Who we are
The Network is a hub for people across the UK working on Rights of Nature – through campaigns, research, and creative practice. We bring together academics, activists, creatives, organisers, and lawyers, whose work often blurs the lines between these fields entirely.
Our members are part of organisations including the Anima Mundi Law Initiative, ClientEarth, Ecoforensic, the Environmental Law Foundation, Lawyers for Nature, Love Our Ouse, Moral Imaginations, Opus Independents, the Pollen Project, and the Soil Association – alongside researchers and teachers at the Open University, SOAS, and the Universities of Cambridge, Essex, Dundee, Reading, Sussex, and Southampton. We're also closely connected to the emerging River Rights Network, and building relationships with related initiatives across the field.
In regular meetings, members share updates, collaborate across projects and organisations, and exchange understandings of what recognising the rights of nature could mean in the UK's particular social and political context.
We hold different, evolving theories of change, and find real strength in that difference. What unites us is a shared urge to see the Rights of Nature recognised here – and a recognition that doing so will reshape more than law. It will reshape culture.
You can read more about how we started, and our collectively developed Mission Statement, below.
How did the Network emerge?
How did the Network emerge?
The UK Rights of Nature Network began in early spring 2023, at a small convening catalysed by Paul Powlesland to create a shared space for people working on Rights of Nature across the UK. Phoebe Tickell went on to convene the group through regular calls, develop its network structure, and organise its first full gathering in July 2024. Over time, this loose group of peers grew into a supportive, multidisciplinary community – sharing ideas and news, collaborating on projects, and building a shared identity and common purpose.
In spring 2024, Phoebe was joined by Lucy Gavaghan, and together they organised a three-day retreat at Hazel Hill Woods for coordinated strategic and planning work. Phoebe became the founding director of the network, and Lucy the founding coordinator. They submitted a funding application to the Earth Funding Lab, securing support for the retreat and the network's ongoing coordination – laying the groundwork for the network as it exists today. After the retreat, they convened a board of members to help steer the network's direction. A year later, in September 2025, Lucy stepped down as coordinator and was succeeded by Thomas Rickard, who served as coordinator for three months.
Our Mission
This mission statement has been written as a collective to capture the essence of the Network and create a sense of lasting unity and guidance. We recognise the broad cultural implications of Rights of Nature recognition and are committed to building relationships of mutual respect and understanding within the UK RoN movement, spanning disciplines, and learning as we grow.
This statement starts with 5 shared, grounding values and follows with a set of 5 aims to be reflected in the actions taken as a group in the future.
Guiding values:
Interdependence: Humans are a part of nature, and not separate from it, living as part of an interdependent whole with other species and systems.
Intrinsic value: Efforts to protect and restore ecosystems and natural entities should be made for nature’s sake, and should not be solely premised on instrumental value such as property interest or the advantage of certain human groups. This is done alongside recognising the intrinsic value of humanity too.
Peace: Our efforts are made in pursuit of peace and harmonious coexistence throughout nature.
Diversity: We find strength in the diversity of individuals and groups forming the network and value the voices of all members.
Unity: The network operates collectively with integrity and honesty.
Guiding Aims:
Legal, socio-political and cultural reform: Implementing Rights of Nature as a tool for radical cultural and socio-political change and legal transformation.
Movement building: Creating a hub for UK-based people who are a part of the Rights of Nature movement to collaborate across disciplines and build the field.
Outreach: Growing the movement through educational content and communications geared to a range of groups in society.
Support: Providing support to values-aligned campaigns and grassroots activism.
Reflection: Exploring and engaging with the broader social and political implications of Rights of Nature recognition.
Coordination and Stewardship:
Jo Smallwood has a longstanding interest in nature conservation, animal rights and law, with a background as a solicitor specialising in environmental law. Her ESRC-funded PhD and postdoctoral fellowship at Sussex University focused on international biodiversity law implementation. Her recent book (Routledge, 2024) explores transformative environmental governance, and her current research centres on Rights of Nature frameworks in Brazil, Ecuador, Colombia and the UK. She co-leads the Environmental Justice Law Clinic at Sussex University and has received funding for transdisciplinary work on the rights of the Andean bear in Ecuador.
(Minimum Viable Board Member)
Since its emergence, each Network member has brought their own flair and experience to the group. The role of the coordinating team has been to provide organisational structure and create a space where this range of backgrounds and ways of thinking strengthens the movement from the inside out.
Phoebe Tickell coordinated regular meetings for over a year and orchestrated our first funding bid, becoming founding director of the network in July 2024. Lucy Gavaghan then provided support to deliver the first group gathering, joining as founding coordinator that September and working part-time until September 2025, facilitating a healthy rhythm of meetings, newsletters, and events. Thomas Rickard succeeded Lucy as coordinator, serving for three months.
An advisory board was formed at the first retreat in July 2024, made up of Patrick Andrews, Marzia Briel, and Tom Brenan. Patrick was later succeeded by Joanna Smallwood, who was in turn succeeded by Severine Saintier. This board is referred to as the 'minimum viable board', or MVB.
Tom Brenan is a qualified solicitor and acts as Co-Director of Environmental Law Foundation, and its Head of Education & Policy. He is responsible for ELF’s University network and Young ELF programme. He has also worked with the National Trust, the Gaia Foundation, WinACC, and the Biodynamic Land Trust. A keen permaculturalist, grower, and Rights of Nature advocate, Tom seeks to tread a more Earth-centred path. He maintains one hand in the soil and the other in the law.
(Minimum Viable Board Member)
Thomas Rickard is an independent researcher and facilitator specialising in participatory environmental governance, with a particular focus on river management, rights of nature, and innovative approaches to human and more-than-human participation. He holds a Masters and PhD in the Analysis and Modelling of Environmental Systems from the Federal University of Minas Gerais, Brazil, complemented by training in systems thinking, ecological design, and environmental narrative analysis.
(Network Interim Coordinator)
Lucy Gavaghan is an organiser and researcher with a degree in International Law and International Relations. In 2022, she founded the pollen project, an independent storytelling initiative. Lucy takes a systems approach and works with international and regional nature-based networks to design creative ways of processing and responding to complex, interconnected, crises. Discussions of nature-connectedness and climate breakdown need to be more accessible. For that reason, inclusion and accessibility must be at the core of our work.
(Network Founding Coordinator)
Phoebe Tickell is a scientist, systems thinker, and founder and director of Moral Imaginations, a non-profit catalysing regenerative futures by igniting humanity's moral imagination. Moral Imaginations works shifts worldviews to centre nature, future generations, and an equitable future for all. The organisation pioneered the first more-than-human perspective into UK government policy-making and created a functioning more-than-human citizens assembly. In 2022, its award-winning collaboration with Camden Council embedded moral imagination as a practice into council leadership and strategy.
(Network Co-initiator and Director)
Marzia Briel-Barr is a qualified South African Attorney specialised in Commercial Law, bringing over 15 years of global regulatory and governance experience to Academia. With career experience in Legal, Compliance, Regulation and Governance roles, first in financial services but more recently in the Public Science and Engineering sector. The key themes of her academic research include nature-centric Governance ecosystems, AI Regulation, Intellectual Property and Research Policy.
(Minimum Viable Board Member)