ABSTRACT

This chapter explores points of overlap and difference between two nascent legal disciplines, animal law and Wild Law. Animal law only emerged as a distinct discipline in the United States in the early 1990s, with much of the impetus coming from developments in other disciplines, especially the philosophical challenges to prevailing law posed by the animal rights arguments of Tom Regan, and by the utilitarian arguments of Peter Singer. Wild Law has emerged even more recently, with the publication in 2002 of the first edition of Cormac Cullinans Wild Law: A Manifesto for Earth Justice a defining moment, in turn building on the pioneering work in Earth Jurisprudence by Thomas Berry. The instrumentalist, property-based nature of the orthodox animal welfare model is clearly analogous to prevailing environmental regulation. While arguments challenging property are a key aspect of both Wild Law and animal law, the Wild Law approach seems much more thorough-going than that in much animal jurisprudence.