ABSTRACT
The Declaration on Great Apes follows declarations of human rights in another respect. The rights enshrined in all those declarations are to be exercised in a self-governing, sovereign nation-state. External sovereignty was taken to follow, logically, from internal: the right to internal self-determination lays upon others, externally, a duty not to interfere in that process. This chapter explores this wider claim for "sovereignty" for the great apes, in light of some current debates in political theory and of contemporary developments in the theory and practice of sovereignty. State sovereignty is, on one hand, undergoing erosion and attack, reevaluation and deconstruction. On the other hand, more would-be states are claiming sovereign status than ever before. Sovereignty in the traditional sense is also under political and theoretical challenge, it is time to ask how a proposal for simian sovereignty—for an internationally protected, autonomous territory for the great apes—might be implemented.
