Contemporary Politics, Volume 8, Number 1, 2002

Animal rights, political theory and the liberal tradition

ROBERT GARNER
University of Leicester

Academics have played an important role in both the women’s movement and
the civil rights movement, and the political science literature has been affected
signi® cantly by their work. Academic ballast for the environmental movement
looks as if it is having a similar impact.1 The animal rights movement, by
contrast, has made fewer political, social and academic advances. It is true that
animal welfare has become an intermittently important issue in some countries,
and particularly Britain. It is true too that some academics, from a wide variety
of disciplines, have devoted at least some of their time to a consideration of, for
instance, the philosophical, psychological and theological relationships between
humans and animals. The issue of human/animal relationships, however, has
been virtually ignored by the political studies community. In particular, the
absence of a comprehensive account of the potential implications for political
theory of granting animals rights is an important blind spot in the discipline.
Not only is there a strong case for an elevated moral status for animals within
mainstream ideological frameworks but also, if established, the granting of rights
to animals has important consequences for political theory, just as feminism has
had important consequences for the conceptualization of political concepts such
as the state, freedom, power, justice and so on.
This article seeks to provide a starting point for a study of the relationship
between animal rights, broadly de® ned, and political theory. By documenting
the exclusion of animals in most modern political thought in general, and the
liberal tradition in particular, as well as the attempts to secure a higher moral
status for animals, the ® rst section provides the necessary background and
context for an audience largely unfamiliar with the literature. It will become
apparent that the main critiques of the moral orthodoxy concerning our relation-
ship with non-human animalsÐ invoking rights, utilitarian and contractarian-
based argumentsÐ have been developed within the liberal tradition. Neverthe-
less, it will be argued, in the second part of this article, that liberalism itself is
problematic from an animal protection perspective. It will be suggested that if,
as in most modern liberal political theory, animals are to be considered the
subject of morality rather than justice, they fall victim to the in¯ uential liberal
principle of moral pluralism. This principleÐ which holds that no society or
state should impose a moral code beyond that which ensures the basic protection
of individual humansÐ makes animal welfare a matter for individual voluntary
preferences rather than a set of compulsory obligations. Moreover, it will also
be shown that the principle of moral pluralism has also had a practical impact,
inhibiting the effective protection of animal interests.

ISSN 1356-977 5 print/ISSN 1469-363 1 online/02/010007-16 Ó 2002 Taylor & Francis Ltd
DOI: 10.1080/1356977022013009 5
8 Robert Garner

Animals, political theory and justice

Moral and political philosophers have from time to time considered the status
of animals. Three main positions have emerged. For some, animals have no
moral standing at all, the existence of moral standing here taken to mean that
an entity is worthy of moral consideration. Second is the view that while animals
might have moral standing, their moral value or status or degree of moral
signi® cance is inferior to that of humans. Finally, there is the view that animals
have a moral status more or less equivalent to that of humans. It is quite clear
that no mainstream political theorist is, or has been, prepared to accept that
animals should be regarded as morally equivalent to humans or even morally
close to humans. The two main ® gures in modern political thought who came
closest to dispensing with an anthropocentric (or human-centred) ethic were
Bentham and, to a lesser extent, J. S. Mill.2 Both recognized that a political theory
prioritizing sentiencyÐ or the capacity to experience pain and pleasureÐ would
have to include animals as recipients of a considerable moral status, but neither
were prepared (unlike a later utilitarian, Peter Singer) to draw the moral
egalitarianism that the logic of their position arguably merited.
It is important to recognize, however, that denying animals equivalent status
to humans is very different from denying them any moral standing whatsoever.
Some philosophers, most notably Hobbes, Locke, Kant and Descartes among the
key ® gures in western thought, have adopted this latter position.3 In these types
of accounts, the treatment of animals may raise ethical issues, but animal interests
do not matter in their own right. In other words, ill-treating an animal does not
infringe any morally important animal interest directly, but we may infringe the
interests of other humans if we ill-treat animals. In this case, the obligation to
treat an animal well is an indirect obligation, since it derives from the direct
obligation to another human.
It is dif® cult to ® nd many contemporary philosophers who would want to
deny that animals are sentient, have interests and as a consequence have moral
standing. One exception is Carruthers, who doubts the ability of animals to
suffer but, recognizing the widespread academic and public acceptance of the
capacity of animals to suffer, devotes most of his book-length study to the
development of an argument against the moral standing of animals which
accepts their ability to suffer.4 A similar approach is adopted by Frey who wants
to deny that sentiency is an adequate grounding for the possession of interests.5
Despite the work of Carruthers, Frey and others, however, the vast majority of
moral philosophers would agree with DeGrazia who concludes that: `Since ethics
concerns interests, which animals have, it would seem prima facie, that the
treatment of animals is part of the subject matter of ethics’ and that the beliefs
of those who deny that animals have moral standing do not `require special
explanation any more than the existence of white supremacists does’.6
The conventional moral position, in the west at least, governing our relation-
ship with animalsÐ the moral orthodoxy it might be calledÐ is that while animals
have moral standing, in the sense that they are worthy of moral consideration,
their moral status, or degree of moral signi® cance, is inferior to that of humans.
As a result, the moral orthodoxy tells us, humans are entitled to sacri® ce the
interests of animals if by so doing some signi® cant bene® t to humans occurs.
Any suffering in¯ icted, therefore, must be `necessary’ if it is to be morally
 Animal rights, political theory and the liberal tradition 9

legitimate. Of course, `necessity’ is a subjective term and much of the debate in

contemporary animal welfare politics centres on to what degree particular kinds
of animal exploitation are necessary, a judgement that can change radically over
time.7
The possession of moral standing translates into moral obligation, but given
that it is widely accepted that we do owe direct duties to animals, however
limited, it is curious that animals are conspicuous by their absence from accounts
of justice developed by political theorists. As Dobson states, `Most theories of
justice . . . simply assume that the list of potential recipients (of justice) is
exhausted once contemporary human beings have been taken into account’, and
again that `any theory of justice which did incorporate animals would `be
regarded as a second division theory’.8 The common absence of animals from
theories of justice, a position endorsed by Rawls, Barry and Miller among others,
gives the impression that western political theory does not generally accept that
animals have moral standing.9 Despite this, however, it is surely inconceivable
that political theorists such as Rawls think we can do anything we want to
animals provided that other humans are not adversely affected as an indirect
consequence, and indeed both Rawls and Barry clearly think that animals have
some moral standing.10
How do we account for this apparent contradiction, that animals are accorded
some moral signi® cance but are not to be seen as recipients of justice? The
answer lies in the fact that Rawls, Barry and others seem to be making the point
that justice is a much narrower area of inquiry than ethics. For Rawls, `a
conception of justice is but one part of a moral view’ in that a `political’
conception of justice is narrower than a comprehensive view because it concerns
only the basic political structure and not `all kinds of subjects ranging from the
conduct of individuals and personal relations to the organization of society as a
whole’.11 While Rawls’s exclusion of animals from a theory of justice is de® ni-
tional, Barry’s is based on the view that the language of justice and injustice
applies only to `moral equals’, and since he has already decided that animals
and humans are not moral equals, the concept is applicable only to humans.12
The exclusion of animals from theories of justice is understandable if de® ned,
as above, in ways which logically exclude then, but it remains, at the very least,
unhelpful if one accepts, as political philosophers such as Rawls and Barry do,
that we owe direct duties to animals. Justice is commonly associated with the
distribution of bene® ts, rewards and duties, and if we regard animals as having
some moral worthÐ even if their moral status is regarded as inferior to humansÐ
then, along with Wissenburg, Galston, Dobson and Nozick, I ® nd it dif® cult to
see how they can be pro® tably excluded as recipients of distributive justice.13
One advantage of inclusion is that the use of the language of justice helps to
distinguish our moral obligations towards animals, which most would hold we
have, from notions of charity and kindness. The former are obligatory and,
potentially at least, rigorous, while the latter are voluntary and unspeci® c. So,
Rawls claims that `it is wrong to be cruel to animals’,14 yet unless we have a
duty of justice to animals, if, that is, animals are beyond the pale as far as justice
is concerned, then it is dif® cult to see how we can have a duty not to be cruel
to them. And, less dramatically, how can we know what these duties are unless
animals are incorporated into a theory of justice?
10 Robert Garner

The liberal challenge to the moral orthodoxy

While it is broadly accepted that animals have at least some moral worth, and
that there is a case for saying that animals ought to be incorporated into theories
of justice, it still remains the case, however, that the vast majority of moral and
political philosophers want to deny that animals are morally equivalent to
humans. The key question for them is to identify morally relevant differences
between humans and animals that allow us to treat them differently. Factual
differences, by themselves, of course, are not relevant, without any additional
argument that explains why they are morally signi® cant. So, for example, to say
simply that species membership alone is suf® cient for the attachment of particu-
lar kinds of moral worth is to beg the question of what it is about members of
that species which sets it apart morally from other species.

The exclusion of animals from a community of equals

The main justi® cation for the moral orthodoxy is that humans are morally more
important than non-humans because they are the only species that exhibit `full-
personhood’, a category incorporating a variety of mental states including
rationality, creativity, intelligence, language use, and autonomy. A number of
different reasons for the moral superiority of humans over animals are derived
from the identi® cation of factual differences. A common approach is to suggest
that because animals cannot be moral agents, and are therefore unable to
appreciate what a moral obligation is, they cannot have the same degree of
moral status accorded to those who are able to recognize and respect the interests
of others, as well as claiming their own rights. It is for similar reasons that
animals are excluded as bene® ciaries of Rawls’s theory of justice.15
Perhaps the most compelling argument is that autonomous humans are
accorded a higher moral status because their interests can be harmed much more
seriously than animals.16 Being left free to pursue their life plans is absolutely
crucial for the well-being of autonomous humans, but not so crucial for animals,
who have much more limited goals. To take an extreme example, the death of a
human is a serious matter, whereas, if we regard animals as merely sentient,
then, providing it occurs painlessly, the death of an animal does not raise any
moral issues at all. Even if we accept that animals have some mental capacities,
the interests of humans, according to this view, will always prevail because their
level of autonomy is always greater.

Challenging the moral orthodoxy

There are two main responses that animal advocates can make to the `full-
personhood’ argument. The ® rst is to reject the view that only humans have
full-personhood, and the second is to deny that autonomy has the force claimed
for it. This second response can be further divided into at least two separate
arguments. The ® rst focuses on the value of sentiency as the benchmark for
signi® cant moral worth, and the second seeks to demonstrate, through an
examination of the so-called `argument from marginal cases’, the implications of
the fact that not all humans are autonomous.
The ® rst of the responses is probably the weakest one. It is quite clear that a
 Animal rights, political theory and the liberal tradition 11

signi® cant number of non-human species exhibit mental capacities that are
surprisingly complex and sophisticated. As Pluhar’s review of the evidence
con® rms:
Many sentient nonhumans apparently have the ability to learn from
past experience, to anticipate future events, to change their behaviour
in the face of changing circumstances, to carry out short-term plans,
and to solve problems in a creative fashion.17
As Pluhar continues, `no characteristic has yet been found that is wholly lacking
in nonhumans and wholly present in humans’.18 Similarly, Tom Regan, perhaps
the best-known philosophical defender of animal rights, bases his case on the
mental complexity of non-human animals. For Regan, because at least some
animals are self-conscious, have a memory, are capable of having an emotional
life and act so as to ful® l their beliefs and preferences, they have a welfare which
is capable of being harmed not only by in¯ iction of pain and deprivation, but
also by death since it forecloses all possibilities of ® nding satisfaction in life.19
Identifying mental complexity as the primary characteristic determining
degrees of moral status, however, leads us to two consequences that most animal
advocates would be unwilling to endorse. The ® rst is that we will be forced to
distinguish morally between different species of non-humans, and accept that
there might be a case for treating them differently. This is the basis, for instance,
of the so-called Great Ape Project, a worldwide campaign that seeks to argue
the case for the attachment of legal rights to creatures closest to us.20 Likewise,
Regan, precisely because he uses mental complexity as a criterion for moral
worth, is then committed to attaching what he calls `subject-of-a-life’ status, and
therefore rights, only to mammals aged over one year.
As a corollary of the above, adopting full-personhood as the primary determi-
nant of moral worth inexorably leads us to the conclusion that, as Pluhar
correctly recognizes, although animals `may have lesser degrees of the relevant
characteristics . . . as far as we know, none can match the capacities of the
mature, normal human being. In short, only humans appear to be fully-¯ edged
persons’.21 It is clear that if we accept that animals are autonomous then the
lives of animals become important since, in DeGrazia’ s words `animals . . . can
be deprived of future satisfactions, goods, or conscious life’.22 However, since it
is accepted that humans have greater autonomy and, by implication, their lives
are worth more, if we had to choose between saving a human life and an animal
life, we are morally entitled, if not compelled, to choose the human. This clearly
has important practical rami® cations. Using animals in scienti® c procedures to
develop new drug products and to test their toxicity, for instance, becomes
legitimate if we accept that humans have greater mental complexity and therefore
more to lose from death or the loss of some quality of life.
The second major response to the full-personhood claim is to deny its force.
There are at least two separate strands to this approach. The ® rst is to accept
that animals lack the level of mental complexity possessed by most humans, but
to deny that this produces the degree of moral inferiority that the moral
orthodoxy requires for animals. Such an argument can be mounted if we seek to
base a case for a high moral status for animals on their sentiency alone. The ® rst
consequence would seem to be that, as the moral orthodoxy claims, the death
of animals, providing it is painless, ceases to be of moral signi® cance, whereas
12 Robert Garner

the death of humans is clearly of greater importance. If we assume that this is

correct, then in¯ icting suffering on animals only becomes morally legitimate
when it can save human lives. Since most humans do not need to eat animals to
survive, and even if they did, humane methods of killing animals exist, then
in¯ icting suffering in the course of producing animals for food remains illegiti-
mate. The same, however, is not necessarily the case for animal experimentation,
much of which, it is claimed, does contribute to the longevity of human life.
Nevertheless, that research on animals which has no prospect of contributing to
the saving of human life remains illegitimate. Building a case for a high moral
status for animals on their sentiency alone, then, does enable us to go beyond
what the moral orthodoxy would prohibit, although it offers less than a successful
attempt to demonstrate that the mental complexity of animals is morally
signi® cant.
The second strand of the argument denying the moral signi® cance of auto-
nomy focuses on the implications of the fact that some, so-called marginal,
humans are lacking in the degree of full-personhood possessed by normal adult
humans. This `argument from marginal cases’ (amc) accepts that while only
humans can be full persons, not all humans can be. As a result, those who adopt
the full-personhood criterion for moral worth have dif® culty explaining why the
moral signi® cance of marginal humans, such as small children and the severely
mentally disabled, should not be equivalent to that of normal adult mammals.
Any attempt to distinguish morally between marginal humans and at least some
animals, therefore, becomes illegitimate. It becomes inconsistent, to take one
example, for Rawls to see no problem with including marginal humans as
bene® ciaries of the decisions taken in the original position and, at the same time,
exclude animals.23 To do so is to adopt a speciesist attitude, illegitimately
distinguishing between humans and animals on the grounds of species alone
rather than any morally relevant characteristic.
Challenging the validity of the amc is essential for advocates of the full-
personhood view, and it is worthwhile here examining the objections to it.24 One
common response is that to devalue marginal humans by comparing them
morally with animals may give rise to such moral confusion that it leads down
a slippery slope towards threats to `normal humans’.25 Such an assertion rests
on an empirically veri® able statement that is far from established. Moreover, it
applies only if we accept the so-called `biconditional’ version of the amc. This
concludes that if marginal humans have rights or are regarded as having
maximum moral signi® cance, then so do at least some animals.26 The alternative
`categorical’ version of the amc holds that because marginal humans have rights,
or maximum moral signi® cance, then so do at least some animals. The former
version, of course, is weaker because it could be used to justify excluding both
animals and marginal humans from full-personhood, thereby committing us to
the position that if we are prepared to exploit animals in order to bene® t those
humans who have full-personhood, it is inconsistent not to consider using
marginal humans in a similar way. The key point here is the suggestion that
moral status is dependent on capabilities and not species. As such, it cannot
logically represent a threat to `normal’ humans, whose moral status is higher
precisely because of their greater capabilities.
Other objections to the amc include the argument that it is the characteristics
of `normal’ members of a species which determine the moral worth of individuals
 Animal rights, political theory and the liberal tradition 13

within it; the `kinship’ argument that our genetic similarities are the key to
explaining why we should apply the same moral status to all humans;27 that the
amc underestimates the capabilities of marginal humans;28 that full moral status
ought to be accorded to marginal humans who, as in the case of small children,
will be normal adult humans in the future; and ® nally that it is in our self-
interest to protect marginal humans.
The problem with the ® rst objection above is that it arguably makes little
sense to accord moral status to a species, rather than to individuals. The second
focuses on appeals to kinship, that our genetic similarities (the fact that we are
all humans) are the key to explaining why we should apply the same moral
status to all humans. The problem with this approach is that it begs the question
of why we should base moral judgements on genetics or on kinship. It might be
correct empirically that, at some level, we accord greater moral weight to those
closest to us, and that intuitively we would help a member of our own family
® rst, before a stranger, if we could help only one. Equally intuitively, however,
we recognize that our obligations to other humans should not necessarily be
dependent on our particular relationship to them so that, for instance, we can
sacri® ce the fundamental interests of other humans in order to bene® t our
relatives. Moreover, even if the kinship approach represents a morally valid
claim, it by no means produces the anthropocentric conclusions designed for it,
because it does not rule out the possibility that a non-human animal may be at
the centre of a human’s affections.
The third response to the amc argues that the capabilities of even the most
damaged human is still greater than the most mentally developed non-human.
Such an assertion must be subject to empirical examination, however, and it is
surely conceivable to envisage instances where the capabilities of animals might
be superior to those of marginal humans. Fourthly, a super® cially effective
critique of the inclusion of small children among those classi® ed as `marginal’ is
that they will be normal adult humans in the future. While this is true for the
vast majority of children, it should be noted that the purpose of identifying full-
personhood as a key determinant of differential treatment is that, at any one
point in time, those with the constituent characteristics can be harmed in much
more damaging ways than those without, and there is no dispute that small
children do not possess these characteristics to the same degree as normal adult
humans.
In the case of human self-interest, ® fthly, it is argued that any one of us
normal adult humans might become marginal in the future and we would expect
to be treated with respect, and, in addition, marginal humans are likely to have
relatives who would want them to be treated with respect. The problem with
the latter point is that it does not enable us to distinguish between marginal
humans and animals, since it could be argued that what happens to animals
matters to other animals and, moreover, human owners of animals may well
think about their animal companions in exactly the same ways that other humans
think about the marginal humans to whom they are related. The ® rst, respect-
based, argument above would appear to be stronger. The prospect of becoming
a marginal human is a powerful reason for avoiding treating present marginal
humans in anything but a digni® ed fashion. One retort that might be offered
here is the view that self-interest does not account for all our moral intuitions,
and that the latter should take precedence if we are to avoid charges of either
14 Robert Garner

sel® shness or speciesism.29 A more effective response is to make the oft-repeated

point that the categorical version of the amc does allow us to avoid the
exploitation of, and therefore show respect to, both marginal humans and animals.

The contractarian approach

There have also been numerous accounts designed to justify a higher moral
status for animals by utilizing the contractarian approach. This has consisted
primarily of attempts to amend Rawls’s original position and veil of ignorance.
The most sustained attempt is provided by Rowlands.30 Just as speci® c human
abilities, and more general characteristics such as age, gender, race and class, are
hidden behind the veil of ignorance, Rowlands argues that rationality is an
undeserved natural advantage that also ought to be hidden. As a result, by
enlarging the uncertainty in the original position, the contracting parties would
have to take into account the possibility that they might lack rationality, which
leaves open the possibility that they could turn out to be either `defective’
humans or, as a logical extension, animals. Therefore, the identity of species is
added to those things excluded behind the veil of ignorance. Rawls’s `difference
principle’, or at least part of it, that social and economic inequalities are to be
arranged so that they are to the greatest bene® t of the least advantaged, would
now bene® t all sentient beings, including animals and the most vulnerable
humans, as the least able to defend their interests. In practice, this `would entail
that many widespread, standard ways that animals are treated are grossly
unjust’.31
The major objection to the inclusion of animals as bene® ciaries of deliberations
in the original position is that rationality, and in particular a sense of morality,
is an essential criterion for the contracting parties since how else can they
deliberate in the original position, and how else can they keep to the agreement
made? 32 The ® rst response to this is that it is possible to challenge the view that
normal adult humans are, in general terms, always imbued with a capacity to
understand what it is to be just. Irrespective of this, however, the rationality
criticism misses the point in the sense that it is not what individuals are like in
the original position that matters but what they eventually turn out like. As
Rowlands points out `The fact that the framers of the contract must be conceived
of as rational agents does not entail that the recipients of the protection afforded
by the contract must be rational agents’.33 If that were the case then Rawls would
have dif® culty incorporating children and seriously mentally de® cient humans
as recipients, yet he clearly wants to do so. As Brian Barry points out, `if a day-
old infant can be represented in the original position, why not a monkey or a
dog?’.34

Animals, rights and utility

If it is established that animals have a higher moral status than the orthodoxy
allows for, then a second-order question arises. This is to which general theory
can we attach the moral status of humans and animals? In the animal ethics
literature, as in ethics in general, the major division has been between rights
and utilitarianism, and, in particular, the advocacy of the former by Regan
and the latter by Singer.35 The dimensions of the Regan/Singer debate follow
 Animal rights, political theory and the liberal tradition 15

conventional lines. The former points to the bene® ts of focusing on individual

sovereignty and condemns utilitarianism for its willingness to sacri® ce indi-
viduals in pursuit of maximizing the aggregate amount of preference satisfac-
tions. The latter, by contrast, emphasizes the ¯ exibility of utilitarianism against
the rigidity of rights and the dif® culty of choosing between competing rights
claims.
It is one of the alleged advantages of Singer’s utilitarian approach that it is
more ¯ exible than the rights approach. In the ® rst place, it requires a weighing
up of the interests affected by any particular action. In addition, it also allows
for a greater recognition that the interests of animals and humans differ. So,
Singer’s emphasis on the equal consideration of human and animal interests
does not equate with identical treatment since it is concerned with identifying
relevantly similar interests. This allows us, for instance, to distinguish between
the undoubtedly different levels of harm that can be in¯ icted on `normal’ and
`defective’ humans, and on non-human animals. It is this very ¯ exibility that is
attacked by the Regan camp. No particular type of animal exploitation is
automatically ruled out as illegitimate, it is argued, because each one is contin-
gent upon a utilitarian calculation. This might mean that the overall bene® ts of
meat eating and animal experimentationÐ in terms, for instance, of employment
and human and animal healthÐ might outweigh the costs.36

Liberalism, animal rights and the moral orthodoxy

It is no accident that the major attempts to develop a critique of the moral
orthodoxy have come from within the liberal tradition. There is, ® rstly, the
pragmatic point that a theory of animal protection developed from within the
liberal tradition is more likely to be acceptable, given that liberalism is central
to western thought and practice. The work of liberal animal advocates quite
consciously emphasizes the language of reason and rationality, much more
acceptable to a liberal audience than the vocabulary of compassion, of caring
and feeling, which would seem to be appropriate in the discourse of animal
suffering and exploitation.37 It is also the case, secondly, that it is possible to
invoke certain liberal values in support of the enhancement of the moral status
of animals. 38 First, its reformist character allows change and improvement to
existing institutions and practices; second, it is a universalistic principle and
therefore offers the prospect of widespread animal liberation; third, its individual-
ism allows us to focus on the protection of individual animals; and, fourth, its
egalitarianism can be used to advocate equality across the species barrier.
There are a number of practical reasons, however, why the animal rights
movement is unlikely to reach its objective of achieving a much-elevated moral
status for animals. In liberal democratic societies, or any other kind for that
matter, signi® cant human interests are rarely, if ever, sacri® ced to uphold the
interests of animals. While there is considerable support in some countries for
reforms to the way animals are raised for food, progress in achieving them is
painfully slow and the number of vegetarians and vegans remains small.
Similarly, while there is considerable support for ending the use of animals in
the laboratory for `trivial’ procedures, such as the toxicity testing of cosmetics,
few are prepared to sanction a prohibition on the use of animals in medical
research. Animals are exploited in a variety of other ways tooÐ for instance,
16 Robert Garner

paraded in zoos and circuses, hunted for sport and/or for their fur and skinÐ
and varying degrees of legislative control are exercised over animal exploitation
ranging from the poor to the adequate.
It is this non-anthropocentric character of the animal rights movement which
holds the key to explaining why it has achieved relatively little progress. Along
with the deep ecology movement, animal rights is the only cause that seeks to
advance the interests of non-human species, even when these interests are in
con¯ ict with the signi® cant interests of humans. In this context, it is no accident
that campaigns designed to protect the interests of the `higher’ mammals, such
as the Great Ape Project mentioned earlier, are likely to be more successful since
we recognize their similarity to us.39 Similarly, the reason that campaigns
designed to protect wild animals tend to be more numerous and successful is
because there are considerable human bene® tsÐ whether aesthetic, economic or
health basedÐ to be had from doing so. Clearly, then, a movement that is painted
as promoting a cause that will, rightly or wrongly, damage some human interests
is going to face peculiar problems. Animals cannot campaign for their own
liberation, and it requires an unprecedented level of altruism from members of
a species who stand to lose from the protection of animals, to ful® l this objective
on behalf of them. As Wise astutely recognizes: `The problem for nonhuman
animals is that they can neither ® ght nor write. Well, they can ® ght a little . . .
But they are uniformly terrible at organized warfare against humans, and we
are excellent at slaughtering them.’ 40
It is the moral orthodoxy, then, which tends to hold sway in mainstream
public debates about our treatment of animals. There is still, however, consider-
able scope for improving the welfare of animals, even though animal rights are
not on the agenda. Where it can be shown that animal suffering is regarded as
unnecessary because it serves no useful human purpose, or where the human
sacri® ces involved are not regarded as substantial, improvements in the way
animals are treated become possible. In Britain, as in many other countries, the
laws relating to the welfare of farm and laboratory animals ® t this pattern. For
instance, the statute regulating animal experimentation in Britain speci® cally
requires researchers to balance the pain and distress their work in¯ icts on
animals with the bene® ts that work is likely to produce.41

Liberalism, the right and the good

Animal advocates may be unhappy that, as a result of the dominance of the
moral orthodoxy, animals will not be given the degree of protection enabled by
granting them rights or an equal consideration of their interests in a utilitarian
calculus, but, it may be argued, at least the worst excesses of animal exploitation
and suffering are eroded, and it still leaves open the possibility that greater
protection will be forthcoming in the future. Liberal democracies, then, would
appear to be consistent with a reasonably high level of animal protection. What
this relatively rosy picture fails to take into account, however, is the impact on
animal welfare of the in¯ uential liberal tenet of the priority of the right over the
good.
Even though liberals differ on the nature of the general rules of a liberal
society, there is a consensus in support of the view that the aim of liberal
political theory is to ® nd `a set of rules to guide political action which are
 Animal rights, political theory and the liberal tradition 17

independent of a conception of the good’.42 That is, any genuine liberal political
theory must include an anti-perfectionist principle of moral pluralism. This is
the idea, derived from a wider theory of liberty, that it is no business of the state
or society to interfere in individual moral codes or individual conceptions of the
good life. As Rawls, the doyen of modern liberalism, points out: `Which moral
judgments are true . . . is not a matter for political liberalism’, and the difference
between this position and that which holds that `there is but one such conception’
of the good `to be recognised by all citizens’ is `one of the deepest distinctions
between conceptions of justice’.43 A liberal state, then, is one that is based on
protecting individual rights rather than pursuing certain goals to which the
individual must be subsumed. As Mulhall and Swift elaborate: `The rights which
people have, and which it is the job of the state to protect, come ® rst and stand
as constraints on the conceptions of the good which people can choose to
pursue.’ For Barry, this liberal view de® nes `justice as impartiality’, which `is
not designed to tell us how to live’ but rather `how are we to live together, given
that we have different ideas about how to live’.44
Liberals are usually committed to the imposition of limits on the toleration
of competing conceptions of the good, since, as Crowder points out, despite the
association of liberalism with pluralism, the two are not necessarily compatible.
Indeed, moral pluralism can `positively undermine the liberal case, since it is
always open to the pluralist to ask, why not the illiberal option’.45 Liberals, then,
will usually accept some version of Mill’s harm principle, whereby individuals
are free to pursue their own conceptions of the good, except when the resulting
behaviour harms others. Now at this point it is important to note that there is
no reason why animals cannot be included as bene® ciaries of Mill’s principle. If
the case for an enhanced moral status for animals is accepted, this harm principle
applies equally to animals as it does to humans, so that if it is regarded as wrong
to harm a human in a particular context, it is equally wrong to harm an animal.
If the moral orthodoxy is accepted, on the other hand, the harm principle will
have to be adapted to take into account the fact that harm in¯ icted on animals
that can be shown to serve signi® cant human bene® ts is regarded as legitimate.
Up to this point, liberalism and the moral orthodoxy relating to animals
remain compatible. The problem arises, however, when, as we saw earlier,
animals are excluded from theories of justice and their treatment becomes a
matter for morals. Now it is possible to conceptualize harm in a wide sense to
include different conceptions of morality, so that I can be harmed by my distaste
for, or disapproval of, someone’s behaviour. However, this was not Mill’s intent
and, indeed, it is a liberal article of faith that moral disgust or indignation,
however deeply felt, is not suf® cient grounds for an activity to be outlawed as
`other-regarding’. The classic example here, which ironically involves the eating
of animals, is Mill’s insistence that even in a society where Muslims are in the
vast majority, it still remains illegitimate to impose the majority’s moral code
and forbid the eating of pork. In this case, for Mill, the `only tenable ground of
condemnation would be that with the personal tastes and self-regarding concerns
of individuals the public has no business to interfere’.46
According to the liberal doctrine of moral pluralism, then, there is an
assumption that individuals should be left alone to pursue their own conceptions
of the good life, and that the state or society should not intervene to impose one
particular moral code over another. Put in the context of our relationship to non-
18 Robert Garner

human animals it means, as Clark asserts, that `third parties have no right to
come between the whaler and her prey, or the farmer and her veal calves, since
none of us have a right to impose our ``merely’’ moral standards on other
autonomous agents’.47 What is more, the assumption is that, for liberals, indi-
vidual choice in the area of morality cannot be obstructed by majoritarianism. It is
for this reason, of course, that liberal polities such as the USA have constitutional
devices speci® cally designed to constrain majority decisions.

Liberalism, moral pluralism and animals

What we have argued so far is that the impact of the moral pluralism in¯ uential
within liberal thought makes the relationship between liberalism and the protec-
tion of animal interests problematic. This only becomes a theoretical problem if
animals are excluded from theories of justice, whether as moral equivalents to
humans (an animal rights position) or as morally worthy but inferior to humans
(the moral orthodoxy). This theoretical problem is made more acute, however,
by the fact that the moral pluralism argument has been utilized in practice by
those who seek to exploit animals. As a result, it is suggested here, the welfare
of animals has been compromised.
There are a number of indicators that the liberal principle of moral pluralism
has had a practical impact on the debate about the welfare of animals. It is
instructive to note, ® rstly, how much choice is invoked as a key principle in the
debate about the treatment of animals. We are free to choose whether or not to
hunt animals, free to abstain from eating meat, free to eat free-range or intensively
produced meat products. Similarly, we are free to choose to buy cosmetics not
tested on animals, even free to choose whether or not to partake of drugs which
have been developed through the use of animals, and toxicity tested on them
once developed. What this liberal principle does not allow is for me to expect
that others will desist from exploiting animals because I ® nd it distasteful or
morally repugnant. Equally, a strict version of moral pluralism would not allow
the state to intervene to prohibit animal suffering, such as in intensive husbandry
systems, if to do so would inhibit the pursuit of a particular conception of the
good. As a result, our treatment of animals becomes merely a preference rather
than a fundamental principle of justice.
Taken to its logical extreme, this moral pluralism could justify the moral
acceptability or toleration of every conceivable atrocity visited on animals. I
might, for instance, not like the idea of live lobsters `screaming’ in pans of
boiling water, but others ® nd this an acceptable price to pay for their dietary
needs. Now, of course, there have been important improvements in the welfare
of animals in many countries over the past 30 or so years. Moreover, the liberal
emphasis on choice might seem a civilized way of dealing with inevitable
differences of moral opinion, and for animal advocates the fact that a more
genuine choice now existsÐ in supermarkets and restaurants in particularÐ is an
important advance. Nevertheless, the greater choice made available is no substi-
tute for statute law regulating and/or prohibiting certain ways of treating
animals, and yet many of the worst excesses of intensive animal agricultureÐ
battery cages, beak trimming, tail docking, live exportation over long distances
and so onÐ still exist even in a country such as the UK, which is meant to be
more enlightened than most on this issue. It cannot be proved that there is a
 Animal rights, political theory and the liberal tradition 19

link between the choices available and the relative paucity of statute law, but
the existence of the former undoubtedly makes the animal suffering that is still
permitted more palatable.
It is perhaps not insigni® cant, too, that in the USA, where liberal ideology
plays a much more prominent societal and political role, animals are less well
treated than in many European countries.48 The importance attached to indi-
vidual autonomy and self-reliance against the interference of the state and
society is re¯ ected, above all, in stringent property laws. As Vincent asserts,
`property is the precondition to the development of the person. To interfere with
property is a gross infringement of rights and liberties.’ 49 It is not surprising,
then, that attempts to enforce anti-cruelty statutes, which exist in most American
states, are hindered signi® cantly by the weight attached to property rights, and
the general assumption that there has to be good reason for interference
in property rights makes general legislative improvements in animal welfare
dif® cult.50 By contrast, in Britain, it might be suggested, the ideology of individual
autonomy and self-reliance has been much less powerful. As Dworkin points
out, in the absence of a formal system of protecting rights in Britain, `the
majoritarian premise has been thought to entail that the community should
defer to the majority’s view about what . . . individual rights are’, and there is a
majority view in Britain that the protection of individual rights does not stretch
to the right of humans to abuse their animal property as they see ® t.51
The fact that defending animal interests as an indirect consequence of
protecting human interests is a fertile strategy for the animal protection move-
ment is indicative of the dominance of anthropocentrism and the state’s reluct-
ance to intervene to protect the interests of animals. In other words, it is much
easier to campaign for an animal welfare objective when there will be a human
bene® t too. There are, for instance, signi® cant environmental and public health
implications of factory farming. Similarly, the use of animals in medical research
has been criticized as potentially dangerous for humans because animals do not,
it is suggested, always make very good models for the treatment of human
diseases.52
There are two classic examples whereby those who seek to continue exploiting
animals explicitly use the language of liberal moral pluralism to justify and
preserve their activities. The ® rst of these is hunting with hounds in general,
and fox hunting in particular. Ironically, the image of fox hunting and its
supporters is conservative, whereas advocates of abolition are often perceived
as middle-class liberals. Conservative traditionalism is undoubtedly an important
factor in the support of fox hunting, and yet proponents have increasingly used
the language of liberalism to defend their activity.53 Faced by an abolitionist
majority (in the Commons and, according to most opinion polls, the general
public), the hunting community has elicited a good deal of sympathy by painting
the abolitionists as an illiberal mob intent upon an attack on a defenceless
minority.
The second example of the con¯ ict between moral pluralism and animal
welfare concerns the issue of ritual slaughter. In many countries, including Britain
but not Switzerland, Norway, Sweden or Ireland, ritual slaughter practised by
Jewish and Muslim communities is permitted despite the fact that there is
evidence that it represents a severe welfare problem. The practiceÐ justi® ed on
the religious rationale that meat from a stunned animal is `unclean’ because the
20 Robert Garner

blood ¯ ow has been alteredÐ involves the cutting of an animal’s throat with a
sharp knife without pre-stunning, which means that the animal remains con-
scious for anything up to three minutes `during which’, according to experts in
the science of animal welfare, `the animal must be in great pain and distress’.54
Moreover, additional welfare problems are created by the way in which animals
are ritually slaughtered. Some animals in the USA, for instance, are shackled
and hoistedÐ as stunned animals areÐ before having their throats cut while fully
conscious. The crucial point for our purposes here is that, despite the fact that
ritual slaughter almost certainly compromises the welfare of animals, it is
permitted in many countries primarily because religious toleration is an impor-
tant liberal principle.

Conclusion
Liberalism can be rescued from the charge that it is an apologist for animal
suffering, but this can only happen if animals are included, along with humans,
among those entities that we are obliged to protect as a matter of justice. At this
point, it becomes illegitimate to exploit animals on liberal grounds because to
do so is to act in an other-regarding fashion by depriving them of liberty or even
life, or causing them to suffer. Animals can be incorporated within a liberal
theory of justice whether they are granted an inferior moral status to humans
(the moral orthodoxy) or whether they are granted a moral status more or less
equivalent to humans (an animal rights or liberation position). As we saw, there
is a strong case for the latter verdict, although there are various practical reasons
why such an eventuality is unlikely.
The relationship between liberalism and the protection of animal interests
becomes problematic if we take on board the absence of animals from liberal
theories of justice and the consequences of leaving animal well-being to the
moral preferences of individuals. In this sense, the exclusion and marginalization
of animal interests in most modern political theory is regrettable. The incorpora-
tion of animals in a liberal theory of moral pluralism clearly reduces liberalism’s
attraction for animal advocates, and, what is more, there is evidence that it has
a practical relevance, inhibiting improvements in the welfare of animals. Because
of this, elements of other political traditionsÐ the conservative notions of respon-
sibility and paternalism, the socialist goal of protecting the weak, the communi-
tarian perfectionist emphasis on a goal-based state with a shared moral code or
a feminist care ethicÐ deserve serious consideration as appropriate ideological
locations for animal protection. Whatever the arguments employed, though, the
interests of animals should be established as an important element in political
thinking, and their exclusion requires more convincing arguments than those
provided so far.

Notes
1. T. Hayward, `Constitutional Environmental Rights: A Case for Political Analysis’,
Political Studies, Vol. 48, No. 3, 2000, pp. 558± 72; A. Dobson, Justice and the Environment,
Oxford, 1998.
2. J. Bentham, An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation, New York, 1948,
 Animal rights, political theory and the liberal tradition 21

p. 311; J. S. Mill, `Three Essays on Religion’ , in J. M. Robson (ed.), John Stuart Mill:
Essays on Ethics, Religion and Society, London, 1969.
3. T. Hobbes, Leviathan, Cambridge, 1992, p. 97; J. Locke, Two Treatises of Government,
London, 1988, p. 271; I. Kant, Metaphysics of Morals, New York, 1965, pp. 345 ± 6;
R. Descartes, `Discourse’, in J. Veitch (ed.), Rene Descartes: A Discourse on Method,
London, 1912, pp. 43± 6.
4. P. Carruthers, The Animals Issue, Cambridge, 1992.
5. R. Frey, Interests and Rights: The Case Against Animals, Oxford, 1980.
6. D. DeGrazia, Taking Animals Seriously: Mental Life and Moral Status, Cambridge, 1996,
pp. 40, 44.
7. R. Garner, Animals, Politics and Morality, Manchester, 1993.
8. Dobson, Justice and the Environment, pp. 66, 174.
9. J. Rawls, A Theory of Justice, Oxford, 1972, p. 512; B. Barry, `Sustainability and
Intergenerational Justice’, in A. Dobson (ed.), Fairness and Futurity: Essays on Environ-
mental Sustainability and Social Justice, Oxford, 1999; D. Miller, Social Justice, Oxford,
1976, p. 18.
10. Rawls, Theory of Justice, p. 505; Barry, `Sustainability’, p. 95.
11. Rawls, Theory of Justice, p. 512; J. Rawls, Political Liberalism, New York, pp. 12± 13.
12. Barry, `Sustainability’, p. 95.
13. M. Wissenburg, `The Idea of Nature and the Nature of Distributive Justice’, in
A. Dobson and P. Lucardie (eds), The Politics of Nature: Explorations in Green Political
Thought, London, 1993, pp. 9± 11; W. Galston, Justice and the Human Good, Chicago,
1980, p. 125; Dobson, Justice and the Environment, pp. 5, 190 ± 3; R. Nozick, Anarchy,
State and Utopia, Oxford, 1974, pp. 35± 47.
14. Rawls, Theory of Justice, p. 512.
15. H. McCloskey, `Moral Rights and Animals’ , Inquiry, Vol. 22, 1979, pp. 23± 54; B.
Ackerman, Social Justice in the Liberal State, New Haven, 1980, p. 71; Rawls, Theory of
Justice, p. 512.
16. See A. Townsend, `Radical Vegetarians’, Australasian Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 57,
1976, pp. 85± 93.
17. E. Pluhar, Beyond Prejudice: The Moral Signi® cance of Humans and Nonhuman Animals,
Durham, 1995, p. 46.
18. Pluhar, Beyond Prejudice, p. 57.
19. T. Regan, The Case for Animal Rights, London, 1984.
20. P. Cavalieri and P. Singer (eds), The Great Ape Project: Equality Beyond Humanity,
London, 1993.
21. Pluhar, Beyond Prejudice, p. 57.
22. DeGrazia, Taking Animals Seriously, p. 232.
23. Rawls, Theory of Justice, p. 510.
24. See the literature review in Pluhar, Beyond Prejudice.
25. Carruthers, Animals Issue, pp. 115 ± 16.
26. Pluhar, Beyond Prejudice, pp. 63± 4.
27. M. Midgley, Animals and Why they Matter, London, 1983; P. Wenz, Environmental Justice,
Albany, 1988.
28. Carruthers, Animals Issue, pp. 115 ± 16.
29. Pluhar, Beyond Prejudice, pp. 97± 101.
30. M. Rowlands, Animals Rights: A Philosophical Defence, Basingstoke, 1998.
31. D. Vandeveer, `Of Beasts, Persons and the Original Position’, The Monist, Vl. 62, No. 3,
1979, p. 373.
32. M. Pritchard and W. Robinson, `Justice and the Treatment of Animals: A Critique of
Rawls’, Environmental Ethics, Vol. 3, 1981, pp. 60± 1.
33. Rowlands, Animal Rights, p. 123.
34. Rawls, Theory of Justice, pp. 509± 10; B. Barry, Theories of Justice, Hemel Hempstead,
1989, p. 212.
35. Regan, Animal Rights; P. Singer, Animal Liberation, 2nd edn, London, 1990.
36. Regan, Animal Rights, pp. 200 ± 31.
37. This is not to say, of course, that animal advocates such as Regan and Singer do not
recognize the values of caring and feeling. It is undoubtedly the case, however, that
their aim is to develop a reasoned and rational case for animal liberation. Singer, for
22 Robert Garner

instance (Animal Liberation, p. iii), writes that `You cannot write objectively about . . .
some of the experiments performed today on nonhumans in laboratories. The ultimate
justi® cation for opposition . . . though, is not emotional. It is an appeal to basic moral
principles which we all accept, and the application of these principles to the victims
. . . is demanded by reason, not emotion.’
38. Rowlands, Animal Rights, pp. 38± 61.
39. K. Tester, Animals and Society: The Humanity of Animal Rights, London, 1991.
40. S. Wise, Rattling the Cage: Toward Legal Rights for Animals, Cambridge, MA, 2000,
pp. 13± 14.
41. D. Morton, `The Animals (Scienti® c Procedures) Act 1986’ , in D. Blackman, P.
Humphreys and P. Todd (eds), Animal Welfare and the Law, Cambridge, 1989,
pp. 195 ± 219.
42. R. Plant, Modern Political Thought, Oxford, 1991, p. 77.
43. Rawls, Political Liberalism, pp. xx, 134.
44. S. Mulhall and A. Swift, Liberals and Communitarians, Oxford, 1992, p. 30; B. Barry,
Justice as Impartiality, Oxford, 1995, p. 77.
45. G. Crowder, `Pluralism and Liberalism’, Political Studies, Vol. 42, No. 2, 1994, p. 303.
46. J. S. Mill, Utilitarianism, On Liberty and Considerations on Representative Government,
London, 1972, p. 142.
47. S. Clark, `Animals, Ecosystems and the Liberal Ethic’, The Monist, Vol. 79, No. 3,
1987, p. 121.
48. See R. Garner, Political Animals: Animal Protection Politics in Britain and the United States,
Basingstoke, 1998.
49. A. Vincent, Modern Political Ideologies, Oxford, 1995, p. 43.
50. G. Francione, Animals, Property and the Law, Philadelphia, 1995; Rain Without Thunder:
The Ideology of the Animal Rights Movement, Philadelphia, 1996.
51. R. Dworkin, Freedom’s Law: The Moral Reading of the American Constitution, Oxford,
1996, p. 16.
52. A. Johnson, Factory Farming, Oxford, 1991; R. Sharpe, The Cruel Deception, London,
1988.
53. R. Scruton, Animal Rights and Wrongs, London, 2000, pp. 116± 22.
54. A. Fraser and D. Broom, Farm Animal Behaviour and Welfare, London, 1990, p. 152.