Natural Heritage in Ireland: Reverence, Ruin, Restoration, and Rights

This talk by Oisín Ó Néill, Advocacy Officer with the Irish Wildlife Trust, explores Ireland’s changing relationship with the natural world from a time when nature was revered, feared, and culturally protected through myth, folklore, and tradition, to an era where it became increasingly managed, exploited, and separated from human identity.

It examines how changing land use, colonial systems, economic pressures, and the view of nature as a resource led to ecological decline: deforestation, habitat loss, species decline, and the erosion of cultural connections with the land.

Tracing the emergence of conservation through the development of the Irish State, it explores the tensions between economic expansion and the protection of nature, before looking at today’s shift from conservation to restoration, repairing ecosystems, restoring habitats, and rebuilding our relationship with the natural world.

The talk concludes by exploring the emerging concept of Rights of Nature, a legal and cultural approach that recognises nature’s inherent value and right to exist, flourish and regenerate, reflecting an older understanding that humans are part of, rather than separate from, the living world.

Free but booking essential: https://naturalheritageinireland.eventbrite.ie