Commodification of Companion Animals in Indonesian Business Law: Regulatory Gaps and an Ecological Justice–Based Reconstruction
Abstract
Within the current architecture of Indonesian law, companion animals are predominantly positioned as economic objects subject to ownership and commercial exchange. This market-oriented legal construction affords only limited recognition of animals as sentient living beings and generates structural deficiencies in legal protection, particularly regarding the responsibilities of business actors toward animal welfare. While prior scholarship in Indonesia has examined animal protection primarily through criminal law or general welfare regulation, little attention has been given to how business law structures themselves institutionalize commodification.This article critically analyzes the commodification of companion animals within Indonesian business regulatory governance and its normative implications. Employing normative juridical (doctrinal) research, the study integrates statutory, conceptual, and limited comparative approaches. Indonesian regulations governing trade, animal health, and commercial activities involving companion animals are examined through the lens of ecological justice, which expands legal reasoning beyond anthropocentric economic interests to include non-human beings as members of the ecological community. A limited comparison with regulatory developments in South Korea is incorporated as a contextual normative reference.The findings demonstrate that Indonesian business law continues to frame companion animals primarily as commodities, resulting in a fragmented regulatory structure that prioritizes administrative compliance, market order, and public health, while addressing animal welfare only indirectly and inconsistently. This configuration produces structural governance gaps that hinder the systematic integration of animal welfare as a legally binding business obligation.Departing from existing literature, this study advances an ecological justice–based reconstruction model that repositions animal welfare within the core architecture of business regulation. The model calls for explicit normative recognition of companion animals as living beings with legally relevant welfare interests; the integration of welfare standards into licensing, supervision, and compliance regimes; and the establishment of clearly articulated duties of care for business actors. By bridging animal law and business law, this article offers a doctrinal and governance-based framework for aligning commercial activity with ecological responsibility in Indonesian legal development.
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DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.30659/akta.v13i2.51465
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