The question is not whether animals are sentient . . . the question is what will you take responsibility for?
Time to do more than take responsibility for just half of the sentient animal's life experience
In England during the early 1800s, the early political champions of animal protection law were ridiculed, jeered, and literally laughed out of Parliament. But in 1822, those champions were successful in the first animal protection law in England being put in place. That law obviously recognised that animals could feel and experience (i.e. were “sentient”) by the fact that early legislators decided to create law that took responsibility for protecting animals from feeling and experiencing pain, distress or suffering that society, via its Courts, deemed to be unnecessary.
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What society classifies as “necessary” varies. Sometimes “necessary” is interpreted by reference to the interests of the animal (e.g. preventing blatant acts of cruelty such as “cruelly beating, kicking, ill-treating, overriding, overdriving, overloading, torturing, infuriating or terrifying an animal”). Necessary may also be extended to consider what is in the interests of the owner of the animal, or the community.
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200 years ago, that first animal protection law in England was a revolutionary achievement. It overcame widespread views that a person “could do what they wanted with their property". As English law spread around the world with the early colonialists, it shaped the rules in ways that can still be recognised in laws today.​​​
Any country that has law which protects animals from feeling or experiencing unnecessary pain, distress or suffering, implicitly recognises that those protected animals are sentient.
Today's recognition of animals as sentient is not revolutionary - it is simply explicitly stating what has been implicit for hundreds of years.
So, for those wanting to elevate standards of animal care, sentience is the doorway to the real issue.
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The question is NOT whether animals are sentient, or whether they suffer. That's been affirmed by the law hundreds of years ago.
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The question IS what will you apply responsibility for?
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The pivotal issue for today's law reformers shaping the law that governs the human-animal relationship today and for decades to come is whether we, as a society, via our law, will take responsibility ("duty of care") for their pleasure ("positive states") rather than just their pain ("negative states", "anti-cruelty law").
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Sentient Animal Law says "yes" and knows how to make positive animal welfare "the law".
You are being presented with two choices:
evolve or repeat.
Law's sentient animal is at a legal crossroads.
Down Path A is "business as usual" and perpetuation of law that operates on basic minimums. It is unfit for a recovering planet, consumer expectations, or resolving existing global animal-related issues - but it's the known, and there are strong voices who resist the uncertainty and cost of "change".
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Down Path B is positive animal welfare law.
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For those seeking to elevate standards of sentient animal welfare, there are two critical lessons to recognise:
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Simply explicitly recognising animals as sentient in legislation predictably fails to result in pragmatic change. The Treaty of Lisbon and New Zealand's 2015 Amendment to its animal welfare legislation both recognised animals as sentient and both failed to define sentience by reference to the animal's negative and positive states. They both stand as examples of good intentions that failed to result in pragmatic changes to the daily lives of animals.
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Meaningful change requires an evolution of the duty of care (i.e. legally enforceable responsibility). Positive animal welfare law doesn't do away with existing duties to prevent animal cruelty, it extends the current duty by obligating the human caregiver to also provide animals with opportunities to experience positive states.
Business as usual OR an updated law that's fit for modern world needs, risks and opportunities?
Law is unique as a change management tool
The evolution of animal law has always needed its champions
Today it needs champions who want a law that does more than simply refrain from cruelty because less pain is not the same as more pleasure.
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Despite the best of intentions, there continues to be misunderstanding, confusion and conflicts of interest about sentience. Sentience is the doorway to potential change, not the deliverer of change.
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Explicitly recognising animals as sentient in law without a corresponding shift in the duty of care has consistently failed to shift applied standards of care above existing baseline minimums.
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BUT, if you legislatively define sentience in a manner that applies responsibility ("duty of care") for the animal's positive states, you'll open the door to changes in standards, practices, and the daily life experience of each animal.
We'd love to show you how this law reform works for you at your next conference, webinar or any other similar event.
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We can:
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demystify the discussions, confusions and legal misunderstanding about animal sentience
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demonstrate the predictable pathways and outcomes of 'sentience' recognition vs definition,
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address stakeholder concerns, opportunities and benefits obtained by those who are already implementing policies that do more than just protect animals from cruelty
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illustrate the messaging that results in wide stakeholder understanding and therefore agreement
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demonstrate how this singular reform is legal reform is consistent with existing legal models and methodologies thereby avoiding the usual barriers of alternative creative proposals on how to deliver timely and effective outcomes on global issues, national interests, and the lives of animals and people.