The legal case against anthropocentrism
Canada’s agriculture sector raises over 700 million animals for human consumption every year, and a growing body of legal scholarship is examining a dissonance that sits at the heart of those practices. The animal-based agriculture industry—meat, egg and dairy farming—largely governs itself in terms of how farmed animals are raised, operating according to non-enforceable industry codes for animal welfare. In contrast, “an increasing number of those involved in legal education are rethinking the law’s species-based hierarchy that places humans at the apex,” explains UVic law professor and Lansdowne Chair in Law, Maneesha Deckha.
Maneesha Deckha is the representative for University of Victoria as a member of the Brooks Animal Studies Academic Network.