Editorial Animal rights: interconnections with human rights and the environment 1 THE EMERGENCE AND MAINSTREAMING OF LEGAL ANIMAL RIGHTS Legal animal rights are on the horizon. 1 Not too long ago, the notion of animals as holders of legal rights still seemed utopian to most. However, the idea of animal rights is not novel; it finds its early roots in the works of philosophers and social reformers such as Jeremy Bentham 2 and Karl Christian Friedrich Krause. 3 Since the advent of modern animal ethics in the late 1970s, sparked notably by Peter Singer, 4 animal rights have become widely theorized and popularized in moral philosophy. Though it has taken several decades for these philosophical developments to be reflected in legal arenas, the landscape has started to shift. Animal law, and the corresponding academic field of legal animal studies, is flour- ishing. There is now a lively scholarly debate dedicated to establishing, elaborating, and advancing the theoretical foundations and practicability of legal animal rights. Moreover, animal rights are gradually beginning to emerge and solidify in case law. Most notably, courts in Argentina 5 and Colombia 6 have extended the constitu- tional human right to habeas corpus and the underlying right to freedom to captive animals. Furthermore, courts in India have developed case law recognizing a range of fundamental rights of animals, among them the right to life, dignity, and freedom from torture. 7 And in May 2020, the Islamabad High Court, too, recognized legal animal rights and, moreover, linked the protection of animals to the human right to life in light of the current pandemic crisis, which has highlighted the ‘interdependence of 1. S Stucki, ‘Towards a Theory of Legal Animal Rights: Simple and Fundamental Rights’ (2020) 40 OJLS. 2. J Bentham, An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation (T Payne and Son, London 1789). 3. KCF Krause, Das System der Rechtsphilosophie (herausgegeben von KDA Röder) (Broc- khaus, Leipzig 1874). 4. P Singer, Animal Liberation (HarperCollins, New York 1975). 5. Tercer Juzgado de Garantías de Mendoza 3 November 2016, Expte Nro P-72.254/15. 6. Corte Suprema de Justicia 26 July 2017, AHC4806-2017 (MP: Luis Armando Tolosa Vil- labona). This ruling was later reversed. Corte Suprema de Justicia 16 August 2017, STL12651- 2017 (MP: Fernando Castillo Cadena). In January 2020, the Constitutional Court of Colombia decided against granting habeas corpus to the animal in question. 7. See, notably, Supreme Court of India 7 May 2014, civil appeal no 5387 of 2014; Kerala High Court 6 June 2000, AIR 2000 KER 340; Delhi High Court 15 May 2015, CRL MC no 2051/2015. Journal of Human Rights and the Environment, Vol. 11 No. 2, September 2020, pp. 149–155 © 2020 The Author Journal compilation © 2020 Edward Elgar Publishing Ltd The Lypiatts, 15 Lansdown Road, Cheltenham, Glos GL50 2JA, UK and The William Pratt House, 9 Dewey Court, Northampton MA 01060-3815, USA Downloaded from Elgar Online at 09/30/2020 08:53:06PM via free access