Teresa Vicente led a historic, grassroots campaign to save the Mar Menor ecosystem—Europe’s largest saltwater lagoon—from collapse, resulting in the passage of a new law in September 2022 granting the lagoon unique legal rights. Considered to be the most important saltwater coastal lagoon in the western Mediterranean, the once pristine waters of the Mar Menor had become polluted due to mining, rampant development of urban and tourist infrastructure, and, in recent years, intensive agriculture and livestock farming.

Worried by the slow death of the Mar Menor, Teresa was moved to action after a mass fish die-off in 2019. She became convinced that the only way to give the lagoon a chance of survival was to grant it legal personhood and recognize its rights. “Rights of nature” has been proposed and debated for years, but the theory did not gain much traction until recently: Ecosystems in Latin America and New Zealand had been granted such legal rights but none in Europe. Despite being told by experts that it was impossible, Teresa pushed ahead.                       Courtesy of the Goldman Environmental Prize