The presentation explores the role of metaphors in international environmental law, focusing on kinship metaphors. The work argues that, in contrast to prevailing legal metaphors like property, public trust, and personhood, the use of kinship metaphors promotes notions of community, shared responsibility, subjectivity of nature, and intergenerational ethics.

By situating kinship within the context of legal pluralism and addressing the gaps and shortcomings of prevailing metaphors…

…using kinship metaphors ultimately helps to re-align legal principles with the urgent needs of the current planetary crisis.