Continental Law vs. Common Law Perspectives with Dr. Eva Bernet Kempers and Prof. Joe Wills
"... we will be discussing the different approaches towards animal rights in the common versus the civil law tradition."
Today, we would like to introduce you to week 4 of our upcoming online course “Contemporary Issues in Animal Rights Law”!
But before we do that, a quick heads-up that the International Centre for Animal Rights and Ethics will be taking an end-of year break from 23 December to 3 January.
So, this is our last newsletter for this year — see you in 2025!
Continental Law vs. Common Law Perspectives
In week 4 of our course, Dr. Eva Bernet Kempers and Prof. Joe Wills will co-teach a comparative analysis of the legal status of animals in continental (civil) and common law systems. They will explore how each legal tradition interprets and implements animal rights, using case studies to illustrate the evolving landscape.
Participants will examine the gradual (r)evolution of legal personhood for animals across different jurisdictions, gaining insight into the broader implications for Animal Rights Law and policy.
Here’s a brief introduction from Dr. Eva Bernet Kempers:
My name is Eva Bernet Kempers, and I'm a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Antwerp in Belgium. Apart from that, I also work as a Junior Research Associate at the Cambridge Centre for Animal Rights Law.
My research focus is in Animal Law, so quite a broad sense. I'm interested in many different topics relating to animals and the law. But my primary focus lies on the continental civil law tradition and the way in which the legal status of animals is given shape in this context of continental Europe.
I will be co-teaching this session with Associate Professor Joe Wills from the University of Leicester, and we will be discussing the different approaches towards animal rights in the common versus the civil law tradition. So this means that we will look into the differences and the commonalities and the different ways of thinking that the common law tradition has as compared to the civil law tradition. So this is also the reason that we'll be teaching this course together.
Professor Joe Wills is an expert in common law approaches and the common law status of animals as property, whereas I am more familiar with the civil law tradition in which you have much more statutory codification of the legal status of animals, for instance.
So I'm very much looking forward to sharing this topic with you all and discussing it and learning from each other and having an interesting conversation about this. So I hope to see you all in the course, Contemporary Issues in Animal Rights Law.
How can I sign up for this course?
You can sign up here: www.icare-animals.org/ciarl-course (we have 1 spot left).
Where can I find more information about this course?
You can read our previous Substack post, or go straight to our website. Our course booklet is available for download here.
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Here’s what you can expect:
Updates on our research, advocacy, and legal education programmes,
News about upcoming courses, seminars, and events,
Insights into our mission to reshape legal systems to protect animals.
We are building a community of passionate animal advocates, legal professionals, and academics dedicated to making a real difference for animals and their rights.
We would love for you to be part of it. Let’s connect, share ideas, and work together to create change!