South Korea seeks to protect threatened pod of dolphins by giving them the same legal rights as humans

Since 2023, South Korea’s largest island — Jeju Island — has been developing legislation to grant constitutional rights to approximately 120 Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphins in their coastal waters. It would be a first for the country in granting animals “legal personhood.” Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphins are listed as “near threatened” on the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN)’s Red List of Threatened Species.

For years, their populations have been declining due to runoff from fish farms, coastal erosion, noise pollution from construction sites, and entanglements from abandoned fishing gear.“Because the dolphins cannot cut the fishing lines themselves, we decided to cut them for them,” Jeongjoon Lee, a Korean director known as “Dolphin Man,” told The Guardian. “In one case, we had to cut wire from two different places, one was going in through the dolphin’s face to its body, and another from around its tail where it had become tangled.”As a filmmaker, Lee has been documenting the mounting threats against Jeju Island’s dolphins and has been at the forefront of granting them legal protection.

Currently, Jeju Island’s Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphins have some protective measures in place, including regulations which prevent more than two recreation boats from approaching within 100 meters of dolphins. But Lee doesn’t think it’s enough. “It is good that we now have a small space to begin to protect them more, but really we need to designate that whole side of the island as a protected area in order to keep them safe for the future,” he reasoned.

Miyeon Kim, who works at Marine Animal Research and Conservation, agrees. His nonprofit is responsible for identifying and naming the local dolphins, and he has also been leading the campaign to grant dolphins legal protection.Image via Serguei S.

Dukachev (CC BY-SA 3.0)“The idea is that if an individual or a company threatens their livelihood, then we could act on behalf of the dolphins to sue them or to take action in another way,” Kim said.“It’s important for us to be able to identify individual dolphins to be able to record scientific facts but it’s also important for the islanders,” he added. “People have to understand and really relate to endangered species in order for these [kinds] of things [establishing legal personhood] to work.” If the measure goes through, it would also establish funding support for the pod of dolphins, which would go towards habitat preservation, population monitoring, and emergency aid for injured dolphins.

If the measure passes, South Korea would join several other countries, including Ecuador and Argentina, in granting legal protection to wild animals. In 2024, Indigenous leaders of New Zealand, Tahiti and the Cook Islands also signed a treaty that recognized whales — which are considered sacred beings — as legal persons.The proposal in South Korea currently awaits review by the National Assembly’s Public Administration and Security Committee.

Fortunately, the bill has gotten a promising surge of support from government leaders in the past year. “The endangered Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphin, which has lived harmoniously with the haenyeo (female sea divers) in Jeju waters, is an important species that requires protection,” said Governor of Jeju Oh Young-hoon in the press release from the ministry.

“With supporters, the Jeju government will do its best to pass a revision to the Special Act on the Establishment of Jeju Special Self-Governing Province and the Development of the Free International City to designate Korea’s first eco-legal person.”‍You may also like: Sea cows have been protecting oceans for 'tens of millions of years' — and these newly uncovered fossils prove itHeader image via julie burgher (CC BY-NC 2.0)‍