Many people, including animal advocates and others who want to grant legal rights (including personhood) to nonhuman animals, are often criticized for their views because others fear it will diminish what it means to be human. I frankly never have understood these unfounded fears because if one looks, for example, at sentience―the ability to feel―if one member of a species has the capacity to feel, then so too do others of the same species. For this and some other reasons, I was pleased to learn of a book by Dr. Raffael Fasel, More Equal Than Others: Humans and the Rights of Other Animals (2024), that focuses on how animals can be granted rights without undermining humans’ basic equality and rights. Here’s what Fasel had to say about this interesting and important book.
Marc Bekoff: What inspired you to write More Equal Than Others: Humans and the Rights of Other Animals?
Raffael Fasel: Over the last decade, animal rights advocates have advanced a radical new litigation strategy. Instead of simply claiming violations of animal welfare provisions, some litigants have argued that animals are legal persons with fundamental legal rights―rights that are akin to human rights and go well beyond what current animal welfare legislation protects. However, as such lawsuits have become more prominent, so has the criticism by those who worry that giving rights to animals would undermine human rights. My book addresses the crucial question arising at this pivotal moment: Can animals become legal persons and holders of fundamental legal rights without threatening humans’ basic equality and rights?
MB: I see you are a legal scholar and philosopher by trade. Does the book draw on both these areas of expertise?
RF: Yes. One of my main interests lies in studying how philosophy and legal theory can be brought to bear on emerging legal phenomena. The pursuit of fundamental legal rights for animals is such an emerging phenomenon, and, as such, there is very little existing case law or legal scholarship that helps us make sense of what it means for animals to have legal rights or personhood.
MB: Who is the book aimed at?
RF: Although the book was published by an academic press, it is written in an accessible way and is aimed at anyone with an interest in the burgeoning field of animal rights law. The book is multidisciplinary in its approach, covering the history of animal and human rights and the legal-theoretical relationship between dominant human and animal rights approaches, as well as practical and policy questions such as how animal rights can be implemented in practice. As such, I hope it therefore appeals to those with scholarly interests as well as activists keen to equip themselves with the most powerful tools to achieve animal rights on the ground.
MB: You said that your book addresses the crucial question of how animals can be granted rights in ways that do not threaten human rights. What conclusions do you reach?
RF: The book draws three main conclusions. First, I show that the human rights advocates’ scepticism about animal rights is not a new phenomenon. As I demonstrate, this scepticism goes back to the inception of human rights in the 18th century. Shedding light on a largely neglected debate between the animal rights proponent Jean-Claude Delamétherie and the animal rights sceptic Jean-Baptiste Salaville, I show that past and contemporary arguments in favour and against animal rights are very surprisingly similar.
Second, after analysing the nature of these arguments, I conclude that they are representative of two opposing fundamental rights conceptions. The first is what I call the “Aristocratic conception,” prominent with human rights proponents, which argues that only human beings have fundamental rights and they have them simply in virtue of being born human―much like a nobleman had special privileges just because they were born into a noble family. On the other side of the spectrum, we can find the “Meritocratic conception,” which dominates thinking among animal rights advocates. According to this conception, anyone―including animals―merits fundamental rights if they can be shown to possess the relevant rights-justifying features. For example, if sentience and an interest in bodily integrity justify the right to not be tortured, then all sentient animals with that interest deserve that right―regardless of which species they belong to.
Finally, I argue that both these conceptions have their strengths and weaknesses and that it is therefore advisable to pursue a middle ground. The Aristocratic conception provides strong rights protection, but it excludes all nonhumans. The Meritocratic conception, by contrast, manages to include nonhumans, but it does so by potentially endangering the rights of vulnerable humans. This is because it makes the possession of rights entirely dependent on whether an individual deserves rights in virtue of having the relevant rights-justifying properties. However, there are humans and animals who lack these properties or have them to a lesser extent than others. To overcome this problem, I offer the Species Membership Approach: legal personhood, fundamental legal rights, and other legal entitlements should be extended to animals not based on their individual capacities, but based on their species.
MB: I know that there is other work on legal animal rights. What makes your book special?
RF: My work is indebted to the pioneering scholarship of many others in the field, including Steven Wise, Gary Francione, Maneesha Deckha, and Alasdair Cochrane. However, the book also adds to existing debates by examining in depth the complex relationship between human and animal rights. As I show, human rights proponents tend to be overly worried about the impact of animal rights on human rights. But I also caution that some animal rights proponents are too sanguine about what they see as the perfectly harmonious relationship between human and animal rights. The book’s contribution lies in offering a clear-eyed account of how―and how not―to advance both animal and human rights.
MB: Do you think people who believe in human rights are more likely to embrace animal rights after reading your book?
RF: One of the main challenges that animal rights litigants have faced so far is the fear among judges and the broader public that granting rights to animals could in some way take away from humans’ rights. But as so often, one fears only what one does not understand. As my book shows, there are ways of granting animals legal rights and personhood―such as through the Species Membership Approach―which prove that this fear is ultimately unfounded.
