During October 2025, new guidelines on Environmental Protest and Civil Disobedience were released by Michel Forst, UN Special Rapporteur on Environmental Defenders under the Aarhus Convention.
The new guidelines aim to support states, civil society, environmental activists, and legal practitioners in understanding and implementing the rights guaranteed under the Aarhus Convention. The document underscores that individuals and groups have a recognised international right to engage in peaceful environmental demonstrations, even when challenging public or private actors whose practices may harm the environment.
The document outlines five guiding principles to help states ensure that peaceful environmental activism is respected, not repressed:
- Address the root causes of the protest: Governments should tackle the real reasons behind environmental protests, such as inaction on environmental protection, lack of transparency, or exclusion from decision-making.
- Reject criminalization of defenders: Authorities and media must stop portraying environmental activists as criminals and instead recognize their legitimate role in defending public interests.
- Protect civic space: Civil disobedience must not be used as a pretext to restrict fundamental freedoms or limit peaceful public expression.
- Ensure human rights–based policing: Law enforcement responses must be lawful, necessary, and proportionate — never arbitrary, excessive, or punitive.
- Uphold justice and civic freedom: Courts should avoid rulings or sanctions that discourage peaceful protest or shrink civic space.
Furthermore, the guidelines recognize that some environmental defenders may resort to civil disobedience when legal channels fail, and the guidelines set out conditions under which such acts may be tolerated (e.g., proportionality, non-violence, necessity, public interest). The guidelines stress the need for states to prevent and remediate retaliatory actions against protestors, such as legal harassment, surveillance, excessive use of force, or criminalisation of protest. The text encourages states to review and reform national laws, police protocols, and judicial practices to ensure that protest rights are respected, especially for environmental defenders, and it calls for transparent mechanisms to monitor how protests are handled, report abuses, and hold responsible persons and institutions to account.
The guideline highlights that public authorities (including political figures) should refrain from using language labelling protesters as threats, “eco-terrorists,” or “foreign agents”, and media (especially public or state media) should maintain factual accuracy, avoid derogatory language, and refrain from mischaracterising environmental defenders.
Guidelines on the Right to Peaceful Environmental Protest and Civil Disobedience – October 2025
This post was originally published on Hans Thoolen on Human Rights Defenders and their awards.