Animal Welfare and International Environmental Law: From Conservation to Compassion

by Werner Scholtz
May 2019

At a time when the planet’s wildlife faces countless dangers, international environmental law continues to overlook its evolving welfare interests. This thought-provoking book provides a crucial exploration of how international environmental law must adapt to take account of the growing recognition of the intrinsic value of wildlife.

Animal Welfare and International Environmental Law offers compelling and timely arguments in favour of wildlife’s inherent worth and proposes a progressive development of the law in response to its needs and interests. Taking into account recent trends in bioethics and conservation, these critical discussions of wildlife welfare have dramatic implications for the future of sustainable development and sustainable use. The book challenges assumptions by taking a perspective which decentres the needs of humans and instead emphasises the growing need to protect wildlife with compassion and care.

This book will prove invaluable to both students and scholars of environmental law, animal law and international law more widely. It will also appeal to policymakers, legal scholars and NGOs dealing with the imminent needs of the earth’s wildlife.