As the waters of the 42-mile-long River Ouse ebb and flow through the historic town of Lewes, a recent summit convened with the mission to protect this freshwater ecosystem through rights-based conservation approaches. Local waterways, such as the River Ouse, are under immense pressure from pollution, development, change in climate and in land use. Yet, UK laws and regulations are failing to protect them. A passionate alliance of people has since been formed with the united purpose to consider how human impact on the River Ouse could be reconciled with its rights as laid out in a river charter.

Uniting forces for our Ouse

In March 2023, Lewes District Council  made a significant step by passing a motion and committing to explore the application of the Rights of Nature to the River Ouse. This marked a pivotal moment in history where the River Ouse could potentially be the first river ever to gain legal rights in the UK. The River Ouse Summit, held on 24 November 2023, orchestrated by Love Our Ouse with the support of Lewes District Council, the Environmental Law Foundation (ELF) and the Adur River Trust, posed a timely question: What should the Rights of the River Ouse Charter contain and how can it best be implemented?

The summit’s mission was to collaboratively gain ideas to draft a Declaration on the Rights of the Ouse and consider its implementation by convening local authority officers and councillors, local nature champions, recreation groups, academics, national press, land owners, utility companies, creative practitioners, lawyers, and engaged citizens, to share experiences and work together on developing the next steps for the Rights of the River Ouse Charter.

The River Ouse Summit: addressing rivers’ rights

Rights of Nature are an important legal mechanism as well as a political and social movement which challenge dominant human relationships with and perception of nature by recognising that nature has intrinsic value, or in other words value in itself and should be viewed beyond just its use as property or a resource for humans. Recognising the intrinsic value of nature challenges the ethical basis of law, policy and decision-making which fail to adequately protect the environment as illustrated by the intertwined biodiversity, climate and pollution crises we are currently witnessing. Viewing rivers as a legal entity possessing certain rights allows human perceptions to shift from the exploitative, hostile approach of treating nature as a mere ‘resource’ which promotes unsustainable use, extraction, and pollution, to a more regenerative system which respects nature and its rights. This approach is not as radical as it may seem, given that companies possess legal identity without being living entities, and given that it was not so long ago that women and persons of colour did not have legally recognised rights.

The River Ouse Summit began with guest speakers drawing on experiences, including granting legal rights to nature in other jurisdictions, notably in Ecuador, where nature’s rights are recognised in its Constitution. There was an interesting panel discussion addressing the rights of rivers set out in the Universal Declaration of River Rights, which illuminated six fundamental aspects: (1) Right to flow, (2) Right to perform essential functions within the river’s ecosystem, (3) Right to be free from pollution, (4) Right to feed and be fed from sustainable aquifers, (5) Right to native biodiversity, and (6) Right to regeneration and restoration.

A group of students and clinic co-lead Dr Joanna Smallwood from the ELF/University of Sussex Environmental Justice Law Clinic worked with students from Kings College London to help deliver four workshops. These workshops focused on what mechanisms were already available to implement river rights, what a Rights of River Charter should look like, who should speak on behalf of the river, and who to engage with and how.

Discussions then moved onto identifying appropriate guardians to represent the river's interests within law and decision-making processes, looking to guardianship models from other rivers such as Colombia’s River Atrato. Workshops considered how the Rights of the River would interact with existing legal frameworks and within decision-making processes. For example, new provisions under the Environment Act 2021 were highlighted, such as the enhanced biodiversity duty, environmental targets for biodiversity and waste water, conservation covenants and biodiversity net gain schemes as well as environmental land management schemes, where farmers are paid for environmental goods and services including in relation to positive land management for water bodies.

A summit of insights: navigating challenges and solutions for the future of our rivers

Questions emerged surrounding responsibility and representation, as various stakeholders from the local community, private and public landowners; local water associations and the wildlife and fish of the river as well as the river itself are involved and affected. It was suggested that implementation plans for different sectors such as agriculture, development and private land owners would be helpful so it is clear what different actors can do to further the Rights of the River. This suggestion of guidance was welcomed by local land owners and farmers. The complex issue of enforcement was also considered: should the Environment Agency, The Office of Environmental Protection, or Lewes District Council be responsible for enforcement, for example,? And what role could citizen science play in this regard?

We were lucky to be part of this groundbreaking summit and witness some great discussions. The development of the River Ouse Charter is looking very positive and an important step towards embedding the concept of Rights of Rivers into the UK’s legal system.

Written by by Milli Carroll, Rinad Hassan and Grace Bowman from the Environmental Justice Law Clinic at the University of Sussex together with SSRP Research Fellow Dr Joanna Smallwood (School of Law, Politics and Sociology, University of Sussex).