The Coller-Menmon Animal Rights and Welfare Program

The Coller-Menmon Animal Rights and Welfare Program is Israel’s premier academic program for animal law. The program explores the intersection between law and animal rights and welfare, and their synergy with environmental protection. Multiple legal tools and methodologies (e.g. advocacy, policy development, litigation, etc.) are employed in developing innovative approaches and strategies to advance the field of animal law.

The Coller-Menmom Animal Rights and Welfare Program fosters much-needed social change and developments to animal law in Israel and abroad, while nurturing Israel’s next generation of animal advocates and animal law scholars. The program is coordinated by Attorney Amnon Keren.

The program includes the following components:

1. Two annual courses on animal law (in the 2020-2021 academic year):

a. The Coller-Menmon Animal Protection Law Course
Instructor: Yosef Wolfson - prominent Israeli animal rights attorney and activist

b. Human-Animal Relations: Society, Culture and Law – The Coller-Menmon Chair
Instructors: Dr. Anat Ben-Yonatan and Dr. Orit Hirsch-Matsioulas, human-animal researchers, post doctoral fellows in the Coller-Memnon Animal Rights and Welfare Program and co-founders of  Human-Animal Studies academic community in Israel (HASI), under the auspices of the Israeli Anthropological Association.

In the 2019-2020 academic year, the Program included the course:

Animal Rights Jurisprudence - The Coller-Menmon Chair
Instructor: Attorney Steven Wise, visiting lecturer and founder and president of the Nonhuman Rights Project.

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2. The Environmental Justice and Protection of Animal Rights Clinic (EJPAR)
The EJPAR Clinic is the first of its kind in Israel. Its efforts include providing high quality legal aid to animal
rights NGOs and activists, research, policy development and litigation, and ensuring enforcement of existing animal protections. 
The academic and practical components are designed to provide opportunities to apply pedagogy through hands-on ​experience. 
 

3. Law, Environment and Animals Club
This club for students tackles diverse legal challenges related to the environment and animal rights. It hosts several events a year including lectures by activists, scholars and policy-makers.
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4. Annual animal law conference or roundtable event

These events aim to develop the discourse in the field and establish animal law as a central topic in Israeli academia and jurisprudence.

In the 2020-2021 academic year the Program takes part in organizing the international inter-disciplinary conference “Human-Animal Relations: Opportunities and Challenges in Changing Realities” (June 2021, online - see call for papers).

Events in the 2019-2020 academic year included: Human-Animal: Legal, Social and Ethical Perspectives (Hebrew) and Regulating Wild Life in Palestine/Israel: Beastly Legalities.

5. Research grants in the field of animal law
​​Achieving desired social and environmental change requires an elevation in discourse, sound policy and enforcement. Academic research is at the root of this activity. The Coller-Menmon Animal Rights and Welfare Program will offer two research grants for animal law. 
In the 2020-2021 academic year, Dr. Anat Ben-Yonatan and Dr. Orit Hirsch-Matsioulas participate in the Program, as postdoctoral fellows.