Full Description
Animal Suffering and Public Relations conducts an ethical assessment of public relations, mainly persuasive communication and lobbying, as deployed by some of the main businesses involved in the animal-industrial complex—the industries participating in the systematic and institutionalised exploitation of animals.
Society has been experiencing a growing ethical concern regarding humans' (ab)use of other animals. This is a trend first promoted by the development of animal ethics—which claims any sentient being, because of sentience, deserves moral consideration—and more recently by other approaches from the social sciences, including critical animal studies. In this volume, we aim to start an entirely unaddressed discussion within the field of public relations: The need to problematise the ethics of persuasion when nonhuman animal suffering is involved, particularly the impact of persuasion and lobbying on compassion towards other animals in the cases of food, experimentation, entertainment, and environmental management. This book provides an interdisciplinary, theoretical discussion illustrated with international case studies from experts in strategic communication, public relations, lobbying and advocacy, animal ethics, philosophy of law, political philosophy, and social psychology.
This unique book merges the fields of critical public relations, animal ethics, and critical animal studies and will be of direct appeal to a wide range of researchers, academics, and doctoral students across related fields.
Contents
PART I. Introduction
Animal suffering, the animal-industrial complex, and the ethics of persuasion
Núria Almiron
PART II: Public relations, persuasion, and compassion towards other animals
On Critical Public Relations and the moral consideration of other animals
Núria Almiron & Laura Fernández
On compassion, influence, and animal suffering
Olatz Aranceta-Reboredo & Núria Almiron
PART III. The ethics of persuasion of the animal-industrial complex
Harming animals, degrading the public sphere. The ethics of persuasion of the animal-based food industry
Eze Paez & Pablo Magaña
Case study: The meat lobby and the World Health Organization
Laura Fernández & Núria Almiron
Fatal Attractions. The ethics of persuasion of the animal-based entertainment industry
Paula Casal & Macarena Montes Franceschini
Case study: SeaWorld against the documentary Blackfish
Laura Fernández & Núria Almiron
For an Ethics of Care. The ethics of persuasion of the animal experimentation industry
Fabiola Leyton
Case study: Huntingdon Life Science and the SHAC Campaign
Laura Fernández & Núria Almiron
Deadly Influence. The ethics of persuasion of the environmental management industry
Catia Faria
Case Study: The Catalan Hunting Federation and Wild Boars Management
Laura Fernández & Núria Almiron
PART IV. Rejecting speciesism
Lobbying and persuasion on behalf of nonhuman animals. Psychological insights
Daniela Romero Waldhorn
Speciesism and Persuasion. A Conclusion
Oscar Horta, Núria Almiron and Dayron Terán
Index
