Abstract
In Zoopolis, Donaldson and Kymlicka dismiss the abolitionist, or extinctionist approach in animal rights theory as insufficient in its theoretical foundation and disproportional regarding the means it promotes to prevent domesticated animals from suffering abuse by humans. Among the consequences of their counterproposal—granting domesticated animals citizenship—is an increased pressure to justify any interference with domesticated animals’ reproductive activities. This paper attempts to give such justification with reference to domesticated animals’ specific state of vulnerability, but also takes into account the interest of the mixed society to prevent overly demanding obligations. Even while recognizing existing domesticated animals as citizens, humans might be unable to fully meet their obligation to protect the most dependent of them, and therefore might be justified in conditionally subscribing to “extinctionism” and limiting these animals’ reproduction to the point of their ultimate extinction. Therefore, rather than upholding a strict opposition between extinctionism in any form and a political framework for animal rights, out of reasonable concern for the well-being of domesticated animals in the societies they have been placed in, a qualified extinctionist approach should be incorporated into the political framework developed in Zoopolis.
Highlights
On the first pages of Zoopolis, Donaldson and Kymlicka describe the condition of the animal advocacy movement as their motivation for providing the underlying animal rights debate with a new perspective (Donaldson & Kymlicka, 2011, p. 1)
They state that “the...movement is at an impasse” (Donaldson & Kymlicka, 2011, p. 1): it has achieved some minor improvements in the treatment of non-human animals in small isolated realms, but remains a failure when evaluated globally.1. They identify the movement’s insufficient theoretical foundations as the cause for its “strategic disaster” (Donaldson & Kymlicka, 2011, p. 79). They discuss the shortcomings of welfarist, ecological, and other animal rights approaches, but the main target of their criticism throughout the book seems to be abolitionism or “extinctionism” that calls for an end to all relations between humans and non-humans
The argument will amount to the claim that even within the political framework of animal rights provided by Zoopolis, one can adopt a refined version of extinctionism with respect to those domesticated animals who remain significantly dependent on humans even when they are provided with better opportunities for agency
Summary
Once we accept domesticated animals as citizens, we accept responsibility for the effects of their reproductive activities. If universal regulation of domesticated animals’ reproduction may be understood as a precautionary measure to prevent harm in potential new generations of animals and in line with actual animals’ hypothetical own best interests, this sort of extinctionism may be characterized as paternalistic (even if only with respect to a more sophisticated sense of the animals’ respective “good”). If this argument is persuasive so long as the environment is usually harmful for domesticated animals, does it lose its force when we make improvements in the system of care provided for domesticated animals (for example via citizenship)? While Donaldson and Kymlicka reject strong reproductive rights for humans and non-humans (Donaldson & Kymlicka, 2013b, p. 781), it seems that assigning individuals a right to assistance for themselves but to their offspring as well amounts to just such a strong reproductive right
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