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EXPERTISE & SERVICES

Our Expertise focuses exclusively on protecting the Ocean, including its interfaces with Human Rights and Climate law. 

Services: we conduct legal assessments, consult on marine protection issues, judicially  enforce marine protection obligations and advocate for new laws that recognise the intrinsic value of the Ocean. 

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OCEAN
LITIGATION

Image by Lachlan Dempsey

OCEAN RIGHTS

Ocean Litigation

OCEAN GUARDIANSHIP

Enforcing Existing Laws

We take direct legal action to hold (State) actors accountable for their marine protection obligations.

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Climate Litigation has already evidenced that judicial enforcement is the key element to making environmental protection effective. It caused a paradigm shift where scientific evidence began to be adhered to through judicial enforcement in courts. 

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UNCLOS and other international treaties already provide solid marine protection laws and the obligation of States to protect and preserve the marine environment is legally binding. 

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It is our Ocean Mission to create a wave of Ocean Litigation to safeguard the Ocean through law.

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Focus areas include but are not limited to:

  • The prohibition of bottom trawling in Areas Beyond National jurisdiction and EU waters;

  • The violation of Human Rights, including the Human Right to a Healthy Environment by potential deep seabed mining:

  • The designation of Marine Protected Areas in Antarctica.

Ocean Vision Legal is dedicated to legally enforcing States’ obligation to preserve and protect the marine environment and holding actors liable for this obligation.

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Our firm possesses unparalleled expertise in Ocean Litigation. Dr. Anna von Rebay represented clients in 80+ court proceedings before establishing how to hold States accountable for their marine protection obligations in her doctoral thesis. She is recognised as the leading expert for Marine Protection and Ocean Litigation by institutions such as the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea, where she is invited as a keynote speaker to share her expertise.

Advancing New Laws

We spearhead the development of new rights that recognise the intrinsic value of the Ocean and Nature.

 

Ocean Rights movement and are the leading experts in establishing and advancing alternative legal pathways to protect and restore Ocean health through Ocean Rights.

 

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Ocean Vision Legal is the central hub for implementing and enforcing Ocean Rights, pushing the development of an Ocean Rights Alliance, and coordinating, facilitating, and advocating Ocean Rights and Ocean for Ecocide Law frameworks.

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Ocean Rights is a lens through which the Ocean is recognised and respected as a living and interconnected entity with inherent rights and intrinsic value. The concept was coined in 2017 by Ocean Vision Legal’s Michelle Bender, building off the Rights of Nature (RoN) movement. Thereby, RoN and Ecocide are two sides of the same coin and give each other effect: like the crime of murder prevents the violation of the Right to Life, Ecocide prevents the violation of the Rights of Nature.

All life, including humanity, is inextricably linked with the health, integrity and functioning of the Ocean. Through Ocean Rights and Ecocide law, humanity can embrace and stimulate a reorientation of values and ethics towards more ecocentric forms of Ocean governance and management (i.e., humankind as one of many interdependent species on Earth).

Focus areas include but are not limited to:

  • Co-founder of The Ocean Rights Collective;

  • Developing the legal thought to advance and scale the innovative movement towards a Universal Declaration of Ocean Rights, or similar, by 2030;

  • Spearheading the implementation and enforcement of Ocean Rights and Ecocide through its application in the marine environment, including through marine protected areas (MPAs) and species protection;

  • Providing legal expertise to institutions, organisations and governments via litigation strategies and law and policy drafting to scale the Ocean Rights movement.

Supporting the communites most in need

We are the leading experts in establishing and advancing alternative legal pathways to protect and restore Ocean health through Ocean Rights (Rights of Nature) & Ecocide. 

Michelle Bender is the leading expert in Rights of Nature (RoN) and creator of the Ocean Rights framework. She has drafted laws in the USA, Panama, Aruba, Palau, and the Philippines.

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Our overarching aim is to use this expertise effectively by establishing Ocean Vision Legal as the central hub for implementing and enforcing Ocean Rights, pushing the development of an Ocean Rights Alliance, and coordinating, facilitating, and advocating Ocean Rights and Ocean for Ecocide Law frameworks.

EXAMPLES OF OUR WORK

"I fear not the man who has practiced 10,000 kicks once,

but I fear the man who had practiced one kick 10,000 times."

(Bruce Lee)

  • Advisory Opinions are given to international courts and tribunals to enforce the obligation of States to protect the marine environment.

  • Prohibition of Bottom Trawling in Areas Beyond National Jurisdiction.

  • Closing European waters for Bottom Trawling (Territorial Sea of Germany; EEZ of Germany) and enforcement of this.

  • The Designation of Marine Protected Areas in Antarctica.

The Rights of Nature movement has grown exponentially in the past 5 years: 200 laws, policies, and judicial decisions codifying the Rights of Nature exist in almost 40 countries. However, less than 5% explicitly refer to or are specific to, marine ecosystems or species. This is a significant and vastly important gap to address, as human well-being is inextricably linked with the Ocean's health, integrity, and functioning, which are all in decline. We are bridging this gap from the local to international level: local initiatives build grassroots momentum for state and international action while demonstrating the proof of concept, while international change is necessary to ensure uniform standards and accountability.

The ocean produces two-thirds of the world's oxygen and is its biggest carbon sink. Sea level rise and marine pollution are prone to affecting human health and the environment. Marine Protection is thus closely interrelated with other fields of law, such as Climate and Human Rights Law.

 

Examples of our work include but are not limited to: 

  • Advisory Opinion on Violating Human Rights, including the Right to a Healthy Environment, Rights of Nature, and Future Generations by Deep Sea Mining.

  • Communications Procedure to the Human Rights Council to stop Japan from dumping nuclear-contaminated wastewater from Fukushima into the Pacific Ocean. 

  • Workshops and Step-by-Step Guidelines on how to submit a Communications Procedure to the Human Rights Council.

  • Facilitating the development of a Universal Declaration of Ocean Rights.

  • Enforcing Rights of Nature and Ecocide before international Courts (see: Ocean Litigation Deep Sea Mining and Human Rights).

  • Establishing the legal framework for the Rights of the Harbour Porpoise in Germany, together with a campaign for the legal recognition of these Rights in the following years.

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