This post is mostly about how animal welfare is less popular than global health but I don’t really see the tie-in for how this (probably correct) claim translates to it being less effective. Taking the first argument at face value, that some people won’t like being in some ways forced to pay more or change their habits, does not seem to translate to “it is not cost effective to do successfully force them (and one hopes eventually change their hearts and minds) anyway.” This was precisely the case for a lot of social movements (abolition, women’s suffrage, civil rights, worker’s rights, the environmental movement, etc.) but all these movements were to various degrees successful.
It seems to me that in order for any of these popularity based arguments to hold water, you need a follow-on of “and therefore it is not cost effective to invest in them, and here is the evidence.” However, I think we have a lot of evidence for cost-effectiveness in investing animal interventions. See cage-free egg campaigns for example. I similarly don’t understand the relevance of other popularity-based concerns, such as being accused of being culturally insensitive. What is the implication for effectiveness if such accusations are made? Why does that matter?
Keeping the public on side is actually quite important for getting things done.
Backlash against the thing you’re trying to promote blows out costs, making the plan less cost-effective
50% of people are women so I think women’s suffrage had a pretty strong support base before it was made law. Similar story for your other examples I think: build support, then laws. Abolition seems like an example of where a counter-movement blew out the cost of change a lot.
Seems to me that the effectiveness costs of public support are already baked into existing effectiveness estimates. It also seems to me that the fact that animal welfare is comparatively unpopular means that it is more neglected and therefore has more low-hanging fruit.
I don’t think any of the popularity-based arguments really support the claim that there is going to be a large backlash that has not yet manifested. I agree that a world where we knew everyone would be 100 percent behind the idea of improving welfare but for some reason hadn’t made it happen out of inertia would make animal welfare interventions even more cost effective. However, I don’t think this means that we should favor global health and development over animal welfare any more than the possibility that people might resent helping the poor people in poor countries over poor people in our own countries means we should focus more on helping the domestic poor out of fear of backlash.
You can’t bake-in something as unpredictable as how movements and counter-movements evolve and interact.
We need to be more open to uncertainty and consider unexpected ways in which our best laid plans may go astray. Animal Welfare is rife with these uncertainties.
I’m not super knowledgeable about women’s suffrage, but
It was not universally supported by women (See e.g. here; I couldn’t quickly find stats but I’d be interested).
Surely the relevant support base in this case is those who had political power, and the whole point is that women didn’t. So “50% support” seems misleading in that sense.
I could similarly say “>99.999% of animals are nonhumans, so nonhuman animal welfare has an extremely large support base.” But that’s not the relevant support base for the discussion at hand.
I didn’t say universal or 50% support. Many women were against, many men were for. My point is that it had a stronger support base than shrimp welfare before we tried to regulate it.
The idea that you can go regulating without considering public support/resistance is silly
Sorry you’re right, you didn’t say this—I misread that part of your comment.
I still think your framing misses something important: the logic “50% of people are women so I think women’s suffrage had a pretty strong support base” applies at all points in time, so it doesn’t explain why suffrage was so unpopular for so long. Or to put it another way, for some reason the popularity and political influence of the suffrage movement increased dramatically without the percentage of women increasing, so I’m not sure the percentage of people who are women is relevant in the way you’re implying.
The idea that you can go regulating without considering public support/resistance is silly
On the other hand I didn’t say this! The degree of public support is certainly relevant. But I’m not sure what your practical takeaway or recommendation is in the case of an unpopular movement.
For example you point out abolition as an example where resistance caused massive additional costs (including the Civil War in the US). I could see points 1, 3, 7, and possibly 8 all being part of a “Ways I see the Quaker shift to abolitionism backfiring” post. They could indeed be fair points that Quakers / other abolitionists should have considered, in some way—but I’m not sure what that post would have actually wanted abolitionists to do differently, and I’m not sure what your post wants EAs to do differently.
Maybe you just intend to be pointing out possible problems, without concluding one way or another whether the GH → AW shift is overall good or bad. But I get a strong sense from reading it that you think it’s overall bad, and if that’s the case I don’t know what the practical upshots are.
This post is mostly about how animal welfare is less popular than global health but I don’t really see the tie-in for how this (probably correct) claim translates to it being less effective. Taking the first argument at face value, that some people won’t like being in some ways forced to pay more or change their habits, does not seem to translate to “it is not cost effective to do successfully force them (and one hopes eventually change their hearts and minds) anyway.” This was precisely the case for a lot of social movements (abolition, women’s suffrage, civil rights, worker’s rights, the environmental movement, etc.) but all these movements were to various degrees successful.
It seems to me that in order for any of these popularity based arguments to hold water, you need a follow-on of “and therefore it is not cost effective to invest in them, and here is the evidence.” However, I think we have a lot of evidence for cost-effectiveness in investing animal interventions. See cage-free egg campaigns for example. I similarly don’t understand the relevance of other popularity-based concerns, such as being accused of being culturally insensitive. What is the implication for effectiveness if such accusations are made? Why does that matter?
Keeping the public on side is actually quite important for getting things done.
Backlash against the thing you’re trying to promote blows out costs, making the plan less cost-effective
50% of people are women so I think women’s suffrage had a pretty strong support base before it was made law. Similar story for your other examples I think: build support, then laws. Abolition seems like an example of where a counter-movement blew out the cost of change a lot.
Seems to me that the effectiveness costs of public support are already baked into existing effectiveness estimates. It also seems to me that the fact that animal welfare is comparatively unpopular means that it is more neglected and therefore has more low-hanging fruit.
I don’t think any of the popularity-based arguments really support the claim that there is going to be a large backlash that has not yet manifested. I agree that a world where we knew everyone would be 100 percent behind the idea of improving welfare but for some reason hadn’t made it happen out of inertia would make animal welfare interventions even more cost effective. However, I don’t think this means that we should favor global health and development over animal welfare any more than the possibility that people might resent helping the poor people in poor countries over poor people in our own countries means we should focus more on helping the domestic poor out of fear of backlash.
You can’t bake-in something as unpredictable as how movements and counter-movements evolve and interact.
We need to be more open to uncertainty and consider unexpected ways in which our best laid plans may go astray. Animal Welfare is rife with these uncertainties.
I’m not super knowledgeable about women’s suffrage, but
It was not universally supported by women (See e.g. here; I couldn’t quickly find stats but I’d be interested).
Surely the relevant support base in this case is those who had political power, and the whole point is that women didn’t. So “50% support” seems misleading in that sense.
I could similarly say “>99.999% of animals are nonhumans, so nonhuman animal welfare has an extremely large support base.” But that’s not the relevant support base for the discussion at hand.
I didn’t say universal or 50% support. Many women were against, many men were for. My point is that it had a stronger support base than shrimp welfare before we tried to regulate it.
The idea that you can go regulating without considering public support/resistance is silly
Sorry you’re right, you didn’t say this—I misread that part of your comment.
I still think your framing misses something important: the logic “50% of people are women so I think women’s suffrage had a pretty strong support base” applies at all points in time, so it doesn’t explain why suffrage was so unpopular for so long. Or to put it another way, for some reason the popularity and political influence of the suffrage movement increased dramatically without the percentage of women increasing, so I’m not sure the percentage of people who are women is relevant in the way you’re implying.
On the other hand I didn’t say this! The degree of public support is certainly relevant. But I’m not sure what your practical takeaway or recommendation is in the case of an unpopular movement.
For example you point out abolition as an example where resistance caused massive additional costs (including the Civil War in the US). I could see points 1, 3, 7, and possibly 8 all being part of a “Ways I see the Quaker shift to abolitionism backfiring” post. They could indeed be fair points that Quakers / other abolitionists should have considered, in some way—but I’m not sure what that post would have actually wanted abolitionists to do differently, and I’m not sure what your post wants EAs to do differently.
Maybe you just intend to be pointing out possible problems, without concluding one way or another whether the GH → AW shift is overall good or bad. But I get a strong sense from reading it that you think it’s overall bad, and if that’s the case I don’t know what the practical upshots are.