The De-Construction of Homo Sapiens to the Consolidation of Non-Human Animals as Subjects of Law: Is it a Question of Personality?

Abstract

Due to social progress equaling new organizations and juridical institutes derived from the advance of legislative innovations, deeper reflections on the re-significance of the concept of juridical personality are required. The latter is submitted to a de-linking of the prerogative of being the subject of law. There are several impairments in Brazilian Law from the anthropocentric point of view with regard to the supposed categorization of the person, providing the human being, from intrauterine life through birth, to maturity and adulthood, with an increasing juridical coverage, frequently highly controversial. If Private Law already acknowledges the status of law to the de-personified person (in the case of estate of the deceased), Public Law has acquired enormous strides, albeit controversial, towards the rights of animals, gifted with sensitivity. It tries to overcome the dilemma of a presumed anomalous juridical personality or simply their conditions of subjects of law for higher and more comprehensive protection. Current paper brings to the fore these issues on the new rights of animals.