Human and non-human animal encounters with the law: the case of agribusiness in Mexico

Keywords: animal geography, legal geography
Session Type: Virtual Paper Abstract
Day: Saturday
Session Start / End Time: 2/26/2022 08:00 AM (Eastern Time (US & Canada)) - 2/26/2022 09:20 AM (Eastern Time (US & Canada))
Room: Virtual 1

Abstract

Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs) are sociotechnical regimes promoting the commodification of life (Emel and Neo 2010) and the standardization of human-animal encounters, livelihoods, and ontologies. In the expanding grain-oilseed-livestock complex, monocultures -such as genetically modified soy and corn- and factory meat farms are mutually reinforced (Weis 2013). This commodification of nature is influenced by the material and symbolic dimensions of the animal (Shukin 2009) and is mediated by law, science and more than human entanglements (Whatmore 2002). This paper will explore the encounters of human and non-humans in relation to the production of industrial meat and how these encounters are influenced by law in Yucatan, Mexico. The context of the Yucatan peninsula is characterized by a large Mayan indigenous population, a pluralistic legal context, vulnerability to climate change, and a growing resistance against agribusiness which includes counter-hegemonic litigation. I will explore the encounters between animals and the law and how different actors promote different symbolic and material spaces. For doing so, I will describe how critical animal geographies have defined human and non-human animal encounters and how these encounters have been analyzed by lively legalities (Braverman 2015).

References:

Braverman, I. (Ed.). (2015). Animals, biopolitics, law: lively legalities. Routledge.
Emel, J., & Neo, H. (Eds.). (2015). Political ecologies of meat. Routledge.
Shukin, N. (2009). Animal capital: Rendering life in biopolitical times. U of Minnesota Press.
Whatmore, S. (2002). Hybrid geographies: Natures cultures spaces. Sage.
Weis, T. (2013). The ecological hoofprint: The global burden of industrial livestock. Bloomsbury Publishing