There are two conceptual tools that often get used in animal advocacy and political advocacy more broadly:

  1. Moral circle
  2. Overton window

These can be useful tools to think about the world and, in particular, the historical context of our advocacy.

However, these hypothetical constructs have not been demonstrated to be actual real-world phenomena. The moral circle and the Overton window might (or might not) be useful concepts, but that doesn’t mean that they actually explain anything about the world. Demonstrating that would require substantial empirical testing of their explanatory power as social and psychological theories. Such testing has not really occurred and, where it has occurred, results have been mixed in terms of support for these two concepts.

This matters because both of these tools have been used as strategies. There are organisations, individuals, and advocacy programmes whose explicit goal is to “Expand the moral circle”. Likewise, there are many political activists explaining how to “Shift the Overton window”.

This is misguided. Before we spend resources on a strategy like this, there are some essential first steps:

  1. Demonstrate empirically that the thing exists, i.e. is a stable, measurable construct that has explanatory power in social and psychological contexts
  2. Demonstrate empirically that the thing can be reliably manipulated

I haven’t seen any studies that have satisfactorily demonstrated either of these two necessary first steps for either the moral circle or the Overton window.

Therefore, until such evidence is obtained, these might be useful constructs or conversational shorthands, but we should hesitate before spending resources on programs that rely on untested assumptions.