Hi Dilan! Thanks for writing this piece; I agree with others that it’s an excellent contribution to an important conversation.[1]
Some small challenges to the piece:
I agree with Thom that many “short-term pragmatists” have a fairly clear theory of change for how their work will contribute to eventual abolition.
I agree with James that many “short-term pragmatists” want to see a diversity of tactics.
I feel confused about how far the pro-animal movement can accomodate conflicting visions. As you say, the US gay rights movement cohering about, broadly, one ask (gay marriage) and, even more broadly, one vision (freedom to marry) seems to have been very helpful.
Something I really liked about the piece: your framing of “short-term pragmatism vs passionate idealism” resonates with me. I agree that “welfarism vs abolitionism” isn’t helpful, not only because new welfarists support abolition, but also because when people invoke “welfarism vs abolitionism”, they tend to collapse a few different, complicated things into one binary (e.g. disagreements about ethics, movement strategy and culture).[2] “Short-term pragmatism vs passionate idealism” helpfully zooms in on mindsets as one dimension of disagreement.
And, from my conversations with advocates, I do think mindset is an important crux. I’m specifically thinking about an influential pro-animal activist who describes themselves as very optimistic, finds it hard to imagine things going wrong and, crucially, thinks this mindset is necessary for success because people need to believe change is possible for social change to ever succeed at all.[3] The optimist in me sees where they’re coming from, but the pragmatist in me finds it very reckless. This seems like an underdiscussed crux relative to, e.g., “welfare vs rights” and “radical vs incremental action”.
I like that the post ends with some recommendations for cultivating visionary pragmatism. I’m generally very interested in ways we advance strategic conversations and disagree productively within the pro-animal movement; and I agree with Josh Baldwin that this post is most helpful if it can guide practical decision-making. Some thoughts:
The movement should think about the validity of different milestones. For example, I’m skeptical that polling against factory farming counts for very much, for reasons similar to those discussed in this article. (You could counter that it still counts somewhat, which I would concede, but that takes us into an interesting conversation about how strong our evidence needs to be...)
Theory of victory mapping should include estimates for how likely a given milestone is. This should be (a) within a certain timeframe, and (b) given a proximate milestone. I think soliciting people’s intuitions about this would be a first step towards productive disagreement. Ambitious Impact’s research reports (sometimes? always?) give probabilities for their theories of change.
There should be some efforts to conduct ‘theory of failure’ mapping. I think sitting down and grappling with the ways a project could go wrong (including probabilities, as above) would add some helpful pragmatism for folks who lean towards the visionary.
There should be strong coordination to avoid negative externalities on other theories of victory. There’s been a recent conversation about an Animal Rising campaign to block new factory farms in the UK.[4] I think it’d be great to see a theory of victory/failure diagram that makes explicit how un/likely it is that this campaign causes some harms (e.g. production is displaced to lower welfare farms arboad) and some benefits (e.g. people power, narrative power). The campaign also cuts against good work done by other groups in the UK to secure more space per farmed chicken (point #2 in James’ comment). So I’d ideally like to see some way to do theory of victory/failure mapping that acknowledges that some groups’ milestones might be in competition with other groups’ milestones, and coordination mechanisms to avoid negative externalities on each others’ campaigns as far as possible.
Finally: I like your long, treacherous hike metaphor, and I think you might like the long, treacherous space journey metaphor in this post.
Thanks for all these thoughts Ben. A few scattered thoughts in response:
I don’t have a view on your third challenge, but it’s a good point.
Regarding your first two challenges: I agree with you, Thom and James on all of these. Reflecting on my intent in outlining short-term pragmatism, I think I ultimately wanted not to critique individual organisations or people, but the movement-wide dynamic/mindset that seems to have arisen. I.e...
While many orgs have a clear ToC, there don’t seem to be many spaces where movement-wide theory of victory gets discussed/debated/refined—at least not spaces that influence actual important decisions (well, not that I’m aware of… it may well be I’m just completely unaware of “the rooms where it happens”).
While many orgs/people want a diversity of tactics, I have a soft sense that our funding priorities could reflect this better. Given the young and clueless nature of our movement, I think we should be funding a very diverse spread of interventions, and more highly valuing interventions that build power.
100% agree with your thoughts about evaluating both validity and likelihood of milestones. I really struggle to see how we can be an effective movement without at least investing a small amount of resource into this.
Appreciate you flagging the point about “theory of failure” mapping, that’s a useful update for me!
Thank you for the link to Milan’s post about doing good while clueless! I think “steering capacity” is a great concept and very relevant here, and I like how it’s broken down—that could be a really useful tool for people wanting to take a “visionary pragmatist” approach going forward.
Hi Dilan! Thanks for writing this piece; I agree with others that it’s an excellent contribution to an important conversation.[1]
Some small challenges to the piece:
I agree with Thom that many “short-term pragmatists” have a fairly clear theory of change for how their work will contribute to eventual abolition.
I agree with James that many “short-term pragmatists” want to see a diversity of tactics.
I feel confused about how far the pro-animal movement can accomodate conflicting visions. As you say, the US gay rights movement cohering about, broadly, one ask (gay marriage) and, even more broadly, one vision (freedom to marry) seems to have been very helpful.
Something I really liked about the piece: your framing of “short-term pragmatism vs passionate idealism” resonates with me. I agree that “welfarism vs abolitionism” isn’t helpful, not only because new welfarists support abolition, but also because when people invoke “welfarism vs abolitionism”, they tend to collapse a few different, complicated things into one binary (e.g. disagreements about ethics, movement strategy and culture).[2] “Short-term pragmatism vs passionate idealism” helpfully zooms in on mindsets as one dimension of disagreement.
And, from my conversations with advocates, I do think mindset is an important crux. I’m specifically thinking about an influential pro-animal activist who describes themselves as very optimistic, finds it hard to imagine things going wrong and, crucially, thinks this mindset is necessary for success because people need to believe change is possible for social change to ever succeed at all.[3] The optimist in me sees where they’re coming from, but the pragmatist in me finds it very reckless. This seems like an underdiscussed crux relative to, e.g., “welfare vs rights” and “radical vs incremental action”.
I like that the post ends with some recommendations for cultivating visionary pragmatism. I’m generally very interested in ways we advance strategic conversations and disagree productively within the pro-animal movement; and I agree with Josh Baldwin that this post is most helpful if it can guide practical decision-making. Some thoughts:
The movement should think about the validity of different milestones. For example, I’m skeptical that polling against factory farming counts for very much, for reasons similar to those discussed in this article. (You could counter that it still counts somewhat, which I would concede, but that takes us into an interesting conversation about how strong our evidence needs to be...)
Theory of victory mapping should include estimates for how likely a given milestone is. This should be (a) within a certain timeframe, and (b) given a proximate milestone. I think soliciting people’s intuitions about this would be a first step towards productive disagreement. Ambitious Impact’s research reports (sometimes? always?) give probabilities for their theories of change.
There should be some efforts to conduct ‘theory of failure’ mapping. I think sitting down and grappling with the ways a project could go wrong (including probabilities, as above) would add some helpful pragmatism for folks who lean towards the visionary.
There should be strong coordination to avoid negative externalities on other theories of victory. There’s been a recent conversation about an Animal Rising campaign to block new factory farms in the UK.[4] I think it’d be great to see a theory of victory/failure diagram that makes explicit how un/likely it is that this campaign causes some harms (e.g. production is displaced to lower welfare farms arboad) and some benefits (e.g. people power, narrative power). The campaign also cuts against good work done by other groups in the UK to secure more space per farmed chicken (point #2 in James’ comment). So I’d ideally like to see some way to do theory of victory/failure mapping that acknowledges that some groups’ milestones might be in competition with other groups’ milestones, and coordination mechanisms to avoid negative externalities on each others’ campaigns as far as possible.
Finally: I like your long, treacherous hike metaphor, and I think you might like the long, treacherous space journey metaphor in this post.
And sorry I missed the conversation at Revolutionists Night!
@Aidan Kankyoku teases some of these apart in his new blog post, which I recommend to anybody who found Dilan’s post interesting.
I’m paraphrasing their views based on a few conversations.
Sorry to pick on Animal Rising; it’s a helpful, fresh-in-the-mind example.
Thanks for all these thoughts Ben. A few scattered thoughts in response:
I don’t have a view on your third challenge, but it’s a good point.
Regarding your first two challenges: I agree with you, Thom and James on all of these. Reflecting on my intent in outlining short-term pragmatism, I think I ultimately wanted not to critique individual organisations or people, but the movement-wide dynamic/mindset that seems to have arisen. I.e...
While many orgs have a clear ToC, there don’t seem to be many spaces where movement-wide theory of victory gets discussed/debated/refined—at least not spaces that influence actual important decisions (well, not that I’m aware of… it may well be I’m just completely unaware of “the rooms where it happens”).
While many orgs/people want a diversity of tactics, I have a soft sense that our funding priorities could reflect this better. Given the young and clueless nature of our movement, I think we should be funding a very diverse spread of interventions, and more highly valuing interventions that build power.
100% agree with your thoughts about evaluating both validity and likelihood of milestones. I really struggle to see how we can be an effective movement without at least investing a small amount of resource into this.
Appreciate you flagging the point about “theory of failure” mapping, that’s a useful update for me!
Thank you for the link to Milan’s post about doing good while clueless! I think “steering capacity” is a great concept and very relevant here, and I like how it’s broken down—that could be a really useful tool for people wanting to take a “visionary pragmatist” approach going forward.