THE INCLUSION OF NON-HUMAN ANIMALS IN EGALITARIANISM

Abstract

Egalitarianism can be defined as the view which holds that a situation improves on at least one aspect if the value contained in this situation is distributed more equally among individuals. Despite having more followers, part of the theory was ignored by them: egalitarianism takes into consideration all sentient beings, but the non- human animals, which are the majority of them, were not included in the texts on the subject, making this literature incomplete and inaccurate. Because of this, it is necessary to study the consequences that this view has for non-human animals. Among the few who discuss, are Horta, Faria, Holtug, Lippert-Rasmussen, Person and Vallentyne, who are my bibliographical references to show six consequences of egalitarianism for non-human animals: (1) to reject speciesism, (2)  do not harm non-human animals for self-benefit, (3) to engage yourself in ativism in favor of non-human animals, (4) actively assist non-human animals regardless of where these animals live, which includes animals who lives in the nature, (5) to give priority to attend non-human animals needs and (6) these five consequences above are independent of the kind of egalitarianism that is assumed.