Zoopolis : a political theory of animal rights / Sue Donaldson and Will Kymlicka.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Donaldson, Sue.

Contributor:

Kymlicka, Will.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Animal rights.

Human-animal relationships--Moral and ethical aspects.

Human-animal relationships.

Animal rights--Moral and ethical aspects.

Genre:

Electronic books.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (vii, 329 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Oxford : Oxford University Press, 2011.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

For many people 'animal rights' suggests campaigns against factory farms, vivisection or other aspects of our woeful treatment of animals. 'Zoopolis' moves beyond this familiar terrain, focusing not on what we must stop doing to animals, but on how we can establish positive and just relationships with different types of animals. Zoopolis offers a new agenda for the theory and practice of animal rights. Most animal rights theory focuses on the intrinsic capacities or interests of animals, and the moral status and moral rights that these intrinsic characteristics give rise to. Zoopolis shifts the debate from the realm of moral theory and applied ethics to the realm of political theory, focusing on the relational obligations that arise from the varied ways that animals relate to humansocieties and institutions. Building on recent developments in the political theory of group-differentiated citizenship, Zoopolis introduces us to the genuine "political animal". It argues that different types of animals stand in different relationships to human political communities. Domesticated animals should be seenas full members of human-animal mixed communities, participating in the cooperative project of shared citizenship. Wilderness animals, by contrast, form their own sovereign communities entitled to protection against colonization, invasion, domination and other threats to self-determination. `Liminal' animals who are wild but live in the midst of human settlement (such as crows or raccoons) should be seen as "denizens", resident of our societies, but not fully included in rights andresponsibilities of citizenship. To all of these animals we owe respect for their basic inviolable rights. But we inevitably and appropriately have very different relations with them, with different types of obligations. Humans and animals are inextricably bound in a complex web of relationships, and Zoopolisoffers an original and profoundly affirmative vision of how to ground this complex web of relations on principles of justice and compassion.

Contents:

Introduction

Universal basic rights for animals

Extending animal rights via citizenship theory

Domesticated animals within animal rights theory

Domesticated animal citizens

Wild animal sovereignty

Liminal animal denizens

Conclusion.

Notes:

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

0-19-161898-5

0-19-162055-6