Nussbaum’s Capabilities Approach and Non-Human Animals: Theory and Public Policy (original) (raw)
Related papers
De Ethica. A Journal of Philosophical, Theological and Applied Ethics, 2016
Originally, the Capabilities Approach had a strong anthropocentric orientation because of its focus on the entitlements of individual humans. However, as a part of the interest to employ it within animal and environmental ethics, it has been discussed whether the Capabilities Approach should consider also non-human life forms for their own sake. The most influential and elaborated contribution to this debate is Martha Nussbaum’s extension of the Capabilities Approach to include sentient animals. In this article, we argue that Nussbaum’s ascription of capabilities to animals is problematic, since the concept of a capability normally denotes an opportunity to choose between different functionings. When Nussbaum ascribes capabilities to animals, the concept seems to simply denote specific abilities. Such a use is problematic since it waters down the concept and makes it less meaningful, and it may obscure the fact that normal, adult humans, in contrast to sentient animals, can act as c...
Ableism and Speciesism: Tensions and Convergence Between Animal Rights and Disability Rights
The Plant-based and Vegan Handbook: Psychological and Multidisciplinary Perspectives, 2024
The disability rights movement seems to have a low opinion of the animal rights movement. This is notably due to the way the notion of disability gets entangled in the well-known “argument from marginal cases,” and not always for the right reasons. This chapter offers a critical overview of this argument and how it has been interpreted by disability scholars. I will then explore how the disability rights movement sometimes fails to fully appreciate the more promising approaches of animal rights theories, and how these theories can strengthen the rights of people with disability. Finally, I will present an important contribution that disability theories can bring to animal rights, mainly stemming from the social model of disability that revisits notions such as dependency, agency, and citizenship.
On rights based approaches to justice for animals (draft work in progress)
In the following paper I critically review and compare Robert Garner's recent rights-based approach to justice for animals with competing accounts by Martha Nussbaum focused on individual capabilities and species norms, and by Sue Donaldson and Will Kymlicka focused on citizenship theory. What does it mean to say that the status and treatment of animals is an issue of justice and why must this feature in a theory of (global) justice that is meant to contribute to the solution of urgent practical problems? I take the question of whether animals place significant moral demands on us as settled in the affirmative. I argue that animal rights are a matter of justice that must be covered by any substantive theory of global justice. In light of my critical survey of these innovative new political theories of animal rights I ask how animals might be included in global justice theory and how their inclusion might significantly enrich and inform global politics.
The Philosophical Quarterly, 2012
To date, vindications of animal rights have come from the hands of philosophers/ bio-ethicists, sometimes assisted by scientists of animal behaviour and cognition. This partnership between ethicists and scientists has enriched our understanding of animal capacities, such as their capacity to suffer. This understanding, in turn, has supported claims to include animals in our moral considerations. Due to this ethics-science cooperation animals are no longer considered mere objects, but are increasingly seen as subjects (at least in theory, if not in practice). However, the view of animals as potentially suffering subjects is still far removed from considering animals as active individual agents and equal members of our political community. Donaldson's and Kymlicka's Political Theory of Animal Rights lays the political theoretical basis for a positive humananimal relationship, which goes beyond the duty to respect the animal's basic negative rights.
Society & Animals, 2009
In the Proceedings that emerged from the Second International Workshop on the Assessment of Animal Welfare at Farm and Group Level, Sandoe, Christiansen, & Appleby (2003) challenged participants to ponder four fundamental questions:a. What is the baseline standard for morally acceptable animal welfare?b. What is a good animal life?c. What farming purposes are legitimate?d. What kinds of compromises are acceptable in a less-than-perfect world?Continued reflection on those questions warrants examination of the shape of our modern agricultural ethic. It also calls for a reexamination of recent work by Nussbaum (2004) on extending the capabilities approach to animals and the interface of…
Ethical and Political Approaches to Nonhuman Animal Issues: Towards an Undivided Future
Ethical and Political Approaches to Nonhuman Animal Issues: Towards an Undivided Future, 2017
**Due to the publisher holding the copyright to the book, drafts of the book unfortunately cannot be circulated. This includes the introduction. Upon release of the book the freely available front matter will be made accessible online and here. Until this changes, which is beyond my authority, all I can do is direct you to the book's site and Amazon. Abstracts of the chapters will be available. Apologies, and thank you for being interested. A.** This book offers ethical and political approaches to issues that nonhuman animals face. The recent ‘political turn’ in interspecies ethics, from ethical to political approaches, has arisen due to the apparent lack of success of the nonhuman animal movement and dissatisfaction with traditional approaches. Current works largely present general positions rather than address specific issues and principally rely on mainstream approaches. This book offers alternative positions such as cosmopolitan, libertarian, and left humanist thought, as well as applying ethical and political thought to specific issues, such as experimentation, factory farming, nonhuman political agency, and intervention. Presenting work by theorists and activists, insights are offered from both ethics and politics that impact theory and practice and offer essential considerations for those engaging in interspecies ethics within the political turn era. === CONTENTS: Acknowledgements List of Contributors List of Figures Foreword (by Richard D. Ryder) 1. Introduction (Andrew Woodhall & Gabriel Garmendia da Trindade) 2. Making Light of the Ethical? The Ethics and Politics of Animal Rights (Mark Rowlands) 3. Far-persons (Gary Comstock) 4. Evolution to Liberation: Political Reflections on Morality and Nonhumans (Steve F. Sapontzis) 5. Robert Nozick on Nonhuman Animals: Rights, Value and the Meaning of Life (Josh Milburn) 6. Reinventing Left Humanism: Towards an Interspecies Emancipatory Project (Zipporah Weisberg) 7. Justice for Animals in a Globalizing World (Angie Pepper) 8. Animal Rights and the Distorting Power of Anthropocentric Prejudice (Gary Steiner) 9. Interspecies Encounters and the Political Turn: From Dialogues to Deliberation (Eva Meijer) 10. Gandhian Satyagraha and Open Animal Rescue (Tony Milligan) 11. Shame: From Defensive Fury to Epistemological Shifts and Political Change (Elisa Aaltola) 12. Are We Smart Enough to Know When to Take the Political Turn for Animals? (Kim Stallwood) 13. Interspecies Atrocities and the Politics of Memory (Guy Scotton) 14. Animal Research and the Political Theory of Animal Rights (Gardar Arnason) 15. Cross-Species Comparisons of Welfare (Tatjana Višak) 16. Population Dynamics Meets Animal Ethics: The Case for Aiding Animals in Nature (Oscar Horta) 17. Afterword (Carol J. Adams) Index