The origins of protectionist movement: some concepts and grounds

Abstract

Since 1824 with the creation of the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA) in London, as with the other societies that were being founded throughout the world, they devoted their time to developing actions in defense of a world more respectful of the environment at various levels: the struggle within a legal framework to permit standards more consistent with the animal and plant world; mobilization and action from both large cities and small towns to avoid routine inhumane actions, the socioeconomic and leisure model; the development of a theoretical body of work developing ideas and from them, an informational, instructional and formative vanguard. Many of the ideological foundations that were the basis of these 19th century protectionists ‒notably the British Salt among others‒ originated in the theoretical evolution of the moral attitudes surrounding animals and nature ‒Greece, both Christian and Eastern societies, the Renaissance, Rationalism, Utilitarianism, and Contractualism primarily. We reflect, from the perspective of cultural protectionism, on how this transit from its initial concepts until the consolidation of a theory sensitive to the environment in the landscape of modern and industrial societies of Europe and America was produced.