Animals as goods
(things) or sentient
beings. A legal
historical indicator
for Animal Welfare
"ENFORCEMENT OF EUROPEAN ANIMAL
WELFARE RELATED LEGISLATION"
Brussels 12-13 June 2012
Teresa Giménez-Candela
Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona
www.derechoanimal.info
THINGS VS. SENTIENT BEINGS
A major change
took place during
the 90’s which
challenged the
continued existence
of a category that
has existed in Law
since Roman times:
animals are objects
that are owned.
ANIMALS IN CIVIL AND
COMMON LAW SYSTEMS
ANIMALS AS NO-THINGS
ANIMALS AS NO-THINGS
This change (animals are “non-objects”) can
be criticised for lack of ambition, in that it
does not give a new legal status nor does it
improve animals’ legal condition. While
maintaining animals’ continued existence as
Property,
by denying that they are “objects” and opens
the door to animals’ legal’ condition being
governed by its own laws.
Kinds of property
Personal property
Personal property
Real estate property
Intellectual property
Property on living beings
(?)
The expression “sentient beings”
as a standard for regulating
animal wellbeing is now being
implemented in many of the
EU’s legal texts
Art. 13 Treaty of
Lisabon
 Only one programmatic
legal text has included this
highly expressive legal
expression which recognises
animals’ condition as beings
who share with us a capacity
to feel and suffer
TWO DIFFERENT PLANES WITH
DIFFERENT CONSEQUENCES
TWO DIFFERENT PLANES WITH
DIFFERENT CONSEQUENCES
 1. - The health and welfare of animals is the aim sought by
Animal Welfare Legislation, primarily intended to regulate the
activity of industries, producers and veterinarians
2. - Avoid conflicts and punish cruelty that could be described as
a crime, is the purpose of Animal Law, which applies internally in
Member States.
 A reduction to absurdity of this dichotomy is that companion
Animals (private) are protected from cruelty, abandonment,
torture and death, but instead, it seems that in this category are
production animals , or testing animals, at least they are not
referenced in the criminal codes
Building bridges for
cooperation
 Legal texts, particularly those
that provide the basic
structure for the entire
regulatory system and the
enforcement of standards,
need to be worded with
categories that put animals in
a context that more
accurately reflects their status
as sentient beings, taking
them out of the category of
objects governed by narrow
Property relationships
Building bridges for
cooperation
 Veterinary surgeons and jurists
should work closer together
with the goal of improving
animals’ living conditions’.
 This in turn will enable us to
address from firmer ground
the changes that must be
made—now more than
ever—in the legal systems
governing animals.
SPECIFIC PROPOSALS of
HARMONIZATION
1. - Making of European legislation on animal
welfare issue an instrument intelligible. Much of
the legislation is repetitive, dark and excessive.
2. - Extending the classification of 'sentient
beings' to all animals. The Declaration of Article
13 of the Treaty of Lisbon, with all its defects,
should be extended to Member States as a
standard of their internal law.
SPECIFIC
PROPOSALS of
HARMONIZATION
 3. Consistently
harmonization of legal
texts to the classification
of 'sentient beings'.
 In other words, to
replace the classification
of animals as "things" or
as "non-things" in the
legal texts of the law
countries, who develop
texts or programmatic
basis.
SPECIFIC PROPOSALS of
HARMONIZATION
4. – Application of this qualification to
companion animals and animals used in
shows.
5. - Standards by which Animal Welfare Law are
measured, be applicable to any legislation on
animals within the EU
THANK YOU FOR YOUR
ATTENTION!!
[email protected]