, State Press
18 Best New Animal Rights Books To Read In 2022
Kurt Braunohler, Roman Mars & Matthew D’ancona, Book Authority
Description
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.