Earth Jurisprudence

Ian Mason

Published in Resurgence Magazine Marsch/April 2008

Humility, generosity, patience and restraint are the four pillars on which Earth Jurisprudence is founded. They will be the principles at the heart of the transition to climate stability, biodiverse environments and resilient livelihoods.

CONTEMPORARY PROBLEMS WITH climate change, loss of biodiversity and impoverished livelihoods are symptoms, not causes. The causes lie in the human psyche and result from losing connection with the natural world. Any strategy to resolve them requires the human race to reconnect with Nature in two ways: through the Earth in all its wonder, and through the spiritual wealth and beauty of human nature.

Earth Jurisprudence helps with both of these. Earth Jurisprudence is a philosophy of law that sees the Earth as the proximate teacher of a Great Jurisprudence in which the universe, not humanity, is the primary lawgiver. Where our technological culture and skill have persuaded us that humans are the masters of all things, Earth Jurisprudence invites humanity to engage as rational and loving participants in something much greater than we are.

Humility is therefore the first lesson of Earth Jurisprudence. This is the humility of the craftsman who surrenders to his materials, is guided by them and allows them to speak and sing for themselves; of the sculptor who finds and reveals the beautiful forms in the rock; of the teacher who finds and reveals the talents and strengths of her pupils and students; of the scholar who knows how little, not how much, we know of ourselves and this universe and contemplates their beauty and mystery in dumbfounded awe; of the lawyer who learns that law is discovered, not made, and that justice, not will, is the natural organising principle of human society and Earth community. It is the humility of the husbandman or woman who tends and cares for the soil and who loves its healthy and generous abundance.

Generosity is the second lesson of Earth Jurisprudence. Wherever we look Nature brings forth abundance. Everything is provided for through a wonderful web of giving and receiving, each as important as the other. To give and to give and to give is only to end up depleted and exhausted. To take and to take and to take is to end up engorged and even more exhausted. The natural balance is to give while receiving what is needed to be able to carry on giving. The economics of Earth Jurisprudence is not about scarce resources; it is about proper use, distribution and replenishment of natural abundance.

Patience is the third lesson of Earth Jurisprudence. In the universe and in Nature, everything comes in its own good time. Years follow the Earth round the sun, season following season with the tilt of the axis. Months and tides follow the moon; days and nights follow the spin of the Earth. Each has its own time providing activity and rest, harvest and replenishment, change and consistency, all in proper time.

With patience comes restraint, the fourth lesson of Earth Jurisprudence. This is how the natural balance of abundance is maintained. If any species, any person, takes more than its necessary due, there will be a shortfall somewhere. If the grasslands expand, forests and jungles contract; where the forests expand grasslands contract: each the inevitable counterpart of the other. Where human demands expand, Mother Earth’s other children lose their diversity and their livelihoods, and sooner or later people do too.

In civil affairs we take this law of restraint so for granted that we barely notice it. Human beings naturally live in human communities and that is only possible when we restrain our more aggressive tendencies. We are all moved, at times, by anger and fear, jealousy or desire but we are socially conditioned to restrain them in the interests of the human community. Such restraint in the civil sphere is the foundation of civil freedom. Earth Jurisprudence, the law of the Earth herself, teaches that similar restraint is a necessary condition of successful life in the community of Nature. It also teaches that Nature’s abundance is soon depleted if this condition is not observed. Just as in civil affairs, our freedom of action in Nature is curtailed by respect for a wider community.

IT IS NO mere coincidence that these lessons of Nature are also the lessons of so many traditions of spiritual wisdom. Human nature is part of the Nature of the universe, not separate from it. The very same principles that unlock and maintain the treasury of natural abundance also unlock the inner treasury of human nature. Shakespeare, through the voice of Henry V, was right to declare that “In peace there’s nothing so becomes a man as modest stillness and humility…” Human nature offers the deepest peace, the fullest understanding and the profoundest happiness and satisfaction to those who follow and practise these simple principles taught by Nature.

Earth Jurisprudence as a philosophy of law can be taken as a personal code of self-development and as a founding philosophy of law for societies. Communities and societies embed their understanding of life, Nature and the world around them in the laws and customs they adopt for themselves. In earlier times the philosophy, or jurisprudence, of Natural Law gave us principles of human rights and government which are embedded in modern ideals of democracy and the rule of law.

But Natural Law jurisprudence, at least in its later interpretations, was mostly about human nature and the relations between humans and God. Earth Jurisprudence adopts a wider view. Seeing a divine presence in every detail of the universe, it draws its principles and conclusions from Nature’s lessons about the interaction of humanity and the universe in the immediate context of the Earth. Even if it is not seen as manifesting divine presence, this context remains the same and equally valid.

Where Natural Law gave principles of human rights and of obligations of the powerful towards the weak, Earth Jurisprudence adds obligations to the natural world. Where Natural Law taught us not to discriminate unfairly between human genders and races, Earth Jurisprudence requires that we respect the integrity and intrinsic value of the Earth and all its species, affording them rights and protections where human carelessness, rapaciousness or ignorance places them under threat.

At the level of states, nations and governments, Earth Jurisprudence translates into what Cormack Cullinan has called Wild Law and which also appears as Community Ecological Governance. Wild Law is the practical application of Earth Jurisprudence principles in the human law-making process whether through customs, statutes, common law judgments or international instruments. Community Ecological Governance is the customary regulation of life that people find who listen to the voice of Nature.

In short, Earth Jurisprudence offers principles for a natural way of living. It works at the individual level by offering lifestyle choices based on humility, generosity, patience and restraint. It works at the level of law and policy by pointing decision-makers towards the needs of the whole natural world, enabling humans to live according to universal regulations. It works at the spiritual level by being attuned to the spiritual needs and aspirations of human nature in wholesome harmony with the natural and spiritual universe. Perhaps most importantly, it works at the human level by reminding us that the human and natural worlds can co-exist in a mutually enhancing partnership where we are truly friends of the Earth.

Ian Mason is a barrister who is also Head of Law and Economics at the School of Economic Science.

Schumacher College is part of the Dartington Hall Trust, a company limited by guarantee, registered in England and as a charity (company no. 1485560, charity no. 279756). Registered office: The Elmhirst Centre, Dartington Hall, Totnes, Devon TQ9 6EL, UK.