A Constitution of Earth
Securing the earth and its biosphere as the foundation of all rights.
Initiated by Donald C. Jacob, the Constitution of Earth was symbolically founded at Unternehmen Mitte in Basel. Around 150 participants gathered on site and online, from countries across Europe and beyond, to begin a conversation that does not yet have an institutional home: how can the biosphere itself be granted constitutional standing?
Why a constitution for the Earth?
Modern constitutions protect the rights of citizens. They rarely protect the living system that makes those rights possible in the first place: the biosphere.
This gap is no accident. Most modern constitutions were drafted at a time when nature seemed boundless, external, and readily available. We no longer live in that era. Climate disruption, the loss of biodiversity, soil degradation, and the destabilisation of biogeochemical cycles are no longer abstract risks. They are the conditions within which all future law must be written.
A Constitution for the Earth proposes a simple but consequential shift: that the earth and its biosphere be recognised as a protected subject of law — not as property, not as resource, but as the foundation that makes every other right meaningful.
Proposal
The Constitution for the Earth proposed recognizing the biosphere as a constitutional asset of the highest order.
It did not propose a world parliament.
Nor did it propose an ecological dictatorship.
It did not call for the dissolution of national sovereignty either.
Rather, the proposal called for a democratic evolution for a finite planet, a framework that states, regions, cities, institutions, and organizations could voluntarily adopt into their own constitutional and legal systems.
Specifically, the proposal called for:
the recognition of the biosphere as a constitutionally protected asset of the highest order,
- independent institutions representing its interests;
- mandatory scientific review of decisions with significant ecological impacts;
- the right of qualified civil society actors to bring legal action on behalf of the biosphere.
The full text remains available as a discussion draft (Version 2.0).
Who
The initiative was launched by Donald C. Jacob, a Switzerland-based artist, landscape architect, ecologist, and author.
Accompanying publications:
— A Constitution for the Earth, oekom Verlag, Munich, 2022.
—The Earth as a Partner. BoD, 2026. ISBN: 9783695750337.
Further works by the initiator can be found at donaldjacob.ch.
Status
This page documents a draft for discussion. Its purpose is to stimulate a serious constitutional debate. While the initiative is no longer actively pursued as a movement, substantive feedback from the fields of public law, environmental law, constitutional law, Earth system science, and democratic theory may be incorporated into future versions.
Contact: dojacob@me.com
