Document type scientific article published in the Interdisciplinary Journal of Legal Studies
Author: Adeline Deting
Abstract in English (provided by the author) : Between constraint and resource: the regionalisation of animal welfare as a political opportunity
The Belgian animal rights movement mobilises itself and deploys its strategies in a political context that is very specific to Belgium. Through the sociological concept of " political opportunity structure ", we present in this article how this context has been able to influence the activity of this movement. Here we examine two transformations of the Belgian institutional landscape related to animal welfare: on the one hand, the creation of an Animal Welfare Council in 1986, as well as its evolution and, on the other hand, the regionalisation of the competence for Animal Welfare in 2014. These two transformations allowed us to analyze simultaneously the manners in which state actors define the political environment and the ways in which social movements attempt to modify it. We saw how, in a political context that was sometimes little to very unfavorable, the animal rights movement was able to perceive opportunities, seize them and make them last over time.
