ABSTRACT
The longest chapter in this book examines the sensitive question of rights in conflict and particularly the potential and actual clashes between biodiversity rights, animals rights and human rights. Animals rights – the rights of individual and particularly sentient animals – can clash with biodiversity rights when for instance invasive species are killed to restore a natural ecosystem (particularly if animals are killed in order to protect plants, such as clearing non-native rabbits to protect native vegetation). Clashes with human rights are even more sensitive, such as imposing limits on what people do or where they live in the name of species or ecosystem conservation. Almost everyone who supports biodiversity rights is likely to support some aspects of animal and human rights but the relative importance given to the three differs between individuals. Flashpoints, like dispossession of people from protected areas are discussed, along with the question of if and when eating meat undermines biodiversity rights and the biodiversity rights implications of trophy hunting. The chapter also discussed if all species are equal, the rights of non-native species and the balance between species and ecosystem rights, with reference to rewilding.
