This article offers a novel, grounded way of assessing the intense interaction between human rights and eco-justice in urban open spaces. Using three iconic parks in the city of Cali, Colombia, as its sites of investigation, the article explores how the anthropocentrism of human rights and the structural order that foregrounds them results in eco-justice aspirations being undermined by human rights – including as environmental rights – in these spaces. The article reflects on three negative consequences of the tensions marking the relationships between human rights and eco-justice in Cali: defaunation; a proliferation of ‘urban heat islands’; and increased local pollution.