Recently, I’ve wondered if the animal movement would benefit from big tent advocacy organizations with internal elections to determine leadership, like the Democratic Socialists of America. I knew such groups existed in the past, but they seemed much rarer now. I wasn’t sure if this was a result of entryism, a general hollowing out of civil society, or something else. So I put my questions to a variety of animal activists and thinkers, who were quite charitable with their time.

Emilia A. Leese, co-author of Think Like a Vegan: Embracing Ethics in a Plant-Powered World, argued DSA-like organizations could be helpful if they were designed so as to, among other things, avoid toxic factionalism and remain ideologically committed to ending animal use. She didn’t think such groups would be a magic fix, but thought they could be a useful tool which could help organize a philosophically disjointed movement.

“A big tent with democratic internal elections can aggregate a lot of people who care about animals but disagree on tactics — welfarists, abolitionists, direct action folks, legal advocates, etc., all under one roof,” Leese said. “That gives the movement more resources, more volunteers, and more political weight. Internal elections also create legitimacy and buy-in: people feel ownership over leadership rather than having it imposed by donors or founders. And it creates a pipeline for new leaders who might otherwise be shut out.”

More skeptical was Ronnie Lee, founder of the Animal Liberation Front, who, for full disclosure, I wrote a biography about. He noted, in the United Kingdom, the Hunt Saboteurs Association and Vegan Society are internally democratic, but not many others. My understanding is the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals elects its leaders as well.

“People who set up the organizations have a vision and just want others to help them achieve that vision, even to the extent of employing them to do so,” Lee said. “They are thinking more about how to achieve protection for other animals than about democracy with regard to humans… My wife and I set up an organization called Greyhound Action to campaign against the greyhound racing industry here in the UK. Greyhound Action was deliberately not internally democratic in order to avoid the risk of our radical vision of greyhound liberation being watered down.”

Mian Osumi, a member of DSA and the New York City chapter’s Socialists for Animal Justice subgroup, was unsurprisingly evangelical about the organizational form. She has been active for farmed animals since college and doing it professionally since graduating, primarily on corporate chicken policy campaigns. Osumi’s animal rights stances grew out of her lifelong leftist commitments.

“The unique thing about DSA is of course not just the big tent, but, as you mention, the democratic nature of the organization, which means a level of grassroots engagement that I don’t see at other national advocacy organizations,” she said. “Being member funded and member run means there can be no corporate capture — like Big Animal Ag.”

Author of On Their Own Terms: Animal Liberation for the 21st Century, Lee Hall thought the idea of an internally-democratic group was a good one.  She had observed and worked for various figures who were essentially ‘presidents for life’ of their different organizations. Hall found this model to be uninspiring, and not conducive to effective mentorship, decisionmaking or collaboration.

On the other hand, Paul Shapiro, who wrote Clean Meat: How Growing Meat Without Animals Will Revolutionize Dinner and the World, shared Lee’s skepticism. He argued a strategy that’s popular with rank-and-file activists might not necessarily be what’s best for animals. Shapiro wanted leaders to be selected based on the latter criteria.

“The analogy to DSA only goes so far: there, humans are advocating for humans,” he said. “In our movement, the intended beneficiaries can’t vote, run for leadership, or tell us we’ve prioritized our own preferences over their interests. That makes it especially important to judge leadership by results for animals. I’m open to different organizational structures, but their value should depend on whether they help animals.”

Another member of DSA’s Socialists for Animal Justice group, Cody Smith, spoke in favor of an internally-democratic model. Working in the healthcare nonprofit sector inspired deep cynicism in him, as he came to think big donors didn’t necessarily want the organization to succeed or wanted surface-level reforms at best. While Smith acknowledged DSA had its internal politicking and power plays, he believed the model was much more representative of its rank-and-file supporters, which was good.

“Ten years ago, The Humane League seemed to dominate the animal rights scene, and looking at their leadership page with their directors’ histories in finance and corporate engagement only affirms my distaste of the neoliberal, reformist, consumer-based stranglehold these organizations have over what should be an intersectional, liberationist, grassroots movement, untainted by major donors and corporate collaborators,” Smith said.

Merritt Clifton, editor of the Animals 24-7 blog, provided some useful background on the history of internally-democratic groups in the nonhuman movement. He said the model had been attempted previously, in regional delegation form, in organizations like the American Humane Association, the original National Humane Education Society (as opposed to the one in West Virginia), the Bands of Mercy, and the World Society for the Protection of Animals.

“Back when animal advocacy organizations were young, small, and local, holding annual meetings with at least a quorum physically present was relatively easy,” Clifton said. “As they grew, and expanded membership regionally and nationally, this became unwieldy. Just holding the annual meeting could and did sometimes bankrupt the early organizations. The American Humane Association, rattled by the breakaway of the [Humane Society of the United States] in 1954 in response to years of complaints that the board was unresponsive to membership, relocated… to be more regionally accessible, but that didn’t work much better, and it eventually abandoned all pretense to being representatively governed.”

Having worked on a biography of Ingrid Newkirk, founder of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, I was aware of accusations PETA had engaged in hostile-takeover attempts of other animal organizations, including internally-democratic ones, like the New England Anti-Vivisection Society, but I didn’t know many of the details to my discredit. I asked Clifton for more information about this. He confirmed PETA used NEAVS’ structure of governance by an annual meeting of dues-paying members to assert control of the group.

“PETA believed the North Shore Animal League was vulnerable for the same reason, but the North Shore governance structure had changed after the death of Alex Lewyt, leaving control firmly in the hands of Elisabeth Lewyt, whom PETA hugely underestimated,” Clifton said. “Friends of Animals was vulnerable through having a large board overlapping with PETA board membership. Ditto In Defense of Animals. In both cases, though, there was one PETA insider — I believe long deceased — who had a sense of honor and ensured that the hostile takeovers didn’t happen.”

Voting memberships were already on their way out, due to logistical challenges, but the Animals 24-7 editor believed PETA’s capture of NEAVS and a pro-hunting slate taking over Defenders of Wildlife put the final nails in the coffin of this approach. Whether the model will be revived, and prove more durable and efficient, remains to be seen. Personally, I would like to see more organizational experimentation, and have seen the positive benefits the sense of ownership DSA’s approach gives to grassroots activists.

Jon Hochschartner lives in Connecticut. He is the author of a number of books, including The Animals’ Freedom Fighter: A Biography of Ronnie Lee, Founder of the Animal Liberation Front. Visit his blog at SlaughterFreeAmerica.Substack.com.

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