Independent Office of Animal Protection (Animal Ask)

Many animal advocacy organisations around the world are campaigning to establish an Independent Office (or Commissioner) of Animal Protection. What benefits could such an Office bring to the lives of animals? And how could an organisation tell if this campaign is a priority in a particular country?

Independent Offices are designed to help overcome a particular problem in government regulation: regulatory capture. Regulatory capture occurs when regulation is co-opted to serve the interests of an industry or another specific group, rather than the public. When it comes to animal welfare, regulatory capture occurs when the interests of the animal agriculture industry is unduly prioritised over meaningful animal welfare standards. This phenomenon often arises when a single government institution (e.g. the country's department for agriculture) is responsible for both promoting the animal agriculture industry and setting the animal welfare standards that regulate that industry.

The 'gold standard' reform to overcome regulatory capture is to establish an Independent Office of Animal Protection, which is a separate government authority with the responsibility to set animal welfare standards without undue interference. Other smaller, more tractable reforms exist: one example is to move the responsibility for animal welfare out of the agriculture department and into another department; another example is to establish a Commissioner for Animal Protection, which is a more limited government authority with the power to hold accountable the department that does have responsibility for animal welfare.

In general, campaigning for an Independent Office (or Commissioner) of Animal Protection involves high-level policy reform, so this campaign is more challenging than other campaigns. So, this campaign is an effective choice in a particular country if several key conditions are met:

• The country must have strong institutions, effective democracy, and a concern for animal welfare. These are necessary for an Independent Office to bring about improvements in animal welfare.
• Regulatory capture must exist in that country's animal welfare regime. Regulatory capture is the problem that an Independent Office can help solve.
• That capture must be limiting the progress in the country's animal welfare standards. This would provide the motivation to select this more challenging campaign over other options for campaigns.

We provide some tests that can be used to examine these conditions in a particular country, and we give examples to illustrate how these tests work. Lastly, we conclude with some strategy recommendations for campaigning for an Independent Office.