LUMEN Hybrid Conference - November 2024

LUMEN Hybrid Conference on "Law of nature and human ecosystem approach: modelling a transcultural ecolegal framework" - Florence, November 19-20, 2024

On November 19 - 20, 2024, the LUMEN Hybrid Conference for early career legal scholars will be held online and in person at the University of Florence (Italy).

The theme of the LUMEN Hybrid Conference will be: “Law of nature and human ecosystem approach: modelling a transcultural ecolegal framework”. Adequate solutions to the ecological crises of our time cannot be found in current environmental legislation without a paradigm shift towards a holistic vision of the relationship between humans and Nature. Recognising and applying holistic approaches to the protection of the Earth requires a strong commitment from legal scholars to rethink traditional legal concepts and adapt them to the complex reality in which we live. Balanced relationships between humans and Nature are encoded in the ancestral cultural and legal traditions of indigenous peoples and local communities around the world. At present, several international documents point to the need to experiment with holistic approaches in order to achieve transformative changes in the way societies relate to ecosystems. From this perspective, a thorough reflection on the legal implications of the ecosystem approach or other holistic approaches can provide the basis for establishing a credible and sustainable governance of the Earth system.

Guest Speakers LUMEN

Guest speakers of the event are Michele Carducci from the University of Salento, Federica Costantini from the University of Bologna, and Ramiro Ávila Santamaría from the Universidad Andina Simón Bolívar-Sede Ecuador.

Ramiro Ávila Santamaría holds a PhD in Legal Sociology from the University of the Basque Country. Master of Law from Columbia University (New York). Master in Legal Sociology from the University of the Basque Country-International Institute of Legal Sociology (Oñati). Lawyer and graduate in Legal Science from the Pontificia Universidad Católica del Ecuador (PUCE). Professor of Law in the Universidad Andina Simón Bolívar-Sede Ecuador directs the Law Area and coordinates the international Master’s Degree in Law Research.

Michele Carducci is a full professor of Comparative Constitutional Law and the holder of the course on Comparative Law of Climate Change at the University of Salento, where he coordinates the Euro-American Research Center on Constitutional Policies and the Ecological Analysis of Law Laboratory. He has served as a reviewer for the IPCC and currently acts as an "amicus" in Italian and international climate litigation, supporting networks of lawyers and activists.

Federica Costantini is Associate Professor at the University of Bologna, conducts his research in marine ecology. Research interests focus on the study and conservation of marine biodiversity using taxonomy approaches and molecular techniques. The research goal is to strengthen research at the interface between ecology, management, and environmental conservation to ensure that knowledge of marine processes and anthropogenic impacts is disseminated throughout society and gains an increasing role in decision-making processes. She participates in several national and European research projects. Author of many publications in international scientific journals. Has taken part in many international and national conferences and leads the Ecological and Environmental Genetics Laboratory of the Department of Biological, Geological, and Environmental Sciences, University of Bologna.

The LUMEN Hybrid Conference will explore whether and to what extent the ecosystem approach or other holistic approaches as well as principles, normative solutions or judicial decisions can be used as the backbone of a comprehensive transcultural and transnational eco-legal system, through a narrative that includes national or local experiences, legal traditions or legal cultures. Original case studies, in a comparative or national perspective, from around the world on: circulation of eco-legal formants and theories; legal provisions or court decisions related to the ecosystem approach or other holistic approaches (e.g. One Health approach focused on ecosystems, nature-based solutions, etc.); legal provisions or court decisions related to rights of Nature or ecological human rights or ecological minimum standards; emerging principles (e.g. resilience, ecological integrity, pro natura, DNSH, etc.); methodologies for ecological analysis of the law; new tools for public and inclusive participation, including the voices of Nature or future generations; or any other issue of ecological constitutionalism from a comparative or national perspective, should demonstrate how the law can contribute to building a comprehensive and holistic response to safeguard the “higher interest” of the interconnected globe and all its human and non-human components.

The event will host additional selected speakers following the LUMEN call for papers from previous months, together with the Principal Investigators of the LUMEN Project, such as Silvia Bagni from University of Bologna, Veronica Federico from University of Florence, and Serena Baldin from University of Trieste.

The conference will take place at the University of Florence and online.

The event will take place at the University of Florence and online.

CONFERENCE AGENDA

November 19, 2024

16.00-18.00 - Opening lectures
Chair: Veronica Federico
Silvia Bagni – Lumen: the research and the theoretical framework.
Michele Carducci - L'analisi ecologica del diritto.
Federica Costantini - Biodiversity conservation to enforce nature’s contribution to people.

November 20, 2024

9.00 Welcome

9.15-10.00 – Keynote Speech
Chair: Silvia Bagni
Ramiro Ávila Santamaría - The rivers of the cities have rights: The case of the Machángara River in Quito.

10.00-10.30 Coffee break

10.30-12.00 Panel Session I – The ecosystem approach as paradigm shift
Chair: Laura Magi
M. Carlsson Kanyama - Can restoration as a more-than-human right repair lake Vättern?
I. Costanzo - From sustainable development to ecological integrity: sparse signals of a comprehensive paradigm shift in EU and Italian environmental law.
A. D’Andrea - Overcoming capitalist economics and the appropriation of common resources. The role of the constitutionalisation of the rights of nature in Ecuador for a new eco-legal framework.
F. Gallarati - Ecosystemic rights: rethinking environmental human rights from a holistic perspective.

12.00-13.30 Panel Session II – The ecosystem approach in bottom-up experiences & rights of non-human animals
Chair: Serena Baldin
E. Canal - How can the concept of forestizenship contribute to the bottom-up construction of a plurinational state based on the Sumak Kawsai? An indigenous perspective.
R. Cecchi - Collective property in the “non-occidentalist west”. A case study in Italy.
S. Zanini - The relevance of non-human animals in the ecocentric and anthropocentric legal perspective.
A. Berti Suman, M. Grasso & D. Delatin Rodrigues - The role of agents of carbon transformation in destabilizing and disrupting the fossil bloc from below.

13.30-14.30 Lunch break

14.30-16.00 Panel Session III – The ecosystem approach challenges to environmental law
Chair: Anna Pettini
L. Dalla Riva - The ecologization of environmental protection in the Brazilian federalism: an analysis based on the theory of legal formants.
J.A. Maldonado Andreu - From extraction to exclusion: colonial obstacles to an ecosystem approach in Puerto Rico’s environmental law.
D. L. Noguera Santander - The Katsa-su territory of the Awa indigenous people as a victim of the armed conflict in Colombia: a transcultural and interjurisdictional contribution to the rights of nature.
J. F. Sánchez Jaramillo - Ancestral and earth law knowledge: intercultural legal practice as foundation for Mother Earth rights.

16.00-17.30 Panel Session IV – The ecosystem approach and the Courts
Chair: Maria Stella Rognoni
A.M. Amaya-Arias - Tools for the judicial application of the non–regression principle Non–regression principle, emerging environmental law principles, environmental justice, judicial tests, ecological and legal standards.
D. Cordero-Heredia & J. Ortiz Pachar - How genetic information of a spices could help to protect nature in courts: the case of the sea cucumbers in the Galapagos Islands.
C. Giannaccari - Non-individualistic view of human nature and sustainable development. Perspectives from Global South.
A. Pedrolli - After the Los Cedros ruling. The impact of rights of nature on the social context.

17.30 – Closing remarks
Silvia Bagni, Veronica Federico

Attend in person

Università degli Studi di Firenze, Campus delle Scienze Sociali, Room D4/0.05 & D15/0.05

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PRIN 2022 PNRR “LUMEN - Law of nature and human ecosystem approach: modelling a transcultural eco-legal framework”, P.I. prof.ssa S. Bagni, Università degli Studi di Bologna, finanziato dall'Unione Europea – NextGenerationEU a valere sul Piano Nazionale di Ripresa e Resilienza (PNRR) – Missione 4 Istruzione e ricerca – Componente 2 Dalla ricerca all’impresa – Investimento 1.1, Avviso PRIN 2022 PNRR DD n. 1409 del 14 settembre 2022, codice proposta P20222H49L – CUP J53D23018680001.