Natural Relations

Ecology, Animal Rights and Social Justice

Ted Benton author

Format:Paperback

Publisher:Verso Books

Published:17th May '93

Currently unavailable, and unfortunately no date known when it will be back

Natural Relations cover

"A major advance in work on animal rights." -Andrew Dobson

Offers a new perspective on contemporary arguments for animal rights, social justice and environmental protection. Benton brings together modern political ecology, debate about the moral status of animals, and critical social theory.In this challenging book, Ted Benton takes recent debates about the moral status of animals as a basis for reviewing the discourse of "human rights." Liberal-individualist views of human rights and advocates of animal rights tend to think of individuals, whether human or animals, in isolation from their social position. This makes them vulnerable to criticisms from the left which emphasize the importance of social relationships to individual well-being.

Benton's argument supports the important assumption, underpinning the cause for human rights, that humans and other species of animal have much in common, both in the conditions for their well-being and their vulnerability to harm. Both liberal rights theory and its socialist critique fail adequately to theorize these aspects of human vulnerability. Nevertheless, it is argued that, enriched by feminist and ecological insights, a socialist view of rights has much to offer. Lucid and wide-ranging in its argument, Natural Relations enables the outline of an ecological socialist view of rights and justice to begin to take shape.

A major advance in work on animal rights ... no-one working in the field will be able to avoid grappling with his original and provocative conclusions. -- Andrew Dobson

ISBN: 9780860915904

Dimensions: 218mm x 137mm x 13mm

Weight: 333g

260 pages