Thanks Shireen. And thanks for all the amazing work you and the team do at Plant Based Health Professionals to help change the social environment - and the narrative - which in turn helps make individual change easier for more people.
I agree with the statement at the end: "The movement does not need to choose between individual change, systemic change or donations. It needs all of it: a portfolio of strategies grounded in research that recognises different audiences need different approaches."
As someone who focuses more on systemic change, I think the movement has reached a point where we have an imbalance, with too much focus on individual change and not enough focus on systemic change to support individual change and make personal transitions easier.
On a different note, perhaps the donation ask could be reframed as, "Going vegan would be great, but if that seems too difficult for you right now, you can start helping by simply donating".
Thanks for adding to the conversation, Brent. We agree, systemic change is so important. There are so many incredible organisations working on diverse areas in this - whether it's plant-based meals in institutions, working to ban factory farming advertising, working with farmers to transition, developing plant-based alternatives, exposing welfare-washing, changing school curriculums, legal and policy work etc. We need so much more of all of it. And like you, we think that systemic change then helps encourage greater levels of individual change.
Also very aligned with your suggestion of how donation asks could help strengthen other important theories of change, rather than undermine them.
Yes, there are many orgs. working on systemic change. What I'm talking about though is that I would like to see more focus on systemic change in our "asks" - in how we interface with the general public.
For Example, which scenario seems more effective?:
Scenario 1: You are walking down the street and come across a campaigner who is concerned about climate change. They ask you if you drive a car. You say yes. They proceed to say you should stop driving cars entirely because it is harmful.
Scenario 2: You are walking down the street and come across a campaigner who is concerned about climate change. They ask if you would be willing to sign a petition to create a new policy that will help society transition away from fossil fuels.
Analysis: In scenario 2, you are still getting the same message - climate change is an issue and fossil fuels are bad for the planet, but the ask is much simpler and easier to get onboard with. The issue is also presented in a systemic change framework, as opposed to the individual change framework in scenario 1. This allows the targeted person to see how their action (signing the petition) fits into the broader strategy, whereas in scenario 1, they might feel a sense of hopelessness about the idea that even if they stop driving it will make a difference.
Another benefit of scenario 2 is that, due to being presented in a systemic change framework, the receiver of the message might not have the same amount of defensiveness to the message. They still recieve the general message, and they may consider what changes they could make in their own life to help with the problem. They key idea her is that the individual being outreached is not being blamed for the problem - the industry or the system is being blamed. (this aligns well with some points in your essay).
My point is that even if one's ultimate goal is to inspire individual change, framing it in a systemic change framework may be more effective. Of course, this can also have the dual impact of actually acheiving a tangible systemic change.
Another benefit of rooting our asks in systemic change campaigns is that it forces our ask to be very specific, which can be more sensible to the general public that the vague idea of animal liberation.
An analogous campaign to the example presented earlier could be something like petitioning at a university to get student support for the university to implement some kind of plant-based policy.
Thanks for expanding on that. We completely agree this kind of framing is more likely to be effective for more audiences, and also importantly highlights the systemic nature of the problem and solutions.
Scenario 1 is an unrealistic ask for many if not most people because driving is largely a necessity of modern life whereas being vegan is do-able.
Scenario 2 is essentially a do-nothing ask where the person could walk away thinking they did something significant but probably learned nothing about changing their own behavior or why they should. The problem comes off as someone/something else's fault with no responsibility of the individual.
A much better course of action could be to instead encourage them to reduce their driving, preferably to mostly only necessary driving and sure, sign a petition.
This is such a well-thought-out analysis of where the movement is right now. The portfolio approach really resonates becuase I've seen firsthand how different people need totally different entry points into caring about this issue. When I tried pushing the vegan message too hard on my coworkers, they jsut shut down, but when we talked about Big Ag's sketchy practices they were way more open to listening.
Really enjoyed reading this article. Thank you. I'm keen to understand and unravel how collective burden strategies/ approaches can tackle the romanticism of animal agriculture. Unlike tobacco, consumers identify farmers not only as large scale factory 'ag' ; but families/ individuals as the backbone of the industry. Understanding those choosing 'high welfare' choices do so to align their good person identity and values, is there risk or an opportunity that 'the industry deceit' can make the smaller farmer, ( degenerative, etc) be the innocent individual as well.
Hi Carly, thanks for reading and for your insightful comment.
We think you've hit on one of the most challenging aspects of this complex issue, in terms of how the industry romanticises themselves in their marketing, and how we as a movement communicate this issue to different audiences.
You're absolutely right that there are both risks and opportunities. Framing the industry as Big Ag could reinforce the idea that the problem is simply scale or method, not the fundamental use of animals. And then consumers might feel they've solved the problem by switching to 'high welfare' products rather than questioning animal use itself.
With careful framing, 'industry deceit' could be about more than factory farming – it could be about a much broader system that keeps people disconnected from what happens to animals, regardless of farm size. And how the romanticised imagery, the euphemistic language ('humane slaughter'), and the selective storytelling that centres farmer hardship can erase animal experience. (Although focusing on how the industry also harms farmers/slaughterhouse workers could be a more effective inroad to engaging with this issue for some audience segments, as we've sometimes found in focus groups.)
Framing could be less about 'evil corporations vs. innocent farmers' and more about a system that has taught all of us – including farmers – to see animals as resources rather than individuals. This doesn't require villainising farmers (many are trapped in difficult economic situations and experience psychological trauma too), but it does mean challenging the 'family farm' imagery that obscures what farmed animals actually experience.
There's definitely still a lot for our movement to research and experiment with in our campaigning and advocacy. Would love to hear more of your thoughts on this.
Thank you for engaging so thoughtfully with our blog and for sharing both what resonated and what you feel is missing. Your critique is fair and we appreciate it.
You're right that this piece doesn't engage deeply with labour, production relations, or the political economy of animal exploitation. It was written as a contribution to a specific debate currently unfolding in the movement - sparked by FarmKind's Forget Veganuary / Can't Give Up Meat campaign - about individual change, 'offsetting' harm, and what constitutes an effective ask. We approached it through a movement-building lens rather than as a comprehensive theory of power.
But we agree with your broader point: without confronting power, including the labour conditions, ownership structures and production relations that enable mass animal exploitation, we won't win. Capital absorbs lifestyle change and philanthropy far more easily than organised disruption.
This is why Project Phoenix exists. Our core focus at the moment is rebuilding people power in the UK animal freedom movement: grassroots organising, collective action, escalation and pressure campaigns that can meaningfully challenge industry and institutions.
We're also very open to learning and to suggestions about strategies that address animal exploitation at a structural level - particularly where animal politics intersects with labour, racialised work, migration and broader liberation struggles. These are conversations we want to be having and learning from, as do many others in the movement.
For context, some of our previous blogs engage more directly with questions of power, organising and how movements win - including pieces on rebuilding grassroots capacity, confronting industry capture and turning concern for animals into collective pressure. But there's so much more to explore, discuss and learn on this.
Thank you again for the encouragement to think more deeply and strategically. We hope this can be part of an ongoing conversation.
Thank you so much for such a generous and thoughtful reply. I really appreciate the listening, openness and clarity.
That context helps, and I agree the FarmKind debate is an important fault line to intervene in. It seems we’re largely in agreement as to the cause here: capitalism absorbs lifestyle change and charity work far more easily than it absorbs collective organisation and strategic disruption of power. That shared understanding matters.
What I’m most interested in continuing to explore together is how animal politics can more directly engage labour, production relations, and collective power as strategy, not just as context. I'll keep reading your work for clues. Many advocates sense that something is missing in debates about “what works” and that rotating between veganism, reduction, offsetting, and donations still leaves the machinery that dominates animals intact. Often, there are some exceptions - and I appreciated the way to pointed to this in communication around animal campaigns - transform attention into leverage that moves people. That free-floating feeling is what I was trying to name when I put some words to strategy growing out of dissatisfaction with current forms of animal advocacy.
I find Project Phoenix encouraging precisely because of its focus on rebuilding people power, escalation, and grassroots capacity. The open question — and one I’d love to think through collaboratively — is how animal advocacy can ground itself in sites of struggle like labour, migration, and supply chains without losing momentum or accessibility. Bringing together the kind of mobilisation that Roger Hallam has achieved, with organisational structures.
Thanks again for engaging so seriously. I’m glad this can be part of an ongoing conversation.
I found it a difficult article to read. probably because I'm not an academic and it was long for me.
I struggled to follow the graphs, despite having a maths degree.
I would have liked refs to the various research outcomes eg the number of vegans, rather than just saying a number of studies have cited.....
I thought it was a fairly simple question to ask, whether we favour financial offsetting or whether it's a sell out. And, excuse my lack of a sophistication, but an equally simple answer i.e. a bit of both. How would the FO be implemented without legislation? Would it just be an individual optional guilt payment? I doubt the animal agriculture would want to encourage the thinking that eating animals is bad and should be offset. Where did the proposal come from?
Hi David. Thanks for your comment and engaging with the article. This blog was written in response to movement discussion around FarmKind's recent UK campaign, initially called Forget Veganuary, then due to movement feedback, was renamed to Can't Give Up Meat. FarmKind propose people carry on eating meat but offset it, much like with carbon offsetting. A lot of their media publicity has claimed that individual change shouldn't be part of the conversation, so we wanted to step back and look at both veganism and offsetting as movement asks. I hope this gives more context.
Thank you. A really thoughtful analysis. Veganism has to be the moral baseline of our movement.
Thanks Shireen. And thanks for all the amazing work you and the team do at Plant Based Health Professionals to help change the social environment - and the narrative - which in turn helps make individual change easier for more people.
I agree with the statement at the end: "The movement does not need to choose between individual change, systemic change or donations. It needs all of it: a portfolio of strategies grounded in research that recognises different audiences need different approaches."
As someone who focuses more on systemic change, I think the movement has reached a point where we have an imbalance, with too much focus on individual change and not enough focus on systemic change to support individual change and make personal transitions easier.
On a different note, perhaps the donation ask could be reframed as, "Going vegan would be great, but if that seems too difficult for you right now, you can start helping by simply donating".
Thanks for adding to the conversation, Brent. We agree, systemic change is so important. There are so many incredible organisations working on diverse areas in this - whether it's plant-based meals in institutions, working to ban factory farming advertising, working with farmers to transition, developing plant-based alternatives, exposing welfare-washing, changing school curriculums, legal and policy work etc. We need so much more of all of it. And like you, we think that systemic change then helps encourage greater levels of individual change.
Also very aligned with your suggestion of how donation asks could help strengthen other important theories of change, rather than undermine them.
Yes, there are many orgs. working on systemic change. What I'm talking about though is that I would like to see more focus on systemic change in our "asks" - in how we interface with the general public.
For Example, which scenario seems more effective?:
Scenario 1: You are walking down the street and come across a campaigner who is concerned about climate change. They ask you if you drive a car. You say yes. They proceed to say you should stop driving cars entirely because it is harmful.
Scenario 2: You are walking down the street and come across a campaigner who is concerned about climate change. They ask if you would be willing to sign a petition to create a new policy that will help society transition away from fossil fuels.
Analysis: In scenario 2, you are still getting the same message - climate change is an issue and fossil fuels are bad for the planet, but the ask is much simpler and easier to get onboard with. The issue is also presented in a systemic change framework, as opposed to the individual change framework in scenario 1. This allows the targeted person to see how their action (signing the petition) fits into the broader strategy, whereas in scenario 1, they might feel a sense of hopelessness about the idea that even if they stop driving it will make a difference.
Another benefit of scenario 2 is that, due to being presented in a systemic change framework, the receiver of the message might not have the same amount of defensiveness to the message. They still recieve the general message, and they may consider what changes they could make in their own life to help with the problem. They key idea her is that the individual being outreached is not being blamed for the problem - the industry or the system is being blamed. (this aligns well with some points in your essay).
My point is that even if one's ultimate goal is to inspire individual change, framing it in a systemic change framework may be more effective. Of course, this can also have the dual impact of actually acheiving a tangible systemic change.
Another benefit of rooting our asks in systemic change campaigns is that it forces our ask to be very specific, which can be more sensible to the general public that the vague idea of animal liberation.
An analogous campaign to the example presented earlier could be something like petitioning at a university to get student support for the university to implement some kind of plant-based policy.
Thanks for expanding on that. We completely agree this kind of framing is more likely to be effective for more audiences, and also importantly highlights the systemic nature of the problem and solutions.
Scenario 1 is an unrealistic ask for many if not most people because driving is largely a necessity of modern life whereas being vegan is do-able.
Scenario 2 is essentially a do-nothing ask where the person could walk away thinking they did something significant but probably learned nothing about changing their own behavior or why they should. The problem comes off as someone/something else's fault with no responsibility of the individual.
A much better course of action could be to instead encourage them to reduce their driving, preferably to mostly only necessary driving and sure, sign a petition.
This is such a well-thought-out analysis of where the movement is right now. The portfolio approach really resonates becuase I've seen firsthand how different people need totally different entry points into caring about this issue. When I tried pushing the vegan message too hard on my coworkers, they jsut shut down, but when we talked about Big Ag's sketchy practices they were way more open to listening.
Thanks for adding your insight. We've definitely seen that happen a lot too - both in our personal lives and in focus groups.
Really enjoyed reading this article. Thank you. I'm keen to understand and unravel how collective burden strategies/ approaches can tackle the romanticism of animal agriculture. Unlike tobacco, consumers identify farmers not only as large scale factory 'ag' ; but families/ individuals as the backbone of the industry. Understanding those choosing 'high welfare' choices do so to align their good person identity and values, is there risk or an opportunity that 'the industry deceit' can make the smaller farmer, ( degenerative, etc) be the innocent individual as well.
Hi Carly, thanks for reading and for your insightful comment.
We think you've hit on one of the most challenging aspects of this complex issue, in terms of how the industry romanticises themselves in their marketing, and how we as a movement communicate this issue to different audiences.
You're absolutely right that there are both risks and opportunities. Framing the industry as Big Ag could reinforce the idea that the problem is simply scale or method, not the fundamental use of animals. And then consumers might feel they've solved the problem by switching to 'high welfare' products rather than questioning animal use itself.
With careful framing, 'industry deceit' could be about more than factory farming – it could be about a much broader system that keeps people disconnected from what happens to animals, regardless of farm size. And how the romanticised imagery, the euphemistic language ('humane slaughter'), and the selective storytelling that centres farmer hardship can erase animal experience. (Although focusing on how the industry also harms farmers/slaughterhouse workers could be a more effective inroad to engaging with this issue for some audience segments, as we've sometimes found in focus groups.)
Framing could be less about 'evil corporations vs. innocent farmers' and more about a system that has taught all of us – including farmers – to see animals as resources rather than individuals. This doesn't require villainising farmers (many are trapped in difficult economic situations and experience psychological trauma too), but it does mean challenging the 'family farm' imagery that obscures what farmed animals actually experience.
There's definitely still a lot for our movement to research and experiment with in our campaigning and advocacy. Would love to hear more of your thoughts on this.
Thanks for your researched and thoughtful strategy piece. Solidarity with anyone who works in animal advocacy. I have a short response here:
https://substack.com/@lifeagainstcapital/note/c-200431139?r=768vr8
Thank you for engaging so thoughtfully with our blog and for sharing both what resonated and what you feel is missing. Your critique is fair and we appreciate it.
You're right that this piece doesn't engage deeply with labour, production relations, or the political economy of animal exploitation. It was written as a contribution to a specific debate currently unfolding in the movement - sparked by FarmKind's Forget Veganuary / Can't Give Up Meat campaign - about individual change, 'offsetting' harm, and what constitutes an effective ask. We approached it through a movement-building lens rather than as a comprehensive theory of power.
But we agree with your broader point: without confronting power, including the labour conditions, ownership structures and production relations that enable mass animal exploitation, we won't win. Capital absorbs lifestyle change and philanthropy far more easily than organised disruption.
This is why Project Phoenix exists. Our core focus at the moment is rebuilding people power in the UK animal freedom movement: grassroots organising, collective action, escalation and pressure campaigns that can meaningfully challenge industry and institutions.
We're also very open to learning and to suggestions about strategies that address animal exploitation at a structural level - particularly where animal politics intersects with labour, racialised work, migration and broader liberation struggles. These are conversations we want to be having and learning from, as do many others in the movement.
For context, some of our previous blogs engage more directly with questions of power, organising and how movements win - including pieces on rebuilding grassroots capacity, confronting industry capture and turning concern for animals into collective pressure. But there's so much more to explore, discuss and learn on this.
Thank you again for the encouragement to think more deeply and strategically. We hope this can be part of an ongoing conversation.
Thank you so much for such a generous and thoughtful reply. I really appreciate the listening, openness and clarity.
That context helps, and I agree the FarmKind debate is an important fault line to intervene in. It seems we’re largely in agreement as to the cause here: capitalism absorbs lifestyle change and charity work far more easily than it absorbs collective organisation and strategic disruption of power. That shared understanding matters.
What I’m most interested in continuing to explore together is how animal politics can more directly engage labour, production relations, and collective power as strategy, not just as context. I'll keep reading your work for clues. Many advocates sense that something is missing in debates about “what works” and that rotating between veganism, reduction, offsetting, and donations still leaves the machinery that dominates animals intact. Often, there are some exceptions - and I appreciated the way to pointed to this in communication around animal campaigns - transform attention into leverage that moves people. That free-floating feeling is what I was trying to name when I put some words to strategy growing out of dissatisfaction with current forms of animal advocacy.
I find Project Phoenix encouraging precisely because of its focus on rebuilding people power, escalation, and grassroots capacity. The open question — and one I’d love to think through collaboratively — is how animal advocacy can ground itself in sites of struggle like labour, migration, and supply chains without losing momentum or accessibility. Bringing together the kind of mobilisation that Roger Hallam has achieved, with organisational structures.
Thanks again for engaging so seriously. I’m glad this can be part of an ongoing conversation.
Excellent post. I appreciate the strategic frameworks, critical analysis, and long-term thinking.
Thanks so much for reading and engaging, Samuel.
I found it a difficult article to read. probably because I'm not an academic and it was long for me.
I struggled to follow the graphs, despite having a maths degree.
I would have liked refs to the various research outcomes eg the number of vegans, rather than just saying a number of studies have cited.....
I thought it was a fairly simple question to ask, whether we favour financial offsetting or whether it's a sell out. And, excuse my lack of a sophistication, but an equally simple answer i.e. a bit of both. How would the FO be implemented without legislation? Would it just be an individual optional guilt payment? I doubt the animal agriculture would want to encourage the thinking that eating animals is bad and should be offset. Where did the proposal come from?
Hi David. Thanks for your comment and engaging with the article. This blog was written in response to movement discussion around FarmKind's recent UK campaign, initially called Forget Veganuary, then due to movement feedback, was renamed to Can't Give Up Meat. FarmKind propose people carry on eating meat but offset it, much like with carbon offsetting. A lot of their media publicity has claimed that individual change shouldn't be part of the conversation, so we wanted to step back and look at both veganism and offsetting as movement asks. I hope this gives more context.