A comparative study of the legal protection of research animals

Abstract

South African law faces fundamental and practical shortcomings that prevent it from adequately protecting animals used in scientific research. This dissertation compares the legal protection provided by South Africa and France, considering each legal system’s successes and failures in protecting research animals. This comparison is framed within the animal welfare approach and the animal rights approach and the ethical theories underlying them. The welfare approach is primarily influenced by utilitarianism and seeks to improve how animals are treated while maintaining the status quo of their exploitation and property status. The rights approach primarily draws from rights-based theories, although utilitarianism also influences it. It rejects the property and utility status based on moral rights and seeks to grant them legal rights. It argued that these approaches are not mutually exclusive and can be applied separately to minimise and eventually eliminate animal suffering. It is found that South Africa primarily applies the welfare approach and, as such, faces the fundamental problem of animals as property, which is the fundamental cause of research animal suffering. South African welfare legislation also faces practical shortcomings, including a lack of explicit recognition of animals’ sentience and intrinsic value, over-generality, fragmentation, and ineffective enforcement. Although France faces the same fundamental problem of animals as property, it addresses many of South Africa’s practical shortcomings. Therefore, French law is drawn from to provide recommendations on how South Africa can address its practical shortcomings.