Alejandra Mancilla

• Mancilla, Alejandra (2025). Effective deoccupation: Towards Responsible Guardianship of Nature. Political Philosophy. 2(2), p. 450–472. doi: 10.16995/pp.23671. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  The doctrine of effective occupation was developed by colonial powers to justify their sovereignty over newly annexed territories and was measured by animus occupandi, the will to be sovereign; and corpus occupandi, the exercise of sovereignty, both specified by the colonizers themselves. While effective occupation over humans ended through the global decolonization movement, it remains the default for nature under the doctrines of Permanent Sovereignty over Natural Resources (PSNR) and the resourcist interpretation of Common Heritage of Mankind (CHM). Here I contend that nature still suffers the harms of colonialism through dispossession, exploitation, and domination. I propose a transition to effective deoccupation, measured by animus deoccupandi (the will to cultivate a well-informed, attentive and respectful relationship with nature), and corpus deoccupandi (the replacement of PSNR and CHM with Responsible Guardianship, with states as fiduciaries of planetary nature). I offer a preliminary sketch of what this would require, address objections, and conclude.

• Mancilla, Alejandra & Roberts, Peder (2024). Introduction : What colonialism tells us about Antarctica, and what Antarctica tells us about colonialism. In Roberts, Peder & Mancilla, Alejandra (Ed.), Colonialism and Antarctica : Attitudes, logics, and practices. Manchester University Press. ISSN 9781526170644. p. 1–29. Full text in Research Archive
• Baard, Patrik & Mancilla, Alejandra (2024). Outlining three arguments for Rights of Antarctica. The Polar Journal. ISSN 2154-896X. p. 1–20. doi: 10.1080/2154896X.2024.2414646. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  In this article, we investigate three arguments for Rights of Antarctica (RoA), understood as recognising the whole continent as a rights-holder with legal standing. For this, we draw inspiration from the Antarctica Declaration, a text developed by an interdisciplinary and international group of scholars and activists. We scrutinise three justifications that could potentially be used in support of RoA. First, we investigate whether arguments for Rights of Nature (RoN) elsewhere can support RoA. RoN has been accepted in several domestic legislations. Unfortunately, we discover important disanalogies between RoA and RoN, defeating the purpose of justifying RoA with reference to RoN. Second, we scrutinise potential arguments that focus on giving rights to specific Antarctic ecoregions or places. However, such arguments would only cover parts of the continent, thus going against the holistic approach of RoA, and they would require using a broader understanding of ‘attachments’ as grounds for justifying rights for parts of Antarctica. In contrast, we construct an argument for accepting RoA based on four components: (1) Antarctica’s intrinsic value, (2) wider forms of human attachments, (3) Antarctica’s substantial role as a global systemic resource, and (4) the fact that Antarctica is under recurrent and substantial threats. While none of these are individually sufficient for recognising RoA, they can jointly make RoA appropriate. We conclude that it remains an open question whether international law or, more specifically, the Antarctic Treaty, would be open to such conceptual and normative innovation, adopting a new paradigm in our treatment of the nonhuman natural world. At the same time, we hope to kickstart a discussion of what RoA would require and how it should relate more generally to RoN discourses.

• Mancilla, Alejandra & Baard, Patrik (2023). Climate justice and territory. Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Climate Change (WIRESs). ISSN 1757-7780. doi: 10.1002/wcc.870. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  The territorial impacts of climate change will affect millions. This will happen not only as a direct consequence of climate change, but also because of policies for mitigating it—for example, through the installation of large wind and solar farms, the conservation of land in its role as carbon sink, and the extraction of materials needed for renewable energy technologies. In this article, we offer an overview of the justice-related issues that these impacts create. The literature on climate justice and territory is vast and spans a range of disciplines, so we limit our discussion to a specific understanding of territory and a specific understanding of injustice that arises from its loss. We understand territory as a normative concept that describes a place under some agent's jurisdiction, where the agent is a politically organized collective and where the jurisdictional rights over that place secure a relevant degree of self-determination for that collective. Accordingly, we consider that the main injustice connected to the loss of territory due to climate change is the loss or undermining of the ability to exercise the collective right to self-determination, which requires some control over the place. This can happen if a territorial agent literally loses the ground where to stand as a direct effect of climate change, raising issues of justice in relocation; or if their place changes due to mitigation policies, affecting their use and understanding of territory, raising issues of justice in energy transition. In concluding, we point to topics for future research.

• Mancilla, Alejandra (2023). Migration and Poverty. In Schweiger, Gottfried & Sedmak, Clemens (Ed.), The Routledge Handbook of Philosophy and Poverty. Routledge. ISSN 9780367750992. p. 457–464. doi: 10.4324/9781003162926. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  In this chapter, an overview of the main answers that contemporary political theorists in the analytic tradition have given to the following questions is offered: (1) Do states have a right to exclude poor foreigners, and if so, what are the limitations of this right? (2) May relaxing or tightening border controls be actively used as tools for the eradication of global poverty? (3) Is the methodological framework used to discuss these questions appropriate? After pointing to some problematic aspects of the current debate (methodological nationalism, artificial abstraction from the context, ahistoricism), it is concluded that the migration of poor people needs to be conceptualized differently, in a way that is more sensitive to the specificities of each case and more alert to upcoming challenges, such as environmental displacement.

• Mancilla, Alejandra & Jabour, Julia Ann (2023). Turned 60, is the Antarctic treaty system in good health? Geographical Journal. ISSN 0016-7398. 189(1), p. 2–6. doi: 10.1111/geoj.12501. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Signed in 1959, the Antarctic Treaty is usually hailed as an example of what states can achieve when they leave aside their interests and truly collaborate. It was over 30 years ago, however, that the last significant legal instrument of the Antarctic Treaty System (namely, the Protocol on Environmental Protection) was signed. Since then, no new legal instruments have been drafted, despite a number of growing internal and external challenges. In this special issue, an interdisciplinary group of scholars examine some of these challenges and evaluate whether the system is well prepared to tackle them. Their point of agreement is that, if not severely ill, the system's chronic ailments—particularly laggardness—must be addressed if it is to respond satisfactorily to rapid social, political, environmental and economic changes on a global scale.

• Mancilla, Alejandra (2022). South American claims in Antarctica: colonial, malgré tout. The Polar Journal. ISSN 2154-896X. 12(1), p. 22–41. doi: 10.1080/2154896X.2022.2062558. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Argentina and Chile, known in the world of Antarctic politics as the ‘South American claimants’, have shown themselves since the inception of their interests in the White Continent as standing alone and in opposition to the advances of the colonial powers of the North – especially the United Kingdom. As Shirley Scott has suggested, while the UK was busy staking claims over Antarctica and treating it as terra nullius, Argentina and Chile ascertained what they took to be their historical rights to the continent, inherited from the time when they were Spanish colonies. In this article, I support Argentina’s and Chile’s contention that the attitude and procedure followed by the other claimants to the continent was unequivocally colonial, but I reject their contention that theirs was not. I examine four sites where their colonial spirit is revealed: their use of the geographic doctrines of continuity and contiguity, and of the sector principle; the appeal to historic rights inherited from the time when they were Spanish colonies; their expansion to Antarctica through the establishment of military settlements, and their underlying economic and strategic interests, no different from their ‘Northern’ counterparts. I then point to some specific and general implications of reinterpreting their story in this light.

• Mancilla, Alejandra (2021). Greening Global Egalitarianism? Global Justice: Theory Practice Rhetoric (TPR). p. 99–114. doi: 10.21248/gjn.13.01.185. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  In Justice and Natural Resources: An Egalitarian Theory (2017), Chris Armstrong proposes a version of global egalitarianism that – contra the default renderings of this approach – takes individual attachment to specific resources into account. By doing this, his theory has the potential for greening global egalitarianism both in terms of procedure and scope. In terms of procedure, its broad account of attachment and its focus on individuals rather than groups connects with participatory governance and management and, ultimately, participatory democracy – an essential ingredient in the toolkit of green politics and policy-making. In terms of scope, because it does not commit itself to any particular moral framework, Armstrong’s theory leaves the door open for non-human animals to become subjects of justice, thus extending the realm of the latter beyond its traditionally anthropocentric borders. I conclude that these greenings are promising, but not trouble-free.

• Mancilla, Alejandra (2021). From Sovereignty to Guardianship in Ecoregions. Journal of Applied Philosophy. ISSN 0264-3758. p. 1–16. doi: 10.1111/japp.12561. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Recent scientific studies suggest that the destabilisation of the earth's climate and biodiversity loss are not separate, but interdependent phenomena. In this context, some have proposed the creation of a ‘Global Safety Net’ of ecoregions that should be preserved to stop further biodiversity loss, preventing at the same time the growth of CO2 emissions produced by deforestation and allowing natural carbon removal. In this article, I suggest that a first step to achieve this might be to replace permanent sovereignty over natural resources in these areas with permanent guardianship. I propose to take some inspiration from a model that has already been implemented over an entire continent with a fair degree of success. In 1959, the Antarctic Treaty froze the sovereign claims of seven countries over Antarctica. However, these countries plus 47 others today have been remarkably successful at jointly preserving the continent for peace, science, and the protection of the environment, especially since the signature of the Environmental Protocol in 1991. After outlining some principles that could give form to a Global Environmental Protocol for Ecoregions, I address a series of objections and offer some concluding remarks.

• Mancilla, Alejandra (2021). A 60 años del Tratado Antártico: Cuatro miradas críticas. Revista Estudios Hemisféricos y Polares. p. 1–5. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Desde la historia, la filosofía y el derecho, los artículos del siguiente número especial examinan -a 60 años desde su entrada en vigor- diferentes aspectos del Tratado Antártico y su evolución.

• Mancilla, Alejandra (2020). Decolonising Antarctica. In Hemmings, Alan & Bunikowski, Dawid (Ed.), Philosophies of Polar Law. Routledge. ISSN 9780429461149. p. 49–61. Full text in Research Archive
• Mancilla, Alejandra (2020). Necessity Knows No Borders: The Right of Necessity and Illegalized Migration. In Mäkinen, Virpi; Slotte, Pamela; Robinson, Jonathan William & Haara, Heikki (Ed.), Rights at the Margins: Historical, Legal and Philosophical Perspectives. De Gruyter Brill. ISSN 9789004416772. p. 212–231. Full text in Research Archive
• Mancilla, Maria Alejandra (2020). Occupancy rights: dynamic as well as located. Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy (CRISPP). ISSN 1369-8230. p. 765–772. doi: 10.1080/13698230.2020.1797389. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Anna Stilz’s Territorial Sovereignty (2019) aims to be a revisionist account of territorial rights that puts the value of individual autonomy first, without giving up the value of collective self-determination. In what follows I examine Stilz’s definition of occupancy rights and her emphasis on the moral relevance of what she calls ‘located’ life plans. I suggest that, if it aims at being truly revisionist, her theory should work with a broader definition of occupancy. So long as it doesn’t, these rights will be mainly the preserve of groups of settlers and peoples with predictable patterns of movement. Moreover, insofar as occupancy rights ground collective rights to self-determination, they actually have the potential to trump individual rights to what I call ‘dynamic’ or non-located occupancy. This is worrying, I claim, for at least two reasons. First, rights to dynamic occupancy are arguably as central for respecting individual autonomy as rights to located occupancy. And second, rights to dynamic ocupancy should be seen as key in helping to form the kind of political allegiances required to overcome the most pressing collective action problems that humanity faces.

• Mancilla, Alejandra (2019). The Human Right to Subsistence. Philosophy Compass. doi: 10.1111/phc3.12618. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  That there is a human right to subsistence is a basic assumption for most moral and political theorists interested in the problem of global poverty, but it is not one exempt from controversy. In this article, I examine four justifications for this right and suggest that it takes the form of a claim, that is, a right which creates correlative duties on others who are then taken to be the main agents in its fulfillment. I point to some criticisms made against this conceptualization and offer an alternative approach that emphasizes the key importance of the moral and political agency of the needy. Two aspects of this approach are that the needy are seen as actors in their own right when it comes to poverty alleviation measures and their demands are no longer seen as demands for mere subsistence but ultimately for putting an end to their political marginalization and exclusion. Towards the end, I point to the complementarity of both views.

• Mancilla, Alejandra (2019). Four Principles to Justify Claims to Jurisdiction and to Natural Resources in Antarctica. The Yearbook of Polar Law. ISSN 1876-8814. 11, p. 170–191. doi: 10.1163/22116427_011010010. Full text in Research Archive
• Mancilla, Alejandra (2019). A continent of and for whiteness?: White colonialism and the 1959 Antarctic Treaty. Polar Record. ISSN 0032-2474. 55(5), p. 317–319. doi: 10.1017/S003224741900069X. Full text in Research Archive
• Mancilla, Alejandra (2019). When subsistence rights are just claims and this is unjust. Social Philosophy and Policy. ISSN 0265-0525. 36(2), p. 134–153. doi: 10.1017/S0265052519000475. Full text in Research Archive
• Mancilla, Alejandra (2018). The moral limits of territorial claims in Antarctica. Ethics and International Affairs. ISSN 0892-6794. 32(3), p. 339–360. doi: 10.1017/S0892679418000527. Full text in Research Archive
• Donoso, Alfonso & Mancilla, Alejandra (2017). Doctors with borders? An authority-based approach to the brain drain. South African Journal of Philosophy. ISSN 0258-0136. 36(1), p. 69–77. doi: 10.1080/02580136.2017.1265375. Full text in Research Archive
• Mancilla, Alejandra (2017). What the Old Right of Necessity Can Do for the Contemporary Global Poor. Journal of Applied Philosophy. ISSN 0264-3758. 34(5), p. 607–620. doi: 10.1111/japp.12170. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Given the grim global statistics of extreme poverty and socioeconomic inequalities, moral and political philosophers have focused on the duties of justice and assistance that arise therefrom. What the needy are morally permitted to do for themselves in this context has been, however, a mostly overlooked question. Reviving a medieval and early modern account of the right of necessity, I propose that a chronically deprived agent has a right to take, use and/or occupy whatever material resources are required to guarantee her self-preservation, or the means necessary to acquire them. There are three individually necessary and jointly sufficient conditions: the need is basic, the claimant does not violate other equally important moral interests, and it is a last resort. I present two recommendations to be followed by the claimants, and offer some examples where this principle may be applied today. I reply to the objections that understanding the right of necessity in this way kills its intuitive plausibility, and that it is a remedy worse than the disease. I conclude that, while not the best solution for the problem of global poverty, the exercise of this right should be accepted if we believe in the human right to subsistence. The final version of this research has been published in the Journal of Applied Philosophy. © 2017 Wiley

• Mancilla, Alejandra (2017). Shanty towns as an expression of the right of necessity [Las poblaciones callampa como expresión del derecho de necesidad]. Revista de Ciencia Política. ISSN 0716-1417. 37(3), p. 755–765. doi: 10.4067/S0718-090X2017000300755. Full text in Research Archive
• Mancilla, Alejandra (2016). Review article: The environmental turn in territorial rights. Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy (CRISPP). ISSN 1369-8230. 19(2), p. 221–241. doi: 10.1080/13698230.2013.868981. Full text in Research Archive
• Mancilla, Alejandra (2016). Shared Sovereignty over Migratory Natural Resources. Res Publica. ISSN 1356-4765. 22(1), p. 21–35. doi: 10.1007/s11158-015-9309-7. Full text in Research Archive
• Mancilla, Alejandra (2015). The Volcanic Asymmetry or the Question of Permanent Sovereignty over Natural Disasters. Journal of Political Philosophy. ISSN 0963-8016. 23(2), p. 192–212. doi: 10.1111/jopp.12038. Full text in Research Archive
• Mancilla, Alejandra (2015). What We Own Before Property: Hugo Grotius and the Suum. Grotiana. ISSN 0167-3831. 36. Full text in Research Archive
• Mancilla, Alejandra (2013). The Bridge of Benevolence: Hutcheson and Mencius. Dao: A Journal of Comparative Philosophy. ISSN 1540-3009. 12(1), p. 57–72. Full text in Research Archive
• Mancilla, Alejandra (2013). Det vi eide førfast eiendom. Hugo Grotius og suum. Arr - Idéhistorisk tidsskrift. ISSN 0802-7005. 3, p. 3–14. Full text in Research Archive

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• Mancilla, Alejandra (2026). From Sovereignty to Guardianship. Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780197902769. 208 p. doi: 10.1093/9780197902769.001.0001. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  As the coldest, windiest, driest, and highest continent in the world, it is no wonder that Antarctica has been painted as exceptional in geographic and climatic terms. But not only that, Antarctica is also seen as politically exceptional. Since the Antarctic Treaty came into force in 1961, the continent has been under the Joint Guardianship of a group of states that have kept peace and privileged science as the main activity, ‘freezing' sovereign claims and focusing on the protection rather than the exploitation of nature. For scientists, Antarctica is the largest open-air laboratory in the world. This book proposes that Antarctica should also be seen as a laboratory for territorial governance, providing inspiration in places where both the regime of Permanent Sovereignty over Natural Resources of individual states and the international regime of Common Heritage of Mankind have proven insufficient and inadequate. At the same time, it shows that Antarctic governance can be made less state-centric and less anthropocentric by incorporating the political representation of nature in decision-making processes that affect the continent. To successfully protect Antarctica, the author claims moreover that action must be taken beyond it: governing Antarctica requires governing the world, and vice versa. Given the twin crises of climate change and biodiversity loss and the growing challenges to international law and cooperation, environmental governance around the world can—and should—benefit from the creative and often unexpectedly fruitful Antarctic political imagination.

• Roberts, Peder & Mancilla, Alejandra (2024). Colonialism and Antarctica : Attitudes, logics, and practices. Manchester University Press. ISBN 9781526170644. 335 p. Full text in Research Archive
• Mancilla, Alejandra (2016). The Right of Necessity: Moral Cosmopolitanism and Global Poverty. Rowman & Littlefield International. ISBN 9781783485864. 140 p. Full text in Research Archive
• Mancilla, Alejandra & Campbell, Tom (2012). Theories of Justice. Routledge. ISBN 9780754629726. 634 p. Full text in Research Archive

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• Mancilla, Alejandra; Krefting, Ellen Marie & Meyer, Tirza (2026). GM-brunsj: Blå humaniora. doi: https:/www.hf.uio.no/ifikk/studier/aktuelt/arrangementer/2026/gm-brunsj.html. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Hva er blå humaniora? Hvordan har forestillinger om havet utviklet seg historisk? Trenger vi nye begreper for å forstå havet og vår relasjon til det? Hvordan kan blå humaniora bidra til samt utfordre forskning i andre fagfelt?

• Roberts, Peder & Mancilla, Alejandra (2022). The Antarctic Paradox. Aeon. Full text in Research Archive
• Mancilla, Alejandra (2019). Justice. Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews. Full text in Research Archive
• Mancilla, Alejandra & Barry, Christian (2017). Introduction: Land claims in Latin America [Introducción: reclamos territoriales en América Latina]. Revista de Ciencia Política. ISSN 0716-1417. 37(3), p. 711–712. doi: 10.4067/S0718-090X2017000300711. Full text in Research Archive
• Colman-Denstad, Erica & Mancilla, Alejandra (2019). Domination or Reconciliation? An Ethical Assessment of Ecological Restoration. Universitetet i Oslo. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  This thesis theoretically assesses ecological restoration from the point of view of environmental ethics. I explore how ecological restoration might affect the perspectives and assumptions we have about nature that allow or encourage the activities that drive processes of exploitation and degradation of nature. My focus is on how ecological restoration may affect the relationship between humans and nature by raising questions about the place of human agency in nature, and the possibility of an ethical and constructive, rather than destructive, relationship. Does ecological restoration encourage damaging by repairing damage, thus implying a promise that destruction is reversible? Is it a way of quieting our conscience while we continue to consume our environment? Restoration may potentially contribute to the idea that environmental problems can be solved by technological fixes and do not require change in behavior or restrictions on our consumption of nature. However, restoration also encourages active participation in nature and can possibly be a way encouraging closeness to nature on an ethical as well as practical level. The practice of restoration may also imply blame for destruction and ascribe humans the responsibility for anthropogenically degraded ecosystems. It may therefore encourage ethical consideration of nature. My overarching question is whether ecological restoration entrenches the ethical boundaries between humans and nature by enacting our superiority, or loosens them by allowing ethical engagement with nature. Within environmental ethics, ecological restoration has been controversial. Through a critical review of the existing debate, I will address both objections to, and arguments in favor of, ecological restoration, and analyze them to determine the root of this ambivalence. I argue that a shared assumption of many objections to restoration is a metaphysical dualism separating humans from the rest of nature. If this dualism is assumed, the positive value of restoration as more than management of resources is nearly impossible to grasp, because human intervention in nature, even when assisting recovery, is interpreted as unnatural and dominating. At the same time, ecological restoration may be a way of overcoming this dualism’s ethical implications, by encouraging active engagement and normative relationships. Through assessment of arguments for and against restoration, I argue for interpreting ecological restoration as a way of negotiating a mutually beneficial relationship between humans and the rest of nature, and for incorporating insights from ecological restoration into environmental ethics.

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