What do environmentalist extermination programs aim at?

Original text Luciano Carlos Cunha · Volume V, p. 31 of the PDF edition · English translation

It is not uncommon for environmentalist programs around the world to carry out mass exterminations of animals of species classified as invasive⁵⁷. These programs are often supported by the public because of the belief that their goal is to ensure that, from then on, something even worse does not happen to animals. We saw in previous chapters that this is not what such programs aim at, since reducing suffering and death is not one of the goals of environmentalism. In this chapter we will investigate what such programs really aim at.

The Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) defines an invasive species as "an alien species that becomes established in a natural or semi-natural ecosystem or habitat, is an agent of change, and threatens native biological diversity"⁵⁸. Note that this definition is about the origin of the species, and not about the origin of its members. This means that an animal of an invasive species may have been born in the place where it lives (as we will see later, this is usually the case). Below we will look at an example of a case that illustrates what can be considered a threat to native biological diversity according to this definition (since this is one of the key factors for classifying a species as invasive).

The case of the program to exterminate ruddy ducks in southern Europe⁵⁹ offers a good example to illustrate what environmentalism aims at with programs of this kind. The white-headed duck (Oxyura leucocephala) is a species native to Europe and is considered endangered. The ruddy duck (Oxyura jamaicensis), on the other hand, was introduced into Europe by humans in the 1950s and is not at risk of extinction. The only characteristic that distinguishes the members of these species is the color of the feathers on their heads. In this case, what motivated the killing policies was the fact that, over the years, Oxyura jamaicensis interbred with Oxyura leucocephala, and in the hybrid offspring the head-feather color of the species of American origin prevailed, rather than the color of the native species.

This was considered a threat to biodiversity because hybridization was seen as contributing to the extinction of the native species. However, what was classified as a threat to biodiversity and as a contribution to extinction in this case was simply the fact that the color of the native species did not prevail in the offspring (and not, as might be understood at first glance, deaths of members of the native species). A program was then carried out to kill all the ducks of the species Oxyura jamaicensis and also all the hybrid ducks.

It is therefore very clear that the program was not aimed at reducing the suffering and deaths of animals. In fact, the program greatly increased suffering and the number of deaths. What, then, is the goal environmentalists sought to achieve with this extermination program? In this case, they could not appeal to a concern for ecological balance, since the ecological function of the European, American, or hybrid ducks is exactly the same. Nor does this practice seem to make sense from the standpoint of biodiversity, since with only the European ducks there are fewer species than if the American and hybrid ducks are also present.

This point shows that the goal was to ensure that only the members of the species valued by environmentalism would be present in the area (for example, native species⁶⁰, or those that exhibit characteristics admired by environmentalists⁶¹). The aim of the killing, in this case, was to prevent hybridization and keep the native species "pure". In the environmentalist view, this is a goal so important that it justifies killing an enormous number of sentient beings.

Goals like this would be widely considered heinous if they were applied in the human case. For example, the Nazi extermination programs based on the ideal of racial purity are widely cited as a paradigmatic example of a heinous practice. In fact, the vast majority of environmentalists themselves strongly reject applying their measures to human beings, upholding them only when the victims would be nonhuman animals⁶². This shows that, in the vast majority of cases, environmentalists combine the environmentalist principle

with an anthropocentric principle, giving greater weight to the latter, so as not to have to accept for humans the implications of the environmentalist principles they uphold.

This strongly suggests that environmentalist practices involving the extermination of animals do not pass the impartiality test, since the people who approve of them do so only because they know they will not be their victims. Since impartiality is one of the central requirements of justice, this shows that there is no way such practices can be just.