Dulce Ramírez is the Vice President of Animal Equality for Latin America. She joins us today to talk about one of the most impressive recent victories for animal rights: Mexico changing its Constitution to specifically incorporate the rights of animals. As Vox reported, the “changes represent the first-ever mention of nonhuman animals in the Mexican Constitution, marking a milestone achievement for Mexico’s animal rights movement, which has for years been drawing attention to pervasive animal cruelty and extreme confinement in the country’s growing meat industry.” Ramírez tells us what the changes mean, where the movement goes next, and how other activists around the world can learn from the victory of the Mexican activists. 

Nathan J. Robinson  

We’re really excited to talk to you, because the occasion of our conversation is the tremendous victory for animal welfare that has recently occurred in Mexico, in no small part directly due to the work of your organization Animal Equality. Mexico has enshrined an animal welfare provision into its national constitution. And so what we want to talk to you about today is what it says, what it does, how this happened, and the lessons that can be learned for the animal rights struggle around the world. Can you just tell us a little bit more about what this constitutional provision is and says? How has the law been changed?

Dulce Ramírez  

Yes, thank you. We are so happy to see this change on a constitutional level. After almost 100 years in Mexico, it is the first time animals are included in the Constitution as individuals, and not a part of an ecosystem.

Mexico includes these animals in three specific articles. One is educational: the constitutional mandate says all educational programs need to include animal protection in all the books, at the academic and high school levels. The other article bans cruelty. The state needs to guarantee animal protection laws for all species, and one of the priorities for Animal Equality this year was to not exclude farm animals. All the legislation normally excludes those animals, and for the first time, the Mexican constitution includes all animals.

So the article established the first general welfare law, and Congress to be able to create this law for the first time because Mexico didn't have that law. So right now, it’s important when we talk about these animal equalities that the next generation will be born with a constitution that includes animals for the first time in Mexico. So yes, we are happy. And this part of the work took almost four years for Animal Equality, including investigative work, legislative progress in different state and municipal levels, and at the end this year, finally, we have it in the Constitution. 

Robinson  

Do any other countries’ constitutions include these kinds of provisions, or is what Mexico is doing here completely unprecedented?

Ramírez  

It is totally unprecedented. It is the first time—only nine countries mention animals in the constitution, but in a very general aspect, as part of the ecosystem, of the fauna, or as environmental protection. But Mexico is the first country in all the world to include animals in these three levels of the first articles—the third and fourth articles are the more important part of the constitution.  So, yeah, we are the first one, and with pride. We received many comments. Harvard [Law] had a comment, and other institutions related with this progress because it’s unique and can be an example and precedent for other countries, specifically for Latin America. It is really important to continue to do this work in other countries.

Robinson  

Now, I suppose the question that may come to people’s minds when hearing about this is, obviously, for anyone who cares about animal rights and animal welfare, it’s great to have this level of protection written into the law. Obviously, the constitution is the bedrock of all other laws—this isn’t just a piece of legislation, this is the fundamental document of governance for the country. But I suppose the question that people then have is, how much is it going to mean? And then how can you make sure that it means something? Because obviously, you’re not going to be able, through this provision, to eliminate factory farming overnight in the country of Mexico altogether. And so what do you hope it can do, and what do you think needs to happen to make sure this provision does have some force, some power? 

Ramírez  

The constitution gives us the general principle for the state to develop the mechanism of legislation to protect animals. The constitution doesn’t ban exploitation. It’s not a magic tool to disappear the suffering of animals in Mexico. But it’s the beginning of the moral, ethical responsibility we have as a Mexican people to provide protection and legitimize our work to defend animals. This is the other important part. Implementation is to create the first general law, and the secondary laws give us this framework to work to protect animals in different ways.

As you know, Mexico is a country where we don’t have, for example, animals in the circus. We banned these five years ago, but now the constitution gives us more aspects for farm animals and lab animals in the universities—gives us more spectrum related with animal protection law[s]. And the other is the big debate about our relationship with animals. This is a cultural change, and it’s the other part of the work Animal Equality is really focused on.

We understand structural change is needed, and individual change is needed. But if we don’t change our culture deeply in the way we relate with animals, we cannot see this change. In Latin America, it is not a secret—in Mexico too, the laws don’t comply. We don’t have the infrastructure sometimes for the judge to follow the rules. We have corruption. We have social issues and big social problems: crime, cartels, narcos. It's a country with a large spectrum of social issues. For the first time, that social problem includes the animal rights movement. The animal rights movement is one of the most important parts, and we need to continue to create the laws and have enforcement—legislative and litigation—work, to be sure this law can really apply to different industries.

Robinson  

As Animal Equality looks at the future, five to ten years from now, do you have particular goals where you think, now that we have this constitutional provision, we would like to see these particular changes, that if you look into the near future, these are the kinds of things we think we can accomplish? Maybe you could give us a couple of examples of those.

Ramírez  

Yes, we have a strategic plan for 2030, and the case for Mexico is to ban all the more cruel practices in farms, for example, [force the end of cages for hens]—the density of the number of chickens. In other countries, we can see the number of chickens in a space in the farm, and in Mexico, we don’t have that regulation. We don’t have any to protect that animal. So we have a vision of the future. We ban the more cruel practices and at the same time reduce meat and products of animals.

Working from reduction, we can implement welfare. We cannot implement any welfare law if we don’t work from production of meat and eggs. Mexico is the country with more consumption of eggs and chickens. We have the highest level of production, and it’s a kind of food used to fight poverty in Mexico because it’s cheap—chicken for meat, or hens for [eggs], is really cheap production in Mexico. So we need to create a strategy to increase the price for the industry, and for the industry to understand the responsibilities they have not only for welfare, but for environmental consequences.

So we work in Mexico and Latin America with a vision at the same level to implement more strict laws for welfare, to ban the more cruel practices, but at the same time, production. First food policy in Mexico, and working very close to the government to program reduction for food. So this is the other important thing. We can have the best laws with the best welfare practice, but we don’t have the reduction of animals. We don’t have land. We don’t have time to implement this welfare practice. So I think this is the vision we have right now in Mexico, more laws and debate for this, but give the responsibility to the states and the governments and the industry, [with] consequences for not applying the welfare in Mexico.

Robinson  

Okay, so we’ve talked there about what the provision is, what you think it can do, and what the goals now are, but I think that to our readers who are excited by this victory, one of the things that they will be thinking about is, how did you manage to get this done? How did this come about? As you say, it is unprecedented. Other countries have not done this, but you have. And what I think people will want to know is, are there things that are unique to Mexico that made it so that it was more likely to be the first country? Is it that Mexico has an especially strong animal rights movement? Is it that you just had a really good campaign there? You think the model is portable to other countries. So, tell us a little bit more about the background so that we can understand a little better what it takes to get something like this written into a country’s constitution.

Ramírez  

Yes, thank you. It’s important. We have different elements. When I say different elements, I can say we have a strong social movement for animal defense. Cat and dog protectors. We have people working for animals in the wild. We have a strong movement for activists in the streets using different tactics. So in that aspect there is momentum, but we don’t have that strong of a momentum if we don’t have a policy agenda, a political agenda. The other is that Mexico is in this transition for another president. This is the first time we have a woman as president for a change. So that is a big opportunity for us, but not only because she is a person who openly shares worries about the environment. Normally, you don’t see very open discussion on a political level for that, because maybe of fear of the industries or the companies. But [President Claudia Sheinbaum] does talk openly, saying we have a progressive agenda related to environmental issues. So in the beginning, we start working with a specific strategy.

In 2021, we presented the first constitutional reform. It takes four years—every [legislative session], Animal Equality presents a proposal. All the time. We are part of the old table work. We identify the importance of including this in the constitution, so it takes four years to educate the legislators because it’s another part of the work. Normally, the politicians in Mexico don’t understand the issue. We are the experts that work with them and explain the problem and try to educate them about this issue. So we took four years to work with all the political parties, and finally, before Andrés Manuel López Obrador, the ex-president, leaves the position to Claudia [Sheinbaum], he publicly committed to including animals in the Constitution. So we have different elements.

Of course, I can talk about the important work Animal Equality does because I'm lucky to be in this organization. We do support and have meetings. I travel a lot with the Congress, and have important meetings with different political parties. Another important thing for us is we don't [align with a] party, we really work for animals. So we represent animals in the Congress. I don’t represent the Morena [political party]. I don’t represent PAN [the National Action Party] or other political parties. I represent animals. This is a very important thing because when you start working in politics with politicians, you are right or left. It’s like you need to choose a side. And we decided in Animal Equality to choose the side of animals. We have this agreement, and we had a total majority in the vote in Congress, in the Senate and the deputies—all the parties voted in favor. And we took pictures and saw the speeches. We have different elements. Of course, the campaign was really important. We met thousands of signatories, the mobilization for the society. Even if they are not activists, animals have some importance for society. [People] want to be part of this historic progress. So we have different elements. I can say definitely Mexico lives in this political and social context. We take that opportunity, we see that opportunity, and we work on that.

Robinson  

On the one hand, most people, I think, are instinctively against animal cruelty. So, in some ways, it’s an issue that is easy to get wider support than things that are considered partisan or associated with one party. On the other hand, it is a difficult issue politically because animals can’t speak for themselves. Obviously, you’re representing a group that is unable to represent itself, and also, in part because of that, it’s an issue that often slips to second place or a lesser priority. You mentioned that in Mexico, you have a lot of poverty, there are the issues of violence—there’s a lot that needs dealing with politically. How do you get politicians who may agree with you in the abstract—very few of them are going to say, I am in favor of animal cruelty—but I would think that one of the dangers is that they’re not going to prioritize it? They’re not going to put it at the top of their list. So how do you force this onto the agenda when there are so many things competing for people’s attention and competing for legislative attention?

Ramírez  

Yes, I think the first step for us was to show the people’s votes. People vote. They want this change, and the society demands the politicians talk about animals in the Congress or present initiatives. So for that reason, we create these social campaigns basically, and we create tactics and action. The politicians receive emails and phone calls. We have this program in Animal Equality we call Animal Defenders, and we have thousands of people organized across the country to send messages to their congress [members.] So this gives us the opportunity to, if they don't know, [let them know this] is a priority—some group of people, like thousands of people, are sending a message that this is a priority. “If you want to campaign, I am considering my vote. You need to talk about animals because it's a priority.” And we use a lot of studies related to that social behavior.

So with violence, for example, in Mexico, we had this deep undercover investigation of more than 50 slaughterhouses. And we not only recorded the atrocities happening with animals. They are not stunning, appropriately, for the law, but we find children there. We know the labor law, the violation of labor law, and the violence for people. So we document many social issues related to animal cruelty. We use a lot of these studies to make this justification for our initiatives and actual discussion. We have more than 20 constitutional reforms [involving] animals there. We have social programs. We have a judicial reform. The ex-president wanted change before he left, so he presented 20 reforms. And in those 20 reforms, we have animals in that. And for us, there was the understanding we have an opportunity because we are not a priority. We understand that, so we created a campaign and made up this big protest. It was really important because all the national press talked about this issue, because we demanded it was a priority. We create these narratives for the people in Mexico, and we use hashtags like animals are priority, too. So I think it’s part of the tactics and the context and the way you can create this narrative related to the social problems in Mexico to have a connection with animals as a priority.

Robinson  

Yes. I think that one of the reasons that this is so exciting is not just for what it means for Mexico in particular, but because around the world, there are a lot of animal rights activists, and they often lose more than they win. They find that it is a hard issue to make progress on. The scale of animal suffering is just so vast that it can be very overwhelming. It can be really hard to be an animal rights activist and to keep pushing forward on this issue despite the many defeats. What you’ve shown here is a model of how something real, something tangible, can be accomplished. And so I want to conclude here by asking you what other lessons or advice do you have from experience of organizing for this constitutional change that you think can be helpful to others around the world who are looking at this and thinking, we need to do what Mexico has done and build on what Mexico has done?

Ramírez  

A lot. I can assume it is part of the culture of Animal Equality, and understand we grow in the adversity, and we need to always be open to make change, depending on the campaign or the political issue. In some moments of the campaign, we believed we would lose. It wouldn’t happen. They wouldn’t put it in the agenda for the Congress. So in some moments, you need to understand, what is your ideal, and what is realistic and what is achievable? So when you have this everything or nothing [approach], you take nothing. So we need to understand as  activists and when working on legislative work, we need to be open to create a vision with flexibility and understand we grow in adversity, and we can always win if we have the resilience and the capacity to see the opportunities. So sometimes we lose, but the campaign always changes. I can say everything changed.

In Animal Equality we always share with the teams, yes, this is hard. Yes, we make mistakes. We fail, but animals need us stronger every day. So I think this is the main lesson for me, because I need to constantly see what the next step is and make decisions. With some deputies or no deputies, other decisions we take very strongly. You never find a picture of me, or of Animal Equality members, with any politician. This is something important for us because it’s our credibility as an organization. Of course, we want to have influence with politicians, but we don’t create a narrative of working with only one political party or only people who, in the end, have other moral issues. So we work specifically on one topic: animals. We maintain our credibility, our strong communication and always with the truth. And the truth is, animals suffer. Animals need activists with resilience and strength to fail but come back stronger. Actually yesterday, I said, okay, what is the next step? We face general law right now, and we face a really strong lobby. So we started the conversation right now. We created the initiative now. So it never ends until all the animals are free of suffering.

Transcript edited by Patrick Farnsworth.