CO-CITIZENRY: Is granting people the right to represent animals in democratic processes a desirable option?
While animals’ rights are fundamentally important, granting people rights to represent them on issues that concern them may lead to the opposite of what we want. Or worse, it may put them at significant risk. Animal suffering primarily comes from human interference. For the most part, the best course of action is to leave them alone, rather than voting for whether their cages should be 10 or 15 square meters. Additionally, most animals’ interests are basic and straightforward, such as not being harmed, not being killed, and being able to drink water and eat. These interests can be included as part of a constitutional non-harm principle and a right-to-life principle that protects them without the need for deliberation.
LUIS CORDEIRO-RODRIGUES: Some philosophers argue that animals should be included in the democratic system, with people acting as their representatives in voting on issues that concern them. This article contends that, while animals’ rights are fundamentally important, granting people rights to represent animals in democratic processes may lead to the opposite of what we want. Or worse, it may put animals’ interests and rights at significant risk. If animals’ rights are basic and straightforward, as proponents of this proposal assume, then deliberation is either redundant or dangerous in safeguarding the interests of animals…
The idea of representing animals is becoming increasingly important. The Dutch parliament has a Party for Animals campaigning to advance animals’ interests. Likewise, in the Portuguese parliament, the party People, Animals, and Nature (formerly Party for Animals and Nature) has proposed several policies to advance animals’ interests. As Robert Goodin has pointed out, although the concerns for animals and the environment are legitimate, the political theory underlying it is not sufficiently developed and sophisticated.
In other words, there are legitimate concerns about animals, given how animals are treated and defending such interests is morally urgent. However, these movements’ discourses lack a convincing moral justification of why this is the case. Hence, some philosophers have tried to advance ethical and political theories that can justify representing non-human interests, including animals.
The case for animal voting is not to imagine animals voting themselves. Indeed, such an approach would be ridiculous, given that most animals (potentially all) would not understand the action. The idea is grounded instead on the premise that human proxies can represent animals in some situations, similar to how adults represent children. Goodin, for example, links the proposal with the idea that parents are usually understood as trustees of their children’s interests…
The initial reaction may be that animals are not competent to vote, so the proposal must be dismissed. But this exaggeration misses the fact that animals also have agency. Animals can show agency in many ways. We must pay attention to how animals are signalling their preferences and try to understand that the expression of preferences does not need to be human-centric. If we decentralise from a human-centric perspective to express preferences and interests, we can see animal behaviour as expressing what they wish.
Animals can express themselves through less sophisticated themes. If this is the case, as long as animals can express their preferences on some topics, they must be included in voting processes . The core of this argument is grounded on the premise that there is something evident about what animals’ preferences/interests are. The primary reason is that animals’ interests are straightforward and obvious, and we can detect their preferences…
Our arguments demonstrate that including animals in voting causes more harm than good. However, the proponents of the voting proposal could argue that this kind of argument can only be accepted if it is based on empirical evidence, and I have not presented any. Additionally, there is no legitimate judge of the quality of the outcome to determine this question: who is to decide?
We should start by replying that the argument does not require empirical evidence to be rejected. That is an impossible criterion for refutation because, to date, no electoral system has included animals. Fortunately, it is also unnecessary because we need a reasonable justification for not giving voting rights to animals. Philosophical argument is grounded on justification, and this justification does not need to be empirical. The critical question, however, is why democracy tends to be chosen over other systems. The reason is that democracy, other things equal, tends to be the best way to identify and provide what people want, even if the consequences of the democratic process are harmful, even if there is political influence, and so forth.
The point is that the value of democratic processes is instrumental in expressing preferences. If it fails to accomplish this action, it fails one of its fundamental purposes. Thus, democratic processes are not used simply because they are unconditionally or intrinsically valuable: if we were to vote for killing everyone from a specific ethnic group, such a voting outcome would not be more valuable than an authoritarian regime prohibiting such killing. Democratic processes are valued for what they can offer. Nonetheless, it is unlikely that voting is the best option for understanding and respecting the interests/preferences of individuals, like animals, who cannot represent themselves. So, the question is whether representatives can really express or at least improve the identification of preferences of animals and forward, thereby, animals’ interests.
A clarifying way to think about how the proposal is problematic is to imagine that we had a committee of white males representing women. They would go to parliament, and after surveying women’s preferences, they would make laws about them. The example feels uncomfortably familiar as this is the form of legislation that existed before women’s voting, and no reasonable person today thinks it is legitimate. The reasons why it is not legitimate are varied, but there are at least two fundamental ones. Firstly, there is too much conflict of interest, which obviously will curtail the legitimacy of the voting. Secondly, the person herself is the best evaluator of their condition, and no one can fully replace them. The problem is that the purpose of including animals in voting is defeated because representatives cannot represent animals’ preferences well. Having a committee with so much power is as worrying as having a group of white males representing women…
For most animals, except those who cannot survive by themselves, the best course of action, other things being equal, is to leave them alone rather than voting for, say, whether their cages should be 10 or 15 square metres. For the most part, animal suffering primarily comes from human interference, and therefore, to place humans to further deliberate on animals’ interests is a bad idea. Additionally, most interests at stake are straightforward and basic. By this, we mean that animals’ interests are evident and very rudimentary, such as not being harmed, not being killed, and being able to drink water and eat. Resultantly, these interests can be included as part of a constitutional non-harm principle and a right-to-life principle that protects these rudimentary interests without the need for deliberation. SOURCE…
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