Animal Law: Reform or Revolution?

This book has emerged out of the inaugural conference of the doctoral programme “Law and Animals” at the Law School of the University of Basel. It tackles one of the normative questions fundamental to this novel field of interdisciplinary legal research - the question of the appropriate legal status and means of legal protection of animals, and frames it in terms of a well-known controversy: reform or revolution? Should the use of animals be merely regulated for the purpose of humane treatment and improving animal welfare, or must it be abolished in order to safeguard the (moral) rights and inherent value of animals? The contributors introduce the reader to the ethical and legal bases of this debate and further pursue the main issue of whether the law’s dealing with animals ought to be reformed.