This short essay is interested in the idea of liberty, specifically individual liberty. The notion that freedom (and its correlating responsibility) is expressed and possessed by a single individual. Liberty is a key feature of legal personality. Human rights and (corporate) law protect various types of freedoms that are expressed by an individual. This notion that liberty can be atomised and placed in a single individual is essential to our current understanding of legal personality.

Legal definitions are extremely important. They set the rules of the game and draw the line that separates the players from the pieces. For example, any definition of legal personality has two main roles. First, it determines which beings can access the legal system as a person. Second, it outlines the rights and responsibilities of those legal persons within that legal system. 

In a recent Guardian article Cleodie Rickard describes the ECT as “fossil fuel companies’ secret weapon against national climate laws” (Rickard, 2023). The possibility of having to compensate fossil fuel companies with millions, if not billions, in taxpayers money has a ‘chilling effect’. An incentive is created for governments to maintain the status quo and prioritise the interests of corporations over climate justice matters and steps towards ecological transition.