Industrial animal agriculture is a system that is supported by a wide variety of factors, from beliefs about animals being a “resource” to the way the political system is structured. In theory, we could coordinate our work so that we targeted numerous different driving forces at the same time, in order to maximally destabilize the existing system and replace it with something better. That could look like working for cultural change while developing alt. proteins and helping farmers to transition out of animal ag., to give a very broad example. You’d probably want to start in one location and then scale up, or something like that.
I can see many practical and conceptual obstacles to this kind of approach, but it also seems to make a lot of sense. What do you think? And as someone with a great overview of the movement, how much of this do you already see happening?
Thanks Rachel. I think there are people trying the kind of holistic systems-change approach you’re describing.
I’m personally skeptical that we have anywhere near the resources to globally destabilize the existing factory farming system. (And I think destabilizing it on a more local basis would have little global impact.) I think the primary drivers of factory farming—especially the demand for cheap meat—are so deep-rooted and widespread that they would take immense resources to change.
Instead our focus has mostly been on reducing the suffering caused by factory farming, by trying to both reduce the suffering of each animal and reduce the number of animals factory farmed. I think some of the interventions to do so, like developing alt proteins, probably overlap with some of the things you’re thinking of.
Industrial animal agriculture is a system that is supported by a wide variety of factors, from beliefs about animals being a “resource” to the way the political system is structured. In theory, we could coordinate our work so that we targeted numerous different driving forces at the same time, in order to maximally destabilize the existing system and replace it with something better. That could look like working for cultural change while developing alt. proteins and helping farmers to transition out of animal ag., to give a very broad example. You’d probably want to start in one location and then scale up, or something like that.
I can see many practical and conceptual obstacles to this kind of approach, but it also seems to make a lot of sense. What do you think? And as someone with a great overview of the movement, how much of this do you already see happening?
Thanks Rachel. I think there are people trying the kind of holistic systems-change approach you’re describing.
I’m personally skeptical that we have anywhere near the resources to globally destabilize the existing factory farming system. (And I think destabilizing it on a more local basis would have little global impact.) I think the primary drivers of factory farming—especially the demand for cheap meat—are so deep-rooted and widespread that they would take immense resources to change.
Instead our focus has mostly been on reducing the suffering caused by factory farming, by trying to both reduce the suffering of each animal and reduce the number of animals factory farmed. I think some of the interventions to do so, like developing alt proteins, probably overlap with some of the things you’re thinking of.