Farming Animals and the Capabilities Approach: Understanding Roles and Responsibilities through Narrative Ethics

In the that emerged from the Second International Workshop on the Assessment of Animal Welfare at Farm and Group Level, Sandoe, Christiansen, & Appleby (2003) challenged participants to ponder four fundamental questions:a. What is the baseline standard for morally acceptable animal welfare?b. What is a good animal life?c. What farming purposes are legitimate?d. What kinds of compromises are acceptable in a less-than-perfect world?Continued reflection on those questions warrants examination of the shape of our modern agricultural ethic. It also calls for a reexamination of recent work by Nussbaum (2004) on extending the capabilities approach to animals and the interface of Nussbaum s work with Rollin s scholarship on (1995a). The resources of narrative ethics are summoned to navigate the above-mentioned questions and to explore how Nussbaum s approach and Rollin s notion of animals natures relate to the main storyline associated with developments in agriculture.