Something Fishy in the Civilising Process

While Elias viewed the natural world as central to human understandings of self, the impact of human–animal relations remains underexplored in figurational sociology. In line with Elias’s work, this chapter looks at changes in people’s attitudes towards animals over the last two centuries, exploring how this influences social relations, philosophical thought, slaughter practices, and the rise of animal advocacy movements. These developments are explored through the governance of farm animal welfare in the United Kingdom and Poland, with an overarching focus on fish welfare and the practice of selling live carp during the Christmas period in Poland. The author suggests that the ‘animal’ civilising process provides significant new insights for the future direction of figurational sociology.