Non solo biodiversità: senzienza animale e moralità pubblica per una migliore protezione internazionale dell’ambiente umano

Respect for the sentience of non-human animals is nowadays an important ethical issue for a growing part of civil society and begins to be embodied into legal requirements in a growing number of countries. In international law, this ‘animal welfare’ approach is complementing the species protection and ecological approaches to natural environment, although so far little and often seemingly contradictory results have been achieved. This is due to the inevitably human perspective of law, and to cultural diversity. However, this more holistic way of conceiving the human environment fosters effective and forward-looking protection.