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This presentation considers the challenges of the animal rights movement to achieving legal and moral rights for animals. The presentation was given at the Minding Animals Conference in London in 2008. Kim Stallwood. www.kimstallwood.com. kim@kimstallwood.com.
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The Animal Rights Challenge
Kim StallwoodMinding Animals, London 2008
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The Animal Rights Mission
• Intervene in abusive situations• Bring public attention to egregious
examples of animal cruelty• Attract the media’s attention• Create a more humane world • Challenge institutional exploitation• Go vegan!• Think! Care! Act!
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The Moral Shock
• Open our eyes to animal cruelty• See what was previously hidden • Discover animal exploitation everywhere• Seek out and witness animal suffering• Prevent its occurrence• Want others to see what we now see• Want them to experience their personal
transformative moment
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How We Become Animal Advocates
Assume society will change in the same way that we changed – a personal transformative moment caused by a moral shock – when animal cruelty and exploitation become visible
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How We Become Animal Advocates
This powerful experience informs the rationale of the majority of the animal rights movement’s existing programs, which are largely public educational
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Important Point #1
To understand how social movements advance their mission from obscurity to acceptance
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Important Point #2
To implement a strategy balancing a vegan utopia with the pragmatic politics of the possible
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The Animal Rights Challenge
Make Animal Rights a Mainstream Political Issue
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Where’s Public Opinion?
• 2% “completely vegetarian”
• 5% “partly vegetarian”
Consumer Attitudes to Food Standards survey 2008
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The Animal Rights Challenge
Make Animal Rights a Mainstream Political Issue
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Lord Houghton of Sowerby
Animal welfare is largely a matter for the law. This means that to Parliament we must go. That is where laws are made and where the penalties for disobedience and the measures for enforcement are laid down.
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Lord Houghton of Sowerby
There is no complete substitute for the law. Public opinion, though invaluable and indeed essential, is not the law. Public opinion is what makes laws possible and observance widely acceptable.
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UK and US Movements
• Mostly female practitioners whereas many of the organizations’ leaders are male
• Commitment to humane education and public education programs that link children’s and people’s welfare and the environment
• Focus on egregious examples of animal cruelty that seek to portray all animal suffering
• Promotion of cruelty-free lifestyles• Struggle to reconcile the tension between utopian
idealism and pragmatic politics
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30 Years of Putting Animals into Politics
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Social Movements
“A collective, organized, sustained, and noninstitutional challenge to authorities, powerholders, or cultural beliefs and practices.”
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The Five Stages of Social Movements
1. Public Education2. Public Policy Development3. Legislation4. Litigation5. Public Acceptance
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The Five Stages of Social Movements
Minimum Influence
Maximum Influence
Stage Five: Public Acceptance
Stage Four: Litigation
Stage Three: Legislation
Stage Two: Public Policy Development
Stage One: Public Education
As a social justice issue progresses through each stage, its influence and resistance to setbacks increase proportionately. (www.kimstallwood.com)
The Caring
Sleuth—
Personal
Transformative
Moment
Public Policy Maker—Animal Rights a Mainstream Political Issue
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The Five Stages of the Abolition of Bloodsports
Minimum Influence
Demos, Sabbing, Letter writing
Local hunt bans by county councils
Hunting Act 2004
House of Lords, EC of HR
Maximum Influence
Stage Five: Public Acceptance
Stage Four: Litigation
Stage Three: Legislation
Stage Two: Public Policy Development
Stage One: Public Education
As a social justice issue progresses through each stage, its influence and resistance to setbacks increase proportionately. (www.kimstallwood.com)
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Labour Government’s Accomplishments Since 1997
• Toxicity testing banned• Alcohol and tobacco products
testing banned• Sow gestation crates banned• Fur farming banned• Bloodsports banned
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Comparison of Three Social Movements with the Five-Stage Analysis
Civil Partnerships
Smoking in Public Places
Animal Rights
5: Public Acceptance
4: Litigation3: Legislation
2: Public Policy Development
1: Public Education
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ASH and StonewallASH • Advocacy & Policy
Development • Information & Research • Networking & Enabling
Networking • Governance • Resources & Sustainability • Image & CommunicationWorks with:• British Heart Foundation• Cancer Research UK
Stonewall• Policy Development• Cultural and Attitudinal
Change• Lobbying for Legal Change• Providing Information• Good Practice Design and
AdviceWorks with:• Leeds City Council• Metropolitan Police
Authority• Sainsbury’s
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Responding to the Challenge
• Evaluate, develop and reassess long-term strategies with the Five-Stage Analysis
• Position animal rights as a Public Education and as a Public Policy issue
• Build alliances with non-animal rights organizations, civic groups, professional associations, businesses, NGOs, etc.
• Invest in international coalitions with like-minded groups
• Position animal rights within a larger social and political context
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Responding to the Challenge
• Establish a permanent movement-wide initiative targeting local, general and European elections
• Stay focused on political parties, elected representatives and government employees to ensure accountability
• Join political parties, get active and stand for election
• Target elected representatives who consistently oppose animal interests
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Responding to the Challenge
• We need a think tank committed to creating the political ideas and hosting the policy debates to make the moral and legal status of animals a priority in British politics
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Conclusion
1. Understand how social movements advance their mission from obscurity to acceptance
2. Implement a strategy balancing a vegan utopia with the pragmatic politics of the possible
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The Animal Rights Challenge
Make Animal Rights a Mainstream Political Issue
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