Animals, vulnerability and global environmental change: The case of farmed pigs in concentrated animal feeding operations in North Carolina

Abstract The global farmed animal sector is a driver of global environmental change, and it is also impacted by global environmental change in both the subsistence and commercial realms. There has been significant research looking at the experiences and impacts of these dynamics for humans. However, here has been little attention paid to the broad processes that shape the vulnerabilities of farmed animals in these contexts or how farmed animals experience and embody these vulnerabilities in their daily lives and lifetimes. The authors demonstrate the ways in which the vulnerabilities of animals, humans, and ecosystems are necessarily interconnected and interdependent. They also show the ways in which animals, as agents, can influence a situation, shaping their own and others’ vulnerability and capacity to respond and adapt to threats. They propose a triple animal-human-environment system approach to vulnerability research. They illustrate, using a case study of the pig industry in North Carolina, that bringing animals into vulnerability scholarship offers a more holistic lens to understanding the drivers, dynamics and impacts of global environmental change.