(Certified) Humane Violence? Animal Welfare Labels, the Ambivalence of Humanizing the Inhumane, and What International Humanitarian Law Has to Do with It
The contemporary human-animal relationship is highly ambivalent. It is characterized by both the exacerbating exploitative use of animals and a progressing moral concern for the life, dignity, and welfare of animals. With regard to the agricultural use of animals (which is the quantitatively most si...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Cambridge University Press
2017-01-01
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| Series: | AJIL Unbound |
| Online Access: | https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/S2398772317000654/type/journal_article |
| _version_ | 1811157376070320128 |
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| author | Saskia Stucki |
| author_facet | Saskia Stucki |
| author_sort | Saskia Stucki |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | The contemporary human-animal relationship is highly ambivalent. It is characterized by both the exacerbating exploitative use of animals and a progressing moral concern for the life, dignity, and welfare of animals. With regard to the agricultural use of animals (which is the quantitatively most significant area of animal use and accounts for more than sixty billion land animals slaughtered globally each year), these two poles stand in particular contrast. On the one hand, agriculture has been increasingly industrialized and intensified over the course of the Twentieth Century. The modern system of industrialized animal production (or the “animal-industrial complex”) is marked by a high degree of rationalization, automatization, efficiency, mass production, and profitability, and has turned animals into mere production units—biomachines that convert feed into meat, milk, and eggs. On the other hand, the transformation of agriculture to industrialized animal production has raised grave ethical concerns, and societal discomfort at the systemic disregard for the welfare of farmed animals has grown. Most people cringe at the sight of footage showing the horrifying conditions prevailing in factory farms and slaughterhouses, and the vast majority of society subscribes to the basic moral principle that inflicting unnecessary pain and suffering on animals is wrong (a dictum also underlying the nearly universal prohibition of animal cruelty and which is so ingrained it could be considered a “rule of civilization,” as noted by the dissent in a Canadian appeal decision regarding an elephant in a city-run zoo). |
| first_indexed | 2024-04-10T05:05:14Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-c9aaa5c195314879b67c8b21ddaafd17 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2398-7723 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-04-10T05:05:14Z |
| publishDate | 2017-01-01 |
| publisher | Cambridge University Press |
| record_format | Article |
| series | AJIL Unbound |
| spelling | doaj.art-c9aaa5c195314879b67c8b21ddaafd172023-03-09T12:27:10ZengCambridge University PressAJIL Unbound2398-77232017-01-0111127728110.1017/aju.2017.65(Certified) Humane Violence? Animal Welfare Labels, the Ambivalence of Humanizing the Inhumane, and What International Humanitarian Law Has to Do with ItSaskia Stucki0https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5072-7326Senior Research Fellow, Max Planck Institute for Comparative Public Law and International Law.The contemporary human-animal relationship is highly ambivalent. It is characterized by both the exacerbating exploitative use of animals and a progressing moral concern for the life, dignity, and welfare of animals. With regard to the agricultural use of animals (which is the quantitatively most significant area of animal use and accounts for more than sixty billion land animals slaughtered globally each year), these two poles stand in particular contrast. On the one hand, agriculture has been increasingly industrialized and intensified over the course of the Twentieth Century. The modern system of industrialized animal production (or the “animal-industrial complex”) is marked by a high degree of rationalization, automatization, efficiency, mass production, and profitability, and has turned animals into mere production units—biomachines that convert feed into meat, milk, and eggs. On the other hand, the transformation of agriculture to industrialized animal production has raised grave ethical concerns, and societal discomfort at the systemic disregard for the welfare of farmed animals has grown. Most people cringe at the sight of footage showing the horrifying conditions prevailing in factory farms and slaughterhouses, and the vast majority of society subscribes to the basic moral principle that inflicting unnecessary pain and suffering on animals is wrong (a dictum also underlying the nearly universal prohibition of animal cruelty and which is so ingrained it could be considered a “rule of civilization,” as noted by the dissent in a Canadian appeal decision regarding an elephant in a city-run zoo).https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/S2398772317000654/type/journal_article |
| spellingShingle | Saskia Stucki (Certified) Humane Violence? Animal Welfare Labels, the Ambivalence of Humanizing the Inhumane, and What International Humanitarian Law Has to Do with It AJIL Unbound |
| title | (Certified) Humane Violence? Animal Welfare Labels, the Ambivalence of Humanizing the Inhumane, and What International Humanitarian Law Has to Do with It |
| title_full | (Certified) Humane Violence? Animal Welfare Labels, the Ambivalence of Humanizing the Inhumane, and What International Humanitarian Law Has to Do with It |
| title_fullStr | (Certified) Humane Violence? Animal Welfare Labels, the Ambivalence of Humanizing the Inhumane, and What International Humanitarian Law Has to Do with It |
| title_full_unstemmed | (Certified) Humane Violence? Animal Welfare Labels, the Ambivalence of Humanizing the Inhumane, and What International Humanitarian Law Has to Do with It |
| title_short | (Certified) Humane Violence? Animal Welfare Labels, the Ambivalence of Humanizing the Inhumane, and What International Humanitarian Law Has to Do with It |
| title_sort | certified humane violence animal welfare labels the ambivalence of humanizing the inhumane and what international humanitarian law has to do with it |
| url | https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/S2398772317000654/type/journal_article |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT saskiastucki certifiedhumaneviolenceanimalwelfarelabelstheambivalenceofhumanizingtheinhumaneandwhatinternationalhumanitarianlawhastodowithit |