Dr. Melanie Joy shares experience and
insights about strategies for animal liberation.
Published last year, Strategic Action for Animals (Lantern Books) is an indispensible and empowering guide to becoming a better activist.
Dr. Melanie Joy, who holds a Ph.D. in psychology and a master’s degree in education, is best known for her research into the reasons why people support animal exploitation (a topic she discusses in her recent book Why We Love Dogs, Eat Pigs, and Wear Cows). But it is her experience as a social psychologist, educator, organizer and activist that informs this earlier book, making it a powerful resource.
The focus of the book is on strategy. “When you are strategic, you capitalize on your strengths, turn your weaknesses into opportunities, and create a force that attracts people to your side and away from those you are fighting. When the playing field is not level, strategy is the great equalizer.”
While it can be read in just a few hours, the book is absolutely packed with valuable information that is both challenging and inspiring. Some may have given the book a pass because fully half of it—the section titled Strategic Organizing for Animals—is devoted to material about building effective grassroots organizations. While this part is most useful for those who are intimately involved in organization building and management, there is some great information here for anyone who works on campaigns for animals either individually or as part of a group, including some guidelines for effective peaceful direct action. (And for those who are, in fact, involved in the work of building an organization, the material in this section is enormously practical and absolutely essential.)
The other two sections are crammed with useful ideas and information for everyone. The section on Strategic Movement Building for Animals focuses on the needs—and some current weaknesses—of the animal liberation movement. Joy makes a very compelling case for the unique nature of animal liberation and why it is fundamentally different—and far more challenging—than other social justice movements. Winning popular support to the cause of animal liberation is crucial for success and there is some great text here about what that means in terms of messages and activism.
A strong power base is essential for a strategic movement, Joy notes, and that means that different types of activists need to work together, not merely tolerate each other. Those who engage in what might be viewed by the public as more radical discourse, actually make it easier for mainstream organizations to become more progressive. Thus all efforts propel the movement forward in different ways. But problems occur when more radical activists devalue the efforts of those working with mainstream groups—and vice versa.
While differences of opinion should be welcomed, they become problematic when individuals are dogmatic, believing that only one ideology and approach is legitimate. “Dogmatism is a problem largely because activists don’t appreciate that the success of the movement depends not on choosing one approach among many, but on using all of them. Strategic movements need a diversity of activists and organizations.”
The author also discusses the importance of building bridges with other movements and finding common cause as in the fight against economic globalization.
The final section of the book, Strategic Activism for Animals focuses on individual advocacy. The author’s experience as a psychologist really stands out here as she shares professional insight about personal paradigms, the very real (to them) fears that people have about vegetarianism, and the common mistake that activists make in thinking that information alone will change people’s minds. She gives valuable real-life practical guidelines for finding the fine line between challenging and supporting listeners and for figuring out when and how to communicate.
This is where every vegan advocate can benefit from this book, including those who don’t consider themselves activists or who are not actually involved in the animal liberation movement. If you ever find yourself talking to others about why you are vegan, the points here will help you do so in an effective way. The material on dealing with stress and traumatic knowledge will resonate with all vegan readers, too.
Melanie Joy writes with compassion and with the authority of experience and research. This is a book to read, underline, and re-read periodically. If you miss it, you are missing the chance to be the best activist possible.
For more articles on activism and spreading the vegan message:
In Praise of Animal Rights Activists
Free Vegan Starter Guides
Going Vegan in Ten Easy Steps
Finding the Right Vegan Message
| Check out my blog The Vegan Dietitian to learn more about vegan diet and lifestyle! |
Comments
We desperately need a book of this nature from someone well-versed in Social Movement Theory...until then, I guess this will have to do. I've requested this from the library and will be giving it a read. "...success of the movement depends not on choosing one approach among many, but on using all of them"...I have a bad feeling that she fails to recognize that welfarism does not promote our cause but actually makes animal exploitation more efficient and more socially acceptable.
Great review! I put this book on my "To Get" list yesterday after you mentioned it in your blog post. Thanks for writing about it in-depth here.
Thanks for your comment, Corey. Dr. Joy is a pretty sophisticated analyst and strategist, so while there may be legitimate debate about some of her points, I think she is fairly astute about the pros and cons of all the approaches. I don't think she "fails to recognize" anything.
Personally, I think there are good counter-arguments against your points. Welfare reform serves to decrease efficiency, not increase it (the whole reason for all of the horrifying practices in animal agriculture are to keep costs low and production high). And welfare reform may make animal exploitation more socially acceptable or it may actually shift perceptions about animals in ways that push society towards a positive view of rights. To say that we absolutely know which of those outcomes is correct is the kind of dogmatism that Dr. Joy suggests we guard against.
Thanks, Tracy. I really think you'll like it! I hadn't read it earlier because I thought it was just about organizations. Am sorry I missed it for a whole year!
I know a younger couple who are going through financial struggles. My husband and I have taken them to a local farmers market several times - They now understand how you can make $20 and some beans/rice stretch for weeks.
They are on the road to eliminating meat because of economics.
As a result they have both lost some weight and seem to be much healthier. Will they ever become "vegan" or animal rights "activists"? --- Doubtful. But, the thought of doing such is easier to address, now that the hard issue of animals as "essential food" has been debunked.
I am all for steps in the right direction --- And I don't think there's any *One* *Right* road to that direction.
I read book nearly a year ago so I don't remember my exact disagreements with some of Melanie Joy's advice, but I do remember this point clearly:
She says we should avoid the term "flesh" and instead use the euphemism "meat," despite pointing out the fact that "meat" sanitizes the reality of what humans are eating.
As Joan Dunayer explains in her book /Animal Equality/, such deceptive language is used strategically by industry to hide the cruelty and injustice of speciesist exploitation. Search on Google for her article "English and Speciesism" (it's posted the website of Lantern Books) for clear examples of what she is talking about.
Thanks, Bea. That’s pretty much similar to what I was trying to express in my blog post from Dec 3. Sometimes people really do get there kind of backwards—giving up/reducing animal foods first and then seeing the ethics of the issue! And I know from reading your work that you are open to different approaches.
Brandon, here is what Dr. Joy said in her points on “strategic communication”: “Avoid loaded, provocative words, such as flesh, torture, and murderer.” I’m not sure I always agree with this regarding all of these words, but there is no doubt about the fact that we have to assess each conversation individually. There are times when loaded words like these serve to cut short a conversation about animals that might otherwise have been ongoing and with a more positive outcome. And that’s a loss for the animals. Again—it’s the idea that there is one right way to speak, one type of language to always use, one single message to promote that we should probably guard against.
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