Zoopolis: A Political Theory of Animal Rights

Citation

Donaldson, S., & Kymlicka, W. (2011). Zoopolis: A Political Theory of Animal Rights. Oxford University Press. (Paperback 2013.)

Chapter Summary

Context and Argument

Zoopolis is a work of political theory that argues that the animal rights debate has been stuck at the level of moral status and should move to the relations between animals and human political communities. Most animal rights theory asks which intrinsic capacities give animals moral rights, and its answer is a set of universal basic rights, such as not to be killed, enslaved or tortured. Donaldson and Kymlicka accept these rights but argue that they are not enough, because they do not tell us what we owe to different animals in different relationships. Drawing on Will Kymlicka's earlier work on citizenship, multiculturalism and minority rights, they propose that animals fall into three groups with different political standing: domesticated animals as co-citizens, wild animals as members of sovereign communities, and liminal animals, which live among us without being domesticated, as denizens. The book has an introduction, six chapters and a conclusion.

Introduction

The introduction describes the state of the animal advocacy movement: legal and welfare reforms have been won, but the systematic use of animals continues. The authors criticise both welfare reform and the idea of a single set of rights for all animals as inadequate, and set out the book's alternative: to treat the moral question as a question about political membership and relationships.

Chapter 1: Universal Basic Rights for Animals

This chapter defends the core of the rights approach. Sentient beings with a subjective life of their own are said to have inviolable basic rights, so that they cannot be sacrificed for the benefit of others, and the chapter argues that this applies to animals as it does to humans. The authors contrast it with approaches that weigh animal interests as one input in a calculation of overall welfare.

Chapter 2: Extending Animal Rights via Citizenship Theory

Here the authors argue that universal rights need to be supplemented by relational ones. They turn to citizenship theory, in particular to work on group-differentiated rights, migrants and people with intellectual disabilities, to argue that political membership does not depend on being able to deliberate in a rational way. The chapter introduces the three-part scheme developed in the rest of the book.

Chapter 3: Domesticated Animals within Animal Rights Theory

The chapter examines the position, associated with abolitionist forms of animal rights theory, that domestication is itself wrong and that domesticated animals should be allowed to die out. The authors reject this view. They argue that domesticated animals have been shaped to live with humans, that they cannot simply be returned to the wild, and that we therefore owe them a place in a shared community.

Chapter 4: Domesticated Animal Citizens

This chapter develops the proposal that domesticated animals should be seen as citizens of mixed human-animal communities. The authors compare their position with the idea of dependent citizenship for people who need support, and discuss how animals can express their preferences and take part in shared life. Implications include ending exploitative uses such as farming for food and rethinking how shared spaces are designed.

Chapter 5: Wild Animal Sovereignty

Wild animals are treated as members of communities with a claim to self-determination in their own territories. The chapter argues against treating wild animals only as parts of ecosystems or as objects of management, and for limiting human intervention, while discussing when intervention might still be justified. It applies ideas about territory and sovereignty drawn from human political theory.

Chapter 6: Liminal Animal Denizens

The chapter concerns animals such as crows, raccoons and urban wildlife, which live in human settlements without being domesticated. The authors argue that they should be treated as denizens: residents entitled to protection and to fair terms of coexistence but not to full citizenship. The chapter criticises routine extermination of such animals and sketches alternative ways of sharing cities.

Conclusion

The conclusion draws the argument together and claims that the political approach is more realistic and more just than the alternatives. It argues that the framework fits with existing movements for inclusion and with a changed relationship between humans and other animals.

Key Concepts

Introduction and Chapters 1–2: Rights and membership

• Universal basic rights: inviolable negative rights, such as not to be killed or enslaved, owed to all sentient beings.
• Relational (differentiated) rights: further obligations that depend on the relationship between animals and human communities.
• Citizenship theory: the idea of political membership applied to animals, with attention to dependent forms of agency.

Chapters 3–4: Domesticated animals

• Critique of abolitionism: rejecting extinction of domesticated animals as the goal.
• Domesticated animal citizens: co-members of a mixed community with rights and with protection.

Chapters 5–6: Wild and liminal animals

• Sovereignty: wild animal communities with a claim to self-determination and territory.
• Denizenship: a status between citizen and outsider, for animals that live among us without being domesticated.

Critical Analysis

Strengths

• A new way to frame the question. Shifting from moral status to political relationships gives readers a reason to ask what rights animals have, as well as what we owe each category of animal.
• Clear three-part structure. The domesticated, wild and liminal division makes the argument easy to follow and to test against examples.
• Engagement with rival positions. The book discusses abolitionist, welfarist and ecological views directly, so it can be used to compare these approaches.
• Use of established political theory. The authors draw on concepts such as citizenship, sovereignty and denizenship that students of political philosophy will recognise.

Limitations

• Contested analogies. Whether animals can be citizens or sovereigns in a meaningful sense is the main point of dispute, and critics may see the analogy as stretched.
• Practical questions remain open. The chapters on wild and liminal animals leave difficult cases, such as predation and conflicts between animals, to be settled case by case.
• Assumes some background. Readers without any political theory or animal ethics will find some of the discussion fast.

Where It Fits in the Course

Within the political philosophy list, Zoopolis is a specialised application of political concepts to a new area. Wolff's An Introduction to Political Philosophy, Sandel's Justice and Miller's Political Philosophy: A Very Short Introduction provide the background in concepts such as justice, citizenship and political authority. Rawls's Political Liberalism and Pettit's Republicanism are major works of contemporary theory against which Donaldson and Kymlicka's liberal and citizenship-based framework can be compared. Read an introduction first, then Zoopolis as an example of extending theory to a contested case. On the ethics side, it complements the animal ethics books on the applied ethics list, which mostly argue from moral status.

How to Use This Book

The book is for undergraduates and graduate students with an interest in either political theory or animal ethics.

• Core: the Introduction and Chapters 1 and 2 set the argument and framework.
• By interest: read Chapter 4 for domesticated animals, Chapter 5 for wild animals and Chapter 6 for liminal animals. Chapter 3 is most useful for readers who know the abolitionist position.
• Seminar use: test each category with examples and ask whether the same approach would give different answers.
• Alongside: read an introduction to citizenship or multiculturalism to see the model from which the authors begin.