Abstract
The Palgrave International Handbook of Animal Abuse Studies presents original, interdisciplinary work that is foundational for animal abuse studies. Grounding the chapters is an interest in criminological and zemiological issues, coupled with a critical perspective that is decidedly non-anthropocentric/non-speciesist—for the task of animal abuse studies is “first and foremost, for the sake of animals themselves” (p. 5, emphasis in original). Professors, researchers, scholars, students and teachers, as well as activists, policy-makers and practitioners of all kinds will find the volume useful as an indispensable resource for anyone concerned with understanding—and eradicating—harm to animals.
The volume is comprehensive. It includes different species, forms of abuse and types of abusers, and it covers a range of social relations and locations that elicit harm. Furthermore, suggestions for social change, including policy implications, are offered throughout. All of the concepts and issues with which the chapters engage, and the theories and methods used to frame those discussions, cannot be addressed in this space. Nevertheless, it is worth noting just a few of the themes that run throughout the Handbook before moving on to the synopsis of it below. The animals in this volume are subjects, objects and abject. As beings, they are kin and comrades, and as inanimate objects—not-beings—they are “things” to consume and possess. Some occupy both territories at once: as subjects and objects alike, those animals are used for clothing, commodities, food, tools, weapons and sources of fun. Their abuse takes place in mundane, private and local spaces, as well as more spectacular, distant and “exotic” ones. And it is found at all levels of sociality—ideological, individual, interpersonal/inter-species, organizational and structural. Furthermore, violence against animals includes active and passive behaviors; it can occur directly and indirectly. And finally, in regard to conceptualizing and measuring that violence, both formal and informal sanctions must be taken into account, as abuse occupies many locations within, between and outside of the de jure/de facto and crime/harm dichotomies.
The Handbook is divided into the following parts: (1) the abuse of domesticated animals; (2) the abuse of animals used in farming; (3) the abuse of animals in the wild; (4) the abuse of animals used in entertainment; (5) the abuse of animals in vivisection and scientific research; (6) the abuse of animals by agents of the state; and (7) interventions with animal abuse offenders. Each part contains chapters that focus on a different type of animal abuse in relation to “its basic characteristics; its incidence and prevalence; how it might be explained and the variety of social reactions and responses to it” (p. 7).
Part 1 focuses on abuse to which domesticated animals—companion animals, pets—are subjected. A multitude of harms is associated with people’s desires to coexist with particular types and breeds of other animals. James Yeates and David Bowles address this issue by looking at the harms and legality of breeding and selling domesticated animals, more generally, and Jennifer Maher, Harriet Pierpoint and Claire Lawson look at the issue, more specifically, with their chapter on status dogs. Violence also stems from specific forms of abuse that humans directly and deliberately inflict upon domesticated animals. Illustrating this dynamic are discussions of physical cruelty, by Arnold Arluke and Leslie Irvine; animal sexual assault, by Piers Beirne, Jennifer Maher and Harriet Pierpoint; and animal hoarding, by Arnold Arluke, Gary Patronek, Randall Lockwood and Allison Cardona. And while certain activities are used to define companion animal/pet abuse, inactivity must also be part of its conceptualization, as Angus Nurse’s chapter on animal neglect reminds us.
Part 2 confronts animals (ab)used in farming—because producing, sustaining and taking the lives of animals on farms necessitates harm. Erika Cudworth examines the ways that farmed animals are abused when they are bred and reared for their flesh, milk and eggs. Nik Taylor and Heather Frasier critique slaughterhouses.
In Part 3, our attention is drawn to animals in the wild. Angus Nurse highlights forms of wildlife collecting that threaten animals as individuals and populations, such as gathering eggs and collecting taxidermy and hunting trophies. Jennifer Maher and Tanya Wyatt illustrate the international trade in animals and animal parts, while Rob White’s chapter covers threats to animals that occur more indirectly through wildlife habitat destruction.
Part 4 deals with harm to animals used in/for entertainment. Several chapters demonstrate how animal abuse is linked inexorably to the sports, play and games to which they are subjected by humans (e.g. Kevin Young’s chapter on animal racing; Peter Squires’s chapter on hunting and shooting; and Claire Lawson’s chapter on animal fighting). Edutainment spaces—locations such as zoos and marine parks that combine leisure and entertainment—also elicit abuse. A critique of aquariums and the treatment of fish within them is offered by Jordan E. Mazurek.
Part 5 examines harm to animals in scientific research and industries that experiment on animals. Allie Phillips and Anthony Bellotti discuss changing laws and practices that allow shelter animals to be acquired and used for vivisection. André Menache addresses the historical and legal context of animal abuse in research, along with types and frequencies of abuse that persist in the name of science.
In Part 6, we are directed to state-sanctioned violence against animals. As humans use animals to inflict violence upon other humans—and mediate other forms of human–human violence—animals are put in harm’s way. The chapter on police dogs, by Janine Janssen, and animals in war, by Ryan Hediger, are two such examples. Conservation, taken up by Krithika Srinivasan and Rajesh Kasturirangan, is another site of formalized, legitimized violence against animals that is included in this section. Their piece discusses violence condoned through conservationist efforts geared toward animals defined as “invasive alien species”—in contrast to, and for the welfare of, “native species”. Ragnhild Sollund’s chapter points us to yet another location and cluster of legal and illegal harms: the plight, particularly theriocide, of trafficked animals seized by officials.
In Part 7, Mary Gupta, Lisa Lunghofer and Kenneth Shapiro concentrate on preventing further violence against animals by those known to be animal abuse offenders. In their chapter, they discuss existing interventions with adults and children, matters central to developing more effective interventions and suggestions for bridging the prevention/intervention divide.
In the introduction of the Handbook, a paradox—central to the book and animal abuse studies—is presented, and correspondingly, offers a means to a conclusion here: “[u]nderlying the enhanced concern and compassion for animals is a long tradition of deliberate abuse” (p. 3). Where there is abuse, there is also compassion. In other words, while it is horrifying that this book exists, it is reassuring that it does. However hard it is to think about the horrors that animals face at the expense of human behavior, animal abuse is, to borrow from Levi-Strauss’s adage, “good to think with”. Only then can it be rendered unthinkable.
While the volume includes countless harms, there are, unfortunately, other forms of harm, sites of abuse and species that suffer cruelty. If only one book could cover them all. Some omissions are practical, due to “limitation of space or because there is little or no current research on them. Prominent among these are the abuse of animals used in religious practices and in certain forms of entertainment, such as circuses and movies” (p. 7).
One of the Handbook’s strengths is that it provides a clear framework for those interested in moving animal abuse studies forward, including researchers with topics not explicitly discussed in the volume. The perspective and empirical foundation that this Handbook offers can be used to inform any number of concerns pertaining to the well-being of the animals themselves.
