Unraveling Speciesism in International Criminal Justice

• In Event: Rethink and Reboot: Reimagining the Logos of International Criminal Justice

Abstract

On most views of international legal personality, it is primarily states (and more recently, slowly, individual humans) who count. The subjecthood of other life forms is invisible in this intentionally constructed anthropocene. In this project, we step back and unravel this limitation, thereby allowing us to wonder what an anti-speciesist approach to international justice could look like. The consolidation of international criminal justice has failed to acknowledge the harms and pain experienced by other natural life forms, notably animals. But what if our concern for suffering was about life, rather than artificial subjects created by people and by the law?
In acknowledging the cruel hierarchies that exist within the human species, this paper interrogates how the focus on state and human subjecthood preserves the brute colonialism and imperial hegemony of the human species at large over all other life forms on the planet. We draw from concepts central to anti-colonialism to map out possibilities for an anti-speciesist agenda. These include: assimilation and humanification/anthropomorphism; extermination; out-lawism and self-defense; ghettoization/reservations; breeding, scientific research, and eugenics for certain genetic traits deemed desirable; domination and invisibility; and favoritism based on certain species being seen as ‘smart’, ‘educable’, ‘like us’, and companionate. The parallels between colonialist and speciesist practices suggest that the international criminal justice space should perhaps expand to include more sentient beings as subjects. However, we conclude that, given international criminal justice’s inability to adequately address the harms and wrongdoing of colonialism and imperialism within the domain of states and individual humans, we should not rely on these institutions to provide redress for animals or other forms of life either. To address all of these harms, we argue, we must reboot. We must imagine something much more radical. This reimagination does not begin in courtrooms, nor does it end there.

Authors

• Shannon Fyfe, Washington and Lee University

• Mark A. Drumbl, Washington & Lee University