The Law of Rivers in the Constitutional State of Rights and Justice

Abstract

This research article analyzes, through a qualitative critical methodology, judgment No. 32-17-IN/21, issued by the Constitutional Court of Ecuador against the indigenous Sumak Kawsay worldview, within a legal pluralism. The recognition of nature as a subject of rights; this being a great challenge of Andean ecological constitutionalism, characterized by a process of creation and application, within Ecuador, and that marks the emergence of an environmental protection paradigm contrary to the Western one, changing the anthropocentric legal vision to a biocentric approach, based on the balance between nature and humanity. The purpose of our article is to determine the relevance of the criteria of the constitutional court, its scope and application, on the declaration of unconstitutionality of articles 86 and 136 of the Environmental Regulation of Mining Activities (RAAM); these being contrary to the constitutional regulations. By starting from a recognition of rights to non-human entities until now excluded from legal thought, it allows to modify the form of the idea of ​​nature, managing to put the sumak kawsay into practice, promoting equity, social justice, pluralism, and democratization. In addition to leaving behind premises of economic progress on nature as an object, but a coexistence in which diversity is no longer the exception, but the rule. Latin America displays a new conceptualization of the emergence of a global ecological rule of law capable of moving the objectives of sustainable development towards a more holistic dimension, facing future challenges, as well as possible future risks. We use theoretical methods, synthetic analytical, exploratory in scope and descriptive in form with a qualitative approach and non-experimental design.