Part I: Animal Rights, Moral Theory and Political Strategy

Transcription

1 Part I: Animal Rights, Moral Theory and Political Strategy In the last two decades or so, the discipline of applied ethics has become a significant growth area in academic circles (see Singer, 1993). Within this broad discipline, an increasing number of professional philosophers have shown a particular interest in the moral status of nonhuman animals. Given this, and more importantly, the additional fact already noted that the writings of some of these philosophers have coincided with a movement which seeks to put their principles into action, it is appropriate to begin this collection of articles with a section which focuses on the theoretical attempts to justify for animals a higher moral status than has traditionally, in theory and practice, been allowed. This philosophical project, of course, is not new. Indeed, modern proponents of an elevated moral status for animals often draw inspiration from thinkers as diverse as Jeremy Bentham (as Singer does), Albert Schweitzer and the little known Henry Salt (see, for instance, Clarke & Linzey, 1990). What marks the period since the 1970s out, however, is the sheer scale of the battering handed out to the moral orthodoxy about animals (see Garner, 1993a, ch.l). Such is the volume of material that has been produced, in learned papers and popular books, that it would be inaccurate to claim that there is only one radical approach to which all others are either imitators or footnotes (see Finsen & Finsen, 1994, ch.6 for an accessible discussion of the differences between the major contributors). Without doubt, though, for whatever reasons, the two major intellectual figures in the contemporary animal rights movement are Peter Singer and Tom Regan and it is appropriate, therefore, that the three chapters in this section are concerned above all with their arguments. The Moral Case For Animal Rights The opening chapter is an edited extract of Singer's review of the groundbreaking collection of articles Animals. Men and Morals edited by three Oxford philosophers (Godlovitch, Godlovitch & Harris, 1973) and represents his first published work on animal ethics. As Singer himself remarked in the preface to Animal Liberation in 1975: 'five years ago I myself would have laughed at the statements (about animal liberation) I have now written in complete seriousness'. The review article presented here provided an important step in the development of Singer's thought and the positive

2 2 Animal Rights response generated from the piece encouraged him to set about the task of writing Animal Liberation. It is not the purpose of this book to enter into a detailed philosophical exploration of the strengths and weaknesses of the case for granting a higher moral status to animals (a general account can be found in Garner, 1993a. A useful set of articles is in Hospers, Book-length studies opposing the idea of animal rights are Frey, 1980; Frey, 1983; Caruthers, 1992; Leahy, 1991). This is not to claim that such an exercise is unnecessary. As Benton asserts, whether or not we accept Singer or Regan's position, the attempt to link the suffering of animals with oppressed human groups only works if one assumes that nonhuman animals are 'sentient beings, with ends, preferences, and a capacity to suffer harm and experience well-being' (the same applies to the attempt to link animal suffering with the position of ethnic minorities, women - see Adams, and, in the past, slaves - see Spiegal, 1988). The difference between Singer's utilitarian defence of animals and Regan's rights-based approach is clearly crucial from a philosophical perspective and, in recognition of this, Benton spends some time examining the pros and cons of each position, eventually plumping to focus on the rights position after recognising the 'powerful arguments' against utilitarianism. Francione comes to a similar conclusion. In practical terms, Singer has felt comfortable to be labelled as a rights advocate although he does not think the use of rights discourse is necessary to secure adequate protection for animals, a view disputed by Regan and, as intimated above, by Benton and Francione also (see Singer, 1985 and Regan, 1985). Benton himself1argely accepts Regan's claim that animals have rights as beings with an interest in respectful treatment. He also suggests, however, that one can distinguish between two different kinds of rights-holders. It is a common criticism of the animal rights position that what distinguishes humans from animals morally is the ability of the former to understand what it is to behave morally and the ability to reciprocate by upholding the moral entitlements of others. This is linked to the greater mental capacities of humans which means, it is argued, that we can be harmed in ways which animals cannot. In order to sidestep this problem, Regan (as does Singer) invokes the so-called 'argument from marginal cases' whereby it is suggested that moral equity demands that those humans - such as infants and the mentally defective - whose mental capacities are closer to those of normal adult mammals than to normal human adults, should be granted a moral status closer to the former than the latter. As Singer indicates in chapter 1, failure to do so is to be guilty of what Richard Ryder has termed 'speciesism' - discriminating on the basis of species alone and not due to morally relevant criteria (Ryder, 1989). Since we do not intuitively think it is right to eat and

3 Animal Rights 3 experiment on infants or the mentally defective, the argument goes, it is inconsistent to be prepared to do these things to animals. Benton accepts much of this argument but still insists that it is possible to distinguish morally between infants, human defectives and animals (socalled 'moral patients'), on the one hand, and normal adult humans (or 'moral agents') on the other. Thus, he argues that the rights that can be properly assigned to moral patients are 'passive' whilst the rights assigned to moral agents are 'active' rights of self-determination. The difference here is that only those with 'active' rights are entitled, and able, to contribute to deciding what the content of their rights should be and, consequently, the obligations which others are to be expected to obey. Those with 'passive' rights, on the other hand, do not detemline the nature of their rights and obligations and therefore other moral agents are responsible for ensuring their well-being. This, Benton alleges, means we have to take into account the species-specific requirements of moral patients which, in turn, allows us to recognise that animals and humans may be differentially treated without denying that animals do have rights (of a passive nature) which ought to be protected. Animal Rights and Political Reality Singer's and Regan's work on the moral status of animals has been available now for over two decades. Although his major book-length study The Case for Animal Rights was not published until 1983, Regan had been developing his position in journal articles dating back to 1975 (the early articles can be found in Regan, 1982). The debate now has become somewhat stale, not least because of the intractability of moral theory. Moreover, by definition, those involved in the animal rights movement accept that serious wrongs are being done to animals and, for them, of greater import is the way in which theory can inform practice - in the sense of strategy rather than objectives. To this end, the contributions by Benton and Francione do move the debate on in interesting directions. We have already outlined Benton's powerful challenge to the utility of rights language in the absence of significant social reform. In the case of animals, he raises the challenging proposition that the removal of human indifference to, and participation in, animal suffering is to a large extent independent of the rational application of reasoned moral theory. The problem with this conclusion, it might be argued, is that it is derived from a theory which, although having a long and honourable history when related to human society, does not work so well when applied to relationships across the species divide. Thus, the argument - (i) that human rights are worthless

4 4 Animal Rights without the ability of the holders to exercise them, (ii) that in order to make this a reality significant social reform may be necessary, and (iii) that significant social reform may alter the way that humans behave towards each other - is persuasive. When this is applied to animals, however, it loses a great deal of its force. On one reading it amounts to saying that only when the institutionalised exploitation of animals is abolished will humans develop more benevolent ways of thinking about their relationship with animals. This is clearly absurd and not, I take it, what Benton is arguing. Even a more generous interpretation, however, along the lines that more benevolent ways of thinking about our relationship with other animals can derive from sources other than the rational espousal of rights theory, is, whilst possible, still inadequate. This is so because it does not provide a more plausible alternative approach which can hope to engender such a change in values and, indeed, animal rights theory has been important precisely because it has provided a means by which present methods of treating animals can be declared as unacceptable. Gary Francione, in direct contrast to Ted Benton, seeks to claim that animal rights is not only effective as a philosophical position but ought also to inform the strategy of the animal rights movement. This is so, he argues, because reformist welfare-based strategies - whereby animal suffering is to be balanced against the benefits likely to accrue to humans - do not provide even the most basic protection for animals let alone providing a means to the abolitionist animal rights objective. This conclusion is partly based on empirical observation which shows that the institutional exploitation of animals carries on apace despite numerous welfare measures designed to alleviate suffering. Indeed, the effect of welfare measures may well, according to this view, be to prolong the existence of animal exploitation since it makes it seem more respectable. More importantly, Francione suggests in addition that welfarism will always fail to alleviate animal suffering because it coexists with, and fails to challenge, the structural reality that animals remain in law as mere objects of property (a point also emphasised by Radford in chapter 4). Thus, in societies where property rights are predominant, they will more often than not override animal welfare by 'determining the ambit of protection accorded to animals by law' (this thesis is worked out in full in Francione, 1995). By contrast to the poverty of welfarism, Francione suggests that animal rights can provide the necessary framework for effective incremental advances in animal protection. Thus, only changes that are themselves abolitionist are likely to be effective since they avoid the need to engage in the trading of human and animal interests (which always works to the advantage of the former) and the replacement of one exploitative regime by

5 Animal Rights 5 another (that is, larger battery cages rather than no cages at all), both characteristic weaknesses of the welfarist position. Professor Francione provides an important corrective to the simplistic view that animal rights is always politically unrealistic. As a number of people have pointed out, however, his analysis does have its problems, a selection of which can be briefly stated here. (See also Finsen & Finsen, 1994, ch.8; Garner, 1993a, pp ; Newkirk, 1992.) In the first place, as Francione himself admits, the interdependency of animal exploitation means in practice that the distinction between abolitionist and reformist measures is not always clear-cut. Thus, the abolition of product testing does not mean that the animals designated for it will not be exploited in other procedures. Likewise, a seemingly abolitionist campaign to prohibit the production of veal would still mean that farmers would have to deal with (kill at birth?) those male calves destined to be raised for veal, unless, of course, the dairy trade was also prohibited so that the surplus male calves were not produced in the first place. Moreover, such abolitionist objectives are also open to the criticism (levelled by animal rightists at welfarist reforms) that they hinder further progress by making remaining practices look more respectable. A further objection is that attempts to distinguish between welfare and rights strategies are likely to be a source of conflict with welfare organisations resentful at the refusal of rights groups to participate in winnable reformist campaigns. Of course, Francione would deny that such welfarist campaigns are worthwhile so we would also need to show that this was not the case. Here, it can be argued that, whilst Francione is right to point to weaknesses in existing animal welfare measures, we need to distinguish between adequate and inadequate reforms. Thus, one can criticise, for instance, the Animal Welfare Act in the United States but not necessarily on the grounds that it is a reformist (non-abolitionist) measure but on the grounds that it is an inadequate reformist measure. By itself, though, this does not mean that there are no effective reforms that can be made short of abolishing a particular practice. Put simply, is it not the case that fewer animals used in scientific experimentation is better than more and, similarly, more room for battery hens is better than less? Francione would still claim, however, that such reformist measures - involving the weighting of human and animal interests - will rarely, because of the property status of the latter, result in the alleviation of animal suffering. This, I think, is a powerful objection. However, it might be suggested in response that deference to property ownership varies from country to country (greater, for instance, in the United States than in the United Kingdom) and from one period of time to another (depending on prevailing governmental ideologies and historical circumstances). Likewise, what constitutes

6 6 Animal Rights unnecessary suffering will depend upon the social climate and, as Benton argues, is not necessarily dependent upon the application of rights theory to animals. It can be agreed that without a major value shift, the pursuit of welfare goals is unlikely to produce major advances for animals. The point is that legislative success tends to be the final stage of a long process whereby a particular goal has become socially acceptable. Here, the philosophy of animal rights can play an important, although by no means indispensable, role.