Conversely, in Western jurisprudence the emergence of the concept of environmental personhood can be traced to Christopher Stone’s seminal 1972 essay “Should Trees Have Standing?” in which the American professor argued that the natural environment as a whole should be granted rights15 and be empowered to institute legal proceedings in its own right through a guardian entity.16 This would enable courts to take injury to the environment into account and to award relief that would directly benefit the environment.17 Stone emphasized that environmental personhood was not as radical as it initially appeared, noting that the legal world is populated by inanimate rights-holders: “trusts, corporations, joint ventures . . . to mention just a few.”18 Stone further drew a parallel between granting rights to nature and the history of the conferral of rights on oppressed or minority groups in ways “theretofore, a bit unthinkable.”19