Poacher pays? Judges' liability decisions in a mock trial about environmental harm caused by illegal wildlife trade

Conservation litigation applies environmental liability law to biodiversity conservation contexts—holding parties who harm biodiversity responsible for providing remedies such as restoration, compensation, apologies and investments into education and cultural activities. Many countries have enabling...

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Main Authors: Fajrini, Rika, Nichols, Rebecca Michelle, Phelps, Jacob
Other Authors: School of Social Sciences
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: 2022
Subjects:
Law
Online Access:https://hdl.handle.net/10356/155055
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Institution: Nanyang Technological University
Language: English
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spelling sg-ntu-dr.10356-1550552023-03-05T15:34:26Z Poacher pays? Judges' liability decisions in a mock trial about environmental harm caused by illegal wildlife trade Fajrini, Rika Nichols, Rebecca Michelle Phelps, Jacob School of Social Sciences Social sciences::Geography::Environmental sciences Conservation Litigation Law Environmental Governance Liability Judicial Decision-Making Illegal Wildlife Trade Conservation litigation applies environmental liability law to biodiversity conservation contexts—holding parties who harm biodiversity responsible for providing remedies such as restoration, compensation, apologies and investments into education and cultural activities. Many countries have enabling legislation, but these types of lawsuits are rare in most countries and have been infrequently used to protect biodiversity from drivers such as illegal wildlife trade. Yet, these types of cases could be strategically used to provide remedies for cases of egregious harm and help catalyze social change through the power of judicial decisions. The viability of future cases, however, relies heavily on the judges and juries who adjudicate cases. Rather than wait potentially decades for test cases to emerge to help evaluate the success of this strategy, we conducted mock trials and post-trial interviews with Indonesian judges (N = 32), a population that is rarely explored in conservation science. We presented them with a hypothetical civil lawsuit in a case of illegal tiger trade, which sought to hold the defendant liable for providing 11 different remedies to address the harm purportedly caused by their actions. The results show that judges were very amenable to providing remedies in this type of civil lawsuit; for eight of the 11 claims, over 60% of the respondents indicated each claim would be likely to be accepted. The results also highlighted six key themes important in judicial decision-making, which provide insights for practitioners developing future lawsuits. The results suggest a favorable setting for testing real-world application of liability laws to remedy biodiversity harm, which may become an important part of future environmental governance. Accepted version This work was funded by the UK Government through the Illegal Wildlife Trade Challenge Fund. 2022-02-03T08:18:06Z 2022-02-03T08:18:06Z 2022 Journal Article Fajrini, R., Nichols, R. M. & Phelps, J. (2022). Poacher pays? Judges' liability decisions in a mock trial about environmental harm caused by illegal wildlife trade. Biological Conservation, 266, 109445-. https://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2021.109445 0006-3207 https://hdl.handle.net/10356/155055 10.1016/j.biocon.2021.109445 266 109445 en Biological Conservation © 2022 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. This paper was published in Biological Conservation and is made available with permission of Elsevier Ltd. application/pdf
institution Nanyang Technological University
building NTU Library
continent Asia
country Singapore
Singapore
content_provider NTU Library
collection DR-NTU
language English
topic Social sciences::Geography::Environmental sciences
Conservation Litigation
Law
Environmental Governance
Liability
Judicial Decision-Making
Illegal Wildlife Trade
spellingShingle Social sciences::Geography::Environmental sciences
Conservation Litigation
Law
Environmental Governance
Liability
Judicial Decision-Making
Illegal Wildlife Trade
Fajrini, Rika
Nichols, Rebecca Michelle
Phelps, Jacob
Poacher pays? Judges' liability decisions in a mock trial about environmental harm caused by illegal wildlife trade
description Conservation litigation applies environmental liability law to biodiversity conservation contexts—holding parties who harm biodiversity responsible for providing remedies such as restoration, compensation, apologies and investments into education and cultural activities. Many countries have enabling legislation, but these types of lawsuits are rare in most countries and have been infrequently used to protect biodiversity from drivers such as illegal wildlife trade. Yet, these types of cases could be strategically used to provide remedies for cases of egregious harm and help catalyze social change through the power of judicial decisions. The viability of future cases, however, relies heavily on the judges and juries who adjudicate cases. Rather than wait potentially decades for test cases to emerge to help evaluate the success of this strategy, we conducted mock trials and post-trial interviews with Indonesian judges (N = 32), a population that is rarely explored in conservation science. We presented them with a hypothetical civil lawsuit in a case of illegal tiger trade, which sought to hold the defendant liable for providing 11 different remedies to address the harm purportedly caused by their actions. The results show that judges were very amenable to providing remedies in this type of civil lawsuit; for eight of the 11 claims, over 60% of the respondents indicated each claim would be likely to be accepted. The results also highlighted six key themes important in judicial decision-making, which provide insights for practitioners developing future lawsuits. The results suggest a favorable setting for testing real-world application of liability laws to remedy biodiversity harm, which may become an important part of future environmental governance.
author2 School of Social Sciences
author_facet School of Social Sciences
Fajrini, Rika
Nichols, Rebecca Michelle
Phelps, Jacob
format Article
author Fajrini, Rika
Nichols, Rebecca Michelle
Phelps, Jacob
author_sort Fajrini, Rika
title Poacher pays? Judges' liability decisions in a mock trial about environmental harm caused by illegal wildlife trade
title_short Poacher pays? Judges' liability decisions in a mock trial about environmental harm caused by illegal wildlife trade
title_full Poacher pays? Judges' liability decisions in a mock trial about environmental harm caused by illegal wildlife trade
title_fullStr Poacher pays? Judges' liability decisions in a mock trial about environmental harm caused by illegal wildlife trade
title_full_unstemmed Poacher pays? Judges' liability decisions in a mock trial about environmental harm caused by illegal wildlife trade
title_sort poacher pays? judges' liability decisions in a mock trial about environmental harm caused by illegal wildlife trade
publishDate 2022
url https://hdl.handle.net/10356/155055
_version_ 1759857305842614272