Conversations & Interviews

Marie Anouk: When should one contact you?

Antoine F. Goetschel: Early — because I enjoy helping to clear away worries before they pile up. With timely advice I can give pointers on how difficulties might simply dissolve. It is cost-efficient, practical and reassuring.

Marie Anouk: How can one prepare for a first meeting with you?

Antoine F. Goetschel: Inwardly — by asking yourself what the matter is actually about. Lawyers need to engage with facts that are bundled and concise. If clients come prepared so that a phone call or e-mail gets to the point, we do not need hours to understand what is at stake.

Marie Anouk: How does a first consultation with you proceed?

Antoine F. Goetschel: Often by phone or Zoom — we exchange views, I listen to the client's concerns and ask about any open questions in broad terms. Once I have the documents in front of me I can form my own picture, and if further questions arise I follow up with the person.

Marie Anouk: What happens after the first consultation?

Antoine F. Goetschel: We agree on the next steps. While the matter is still fresh in my mind — on the same day or the next — I respond with a draft letter, possibly on the client's letterhead, or with a first draft contract in, say, an inheritance matter. Then we discuss the outcome of my thinking, already in the form of a draft letter or contract.

Marie Anouk: How do you tell in an initial meeting whether a trusting collaboration is possible?

Antoine F. Goetschel: After 40 years as a lawyer I have experienced a great deal and quickly reach the point when I sense that I do not match what a client is looking for. If mistrust or passive aggression towards me as a potential adviser is in the room, I address it directly. And if I feel the person would be more comfortable with someone else, I tell them so. The client's wellbeing comes first — not my own feelings.

Marie Anouk: What distinguishes a difficult mandate from a good one?

Antoine F. Goetschel: A difficult mandate is one that involves erratic instructions from the client — rosy today, sky-blue tomorrow; saying fifty but wanting to pay thirty; a factual account that shifts slightly with each conversation; or a client who does not stand by what they have previously written. It also becomes difficult when a client refuses to take a single step towards the other side — say, a brother who has been a source of irritation for 30 years — even though I am convinced that a handshake would substantially reduce costs and lead far more quickly to a result.

Marie Anouk: When do you deliberately advise against taking a legal step?

Antoine F. Goetschel: When I think from the end and know or estimate from experience that a black-and-white court ruling will not make the person any happier than they are now. My goal is for clients to leave me in better spirits than when they arrived. If the proposed measures would lead to more unhappiness, greater complexity, endless back-and-forth or undeclared money problems, I would say: try a good breathing technique before firing legal broadsides.

Marie Anouk: What matters to you in personal interactions?

Antoine F. Goetschel: Trusting respect and attentive listening seem paramount to me. A balance of positions is important — that I am neither put on a pedestal nor undervalued, but engaged as the person I am: with my professional experience, my knowledge and my sense of what is right. When that alignment exists, we can pull the same rope at the same end.

Marie Anouk: How do you create clarity in emotionally charged or conflict-laden situations?

Antoine F. Goetschel: By addressing them directly, and by drawing on my experience and years of personal-development work — in systemic thinking, in advisory situations — as well as skills I acquired through management consulting training. I also exercise patience, giving the other person space to reconsider a position they may have painted themselves into, and to come back in a few days or a week to reflect whether the path we had envisioned is really the right one. I am equally open to being guided towards a different approach if it convinces me more. Emotion — and especially malign emotion — narrows the field of vision.

Marie Anouk: Why cannot trust be replaced digitally?

Antoine F. Goetschel: In the world of artificial intelligence that is increasingly upon us, 60–70 per cent of the questions put to a lawyer can now be answered by AI. One can draft legal submissions and defend oneself with template letters and get quite far. What is missing is the shift in perspective — the two eyes and two hearts looking at a concern — so that a person in difficulty, whether with their landlord or at a parent's deathbed, does not become locked into a single view and feel compelled to pursue it at all costs. A conversation with a professional who has experienced similar extreme situations over 40 years makes it possible to ask the questions differently and find satisfaction in a solution that operates not on the surface but at a deeper level. A relationship of trust with a lawyer, I believe, is particularly important here — and cannot be replaced by artificial intelligence. The emotional and professional intelligence at stake in such conversations is consistently underestimated.

Marie Anouk: Was there a moment when you realised that trust matters more than being right?

Antoine F. Goetschel: The goal should be for clients to leave me happier than when they came. If they have right on paper — the claim is upheld — but the actual, underlying problem remains unsolved, then I believe a trusting conversation about where the root of the problem lies, and whether it might not be more rewarding to remove the deeper thorn, matters more than the formal legal victory in a credit note or a court ruling.

Marie Anouk: What happens when there is no will?

Antoine F. Goetschel: The heirs must follow the statutory rules, which provide for compulsory portions and disposable shares. If no will has been drawn up to exhaust those shares, everything passes by law. The difficulty is the equal treatment of all heirs — an advantage for some, a disadvantage for others, because every bank instruction and every disposition has to be agreed jointly. If relations between siblings and the surviving spouse are good, someone takes the lead; if they are strained, tensions arise immediately over every cost, every banking decision. That is why I recommend — as do lawyers generally — that people of all ages draw up a will. It can be very simple, but it must be clear.

Marie Anouk: When does a will create more conflict than solutions?

Antoine F. Goetschel: When it has not been discussed with a notary or a lawyer; when it contains only wishful thinking or clauses the testator knows cannot be enforced; when heirs who are not mentioned at all — say, two of four children — will inevitably challenge it, arguing they have a higher entitlement than those who are named. When wishes go beyond what is ethically and legally possible, and have been discussed with neither an experienced lawyer nor the heirs themselves, the result can easily be years of cumbersome estate-division proceedings.

Marie Anouk: How does inheritance law deal with blended families?

Antoine F. Goetschel: Generously, with tolerance — by approaching all members of the blended family with goodwill, and asking, as testator, how to arrange things so that one person's feelings are not hurt while another is favoured. When negative emotions arise that could have been minimised by thoughtful wording in the will and a kind approach to all concerned, the matrimonial and inheritance matters become easier to navigate. One must also consider the inheritance-tax consequences — which is why I am glad to work with specialists in estate taxation, to ensure that taxes, where due, are paid willingly but not excessively.

Marie Anouk: What can be done when heirs cannot agree?

Antoine F. Goetschel: One can appoint an executor — a trusted person, ideally someone with legal knowledge, or an experienced lawyer. The executor can seek dialogue with the other heirs and, if one party feels sidelined and has engaged a lawyer, that lawyer can intervene in a measured but clear way on behalf of the siblings or the surviving spouse. The overall picture must always be kept in mind — not merely the short-term interest in as much liquidity as soon as possible.

Marie Anouk: Which mistakes can no longer be corrected after someone has passed?

Antoine F. Goetschel: Dismissive, demeaning or hurtful remarks made by the testator shortly before death. A will written in negative emotion that leaves one child bearing the brunt of the testator's hatred while another is singled out as especially loved. Such things prompt the disadvantaged person to contest the will. There are also cases of disinheritance that were justified years ago but where circumstances have since changed — and yet the old wording remains. All these fuel conflict rather than resolution. Not to be forgotten: unresolved conflicts between siblings and their parents very often surface precisely at the deathbed or the funeral, and once that lid is opened the worms are almost impossible to put back in the jar.

Marie Anouk: What are the most common mistakes in inheritance law?

Antoine F. Goetschel: Deviating from the norm of equal treatment among heirs without good reason. Forgetting to explicitly waive the duty to account for advances — giving one child 30 and another 80 during their education without clarifying whether the larger amount must be set off against their inheritance. Gifting valuable items — watches, property — without first working out how that is to be treated under inheritance law. When all this surfaces at the estate division, combined with unclear provisions and fractious heirs whose partners were promised a large inheritance, things become complicated. A good breathing technique, some meditation and calm are the best medicine: the goal is to be part of the solution, not the problem.

Marie Anouk: How do you recognise that an inheritance matter is really about relationships?

Antoine F. Goetschel: When the conversation or the written tone conveys — somewhat bluntly put — «it's only about the money, you fool.» When people argue over trivialities, over a cinnamon jar or six wine glasses, while a property worth 22 million sits next door unmentioned. When someone offers a handshake but will not be held to it. I quickly sense that what is actually being celebrated is the dispute itself — and that is rarely what the testator wanted. They would be well advised to approach their children and grandchildren while still alive, and to arrange things so that these worries can be sidestepped. Let me add: inheritance typically comes a generation too late. A person under 30 has a greater need for liquidity — for education, for travel, for equipping themselves. When the parents die at 90 and you are 60, any sum is welcome, but the real need was earlier. That is why it is worth thinking generously about giving with warm hands during one's lifetime — properly documented with a lawyer and notary.

Marie Anouk: What must be clarified before a contract negotiation?

Antoine F. Goetschel: Laozi wrote: solve problems before they arise; bring order before chaos sets in. One should think in advance about the ultimate purpose of the contract — why am I entering into this relationship, to what end? When the focus falls entirely on the contractual provisions — and we have gone from one- or two-page contracts to documents of 50, 60 or 100 pages in the American tradition — what should be resolved often is not. Trust should come first, then the purpose. The clearer and simpler a contract, the more it signals that the parties want to be part of the solution, not the problem. Recently I concluded an agreement on a major project with a handshake. Because I trust the person, that handshake means more to me than a 50-page lawyers' contract with jurisdiction in Gibraltar and governing law in America — or Uganda.

Marie Anouk: When is a contract valid and when is it not?

Antoine F. Goetschel: Law is, in essence, form. Lawyers look first at whether the required form has been observed: was land sold without notarial authentication? Then the contract is void. Lawyers love to check the form first — is a signature missing, is the date absent? «I want out of this» — colloquially, we look for the hair in the soup. A contract is also void when the parties had entirely different understandings of its basic subject matter — I wanted sugar, you delivered salt, and because both look similar a false delivery occurred: that raises the question of mistake. The fundamental principle is that contracts must be honoured — this was already true in ancient Roman law. Breaking a contract one has already partly performed is not easy, especially when the other party insists on it.

Marie Anouk: Can a contract be valid if nothing is signed?

Antoine F. Goetschel: Many contracts are valid without written form. We buy food, we buy shoes — all of these are implied acts. Under Swiss law there are comparatively few contracts that require written form by statute. Written form is prescribed so that the parties think more carefully about the content and, where the law allows, can use the available scope — sensibly, with the help of legal counsel. Beyond that there are contracts requiring notarial authentication, because the legislator wants the parties to have a qualified person review the matter with appropriate care. Employment contracts can often be agreed verbally. I nonetheless recommend written form because it protects you if something goes wrong. At the same time I view the legalisation of daily life — with the many lawyers on the market — with some scepticism, because it tends to undermine rather than strengthen trust.

Marie Anouk: What can be done if the other party does not honour the contract?

Antoine F. Goetschel: One can insist on one's legal position and enforce it. For purchase contracts the steps to take if the party fails to pay, or if a defect notice has not been raised, are precisely prescribed. And one can — without wishing to sound preachy — seek a conversation: how do we get the cow off the ice? How do we resolve this disagreement? We can say: we have consensus in disagreement — we agree we disagree on these points, so how do we resolve them? Looking back over 40 years, many lengthy, resource-intensive, nerve-racking, offensive and costly proceedings could have been avoided by still treating the counterparty, even one trying to wriggle out of the agreement, with respect. Long proceedings are avoided and one's own quality of life is preserved.

Marie Anouk: Which clauses carry the greatest risk?

Antoine F. Goetschel: Clauses on governing law — when a Swiss or European contract applies American or Chinese law that the parties have no knowledge of and that has no connection to the subject matter. When the jurisdiction clause requires bringing claims in a completely different location: I recall a major case in Canton Lucerne where proceedings had to be brought in Gibraltar even though substantial sums were based in Lucerne. Beyond that: if I cannot explain a clause to a friend in plain language, or if behind the façade of grandiose terms something lurks that I do not actually understand, I would be sceptical. Terms like «compliance» mean different things to different people. If I do not understand what was agreed, or what I can demand from whom, under what conditions and with what guarantees, I would ask questions and only enter the contract once I know precisely what I am committing to.

Marie Anouk: What do many people overlook in contracts?

Antoine F. Goetschel: That they do not think about the worst-case scenario — and that they enter contracts with people they do not trust.

Marie Anouk: What matters more to you — protection or clarity?

Antoine F. Goetschel: Protection matters more to me, so that clients feel on solid ground when performing the contract. Clarity serves to reinforce that protection. If something unintelligible is signed, the other side may have built in a trap that works against my client. The two concepts are therefore friendly companions, not opposites.

Marie Anouk: When do you advise against signing something?

Antoine F. Goetschel: When a contract or declaration benefits only the other party; when the advantages for the client are very slim; when the prospect of any benefit for the client is fading; and when signing would not even bring emotional relief. For example: when parents insist on a renunciation of inheritance from a potential heir while everyone is still alive, I would generally advise against relinquishing something prematurely, as a child, without knowing exactly what it relates to, when the counter-performance is far too small relative to what is being foregone, and when the parents and stepmother will not be made happier by it and the difficulties continue regardless.

Marie Anouk: What are the greatest legal risks when buying property?

Antoine F. Goetschel: The animal-welfare advocate in me surfaces: buying a pig in a poke — and naturally wanting to open the bag quickly to free the cat — only to discover that the property does not actually exist, that it sits on a cadastral register showing heavy environmental contamination, that it was formerly a garage and one cannot do what one intended. Paying too much relative to comparable properties without any added value. I recommend obtaining several valuations to know whether a property is worth two, four or five. If you rely on a single agent you risk either selling too cheaply or pricing too high so that the property sits on the market and buyers are put off. I therefore work with a specialist firm focused on finding the optimal — not necessarily the maximum — value so that the transaction proceeds quickly and to everyone's benefit.

Marie Anouk: Which mistakes can become particularly costly?

Antoine F. Goetschel: Costs can escalate in the tax area, or when there is a substantial backlog of investment needed; when buying a company that owns properties and carries debts tied to those properties. There is also risk when the view you consider important cannot be secured long-term; when the zoning around the property — or the possibility of building higher — has not been checked in advance. Disappointments with real estate can definitely arise from such oversights.

Marie Anouk: What must be checked before signing a purchase agreement?

Antoine F. Goetschel: Where property is concerned: get to know the property as well as possible; take advice on the quality of the building fabric and the medium- and long-term appeal of the location — will it remain connected to private and public transport, or become isolated? It may be romantic to live somewhere remote, but if you later have to rely on a postal bus because you failed to check whether the regional rail service would continue, and find yourself carrying every kilo of flour three kilometres in old age, the joy of ownership can fade quickly.

Marie Anouk: When do conflicts with neighbours arise, and how can they be avoided?

Antoine F. Goetschel: Neighbour conflicts are becoming more acute; tolerance has decreased compared with the start of my career 40 years ago. People suffer from densification and the stress of crowding — in private and public transport. They tolerate less. Covid may still linger: locked indoors, every cough and every bark of the neighbour's dog grated on one physically. These concerns can be eased by open-heartedly seeking dialogue: «You have children — of course they can play.» One can also accept that a dog barks from time to time, as the law and courts expect. Rather than pushing your own feelings to the fore, ask: am I reacting as an average person would? If you are excessively sensitive, you must protect yourself. I recall a well-known legal academic with extraordinarily thick doors — fitted like those in a conservatoire — to shield himself from noise. He knew he was not an average person. A shift in perspective helps: how would a judge likely decide this? And meditative techniques, walks and breathing exercises are always useful.

Marie Anouk: Where do the greatest misunderstandings arise in practice — in the purchase, in use, or with neighbours?

Antoine F. Goetschel: As the saying goes, no one can win peace if the dear neighbour does not like it. In purchases there are mistakes, and a civil action over construction defects may drag on for some time — but that is manageable: you pay somewhat more, but if you buy a house you have access to the necessary liquidity or creditworthiness. In use you can adapt. The bigger problems, in my experience, are in the area of neighbour law, because of declining tolerance, the ongoing friction of living door-to-door or house-by-house — disputes over animals, parking spaces, parties, Airbnb. I would give high priority to the quality of neighbourly relations — to the tone one strikes, to ordinary tolerance on the one hand and clarity and the ability to reach agreements on the other.

Marie Anouk: Which topics come up most often despite appearing minor at first glance?

Antoine F. Goetschel: As a Swiss comedian once said, people are curious creatures — and yet they are irritated when the neighbour's pram is always in the way, when they almost trip over bicycles the neighbour's children have tossed aside, when doors are left unlocked despite repeated break-ins. Demanding that the neighbour be more careful or show more tolerance can quickly generate discomfort — about the neighbourly situation, and within oneself: «I have everything I need; why do I let myself be so annoyed, in my own four walls, where I want to be able to be human?»

Marie Anouk: When is a foundation appropriate, and when an association?

Antoine F. Goetschel: A foundation makes sense when substantial assets — foundations below roughly one million make little sense, given legal fees, accounting costs and bank charges — are to be devoted to a good purpose: animals, children, arts and culture, the environment. Whether the assets are to be deployed in a single tranche, gradually over 10 or 20 years, or in perpetuity. An association brings people together for a shared purpose — I am in a choir, we form an association; through membership fees we pay the choirmaster and can afford musicians for concerts. Bringing people together around an ideal purpose — animals, culture, sport — under a charitable aspect. There are grey areas. My rule of thumb: a foundation suits large capital deployed for a specific purpose, where the founder's will stands centre stage. Often, too, a large grant to an existing foundation under specified conditions suffices to fulfil the same goal.

Marie Anouk: Which legal obligations are often underestimated?

Antoine F. Goetschel: As banal as it sounds for associations: the duties of an employer. These include clean accounting and the fact that the association board, like the board of a limited company, is personally liable to ensure that AHV contributions and social-security contributions are paid. For foundation board members: the duty to act in a fiduciary, transparent manner in line with the foundation's purpose, placing one's own financial interests last. Recently a very wealthy foundation in Canton Lucerne was established where the executor was also the sole board member of this billion-franc foundation — and was promptly removed by the supervisory authority because his personal financial interests conflicted with the foundation's long-term pursuit of its purpose.

Marie Anouk: What happens when an association is poorly organised?

Antoine F. Goetschel: Initially, not much — the choir fails to get off the ground; the association's purpose is barely realised, which is a pity. Associations can become contaminated when personal difficulties are carried into them — this paralyses the work. Beyond that, with larger associations and organisations, the reputation of the entire movement can suffer. I have seen this in animal welfare: when one organisation runs into difficulties, donors ask themselves not merely whether to continue supporting that particular organisation but whether to trust the entire movement. «If things are going wrong in animal welfare I will redirect my giving to species conservation or the zoo» — which is good for the zoo but unfortunate for the animals it confines.

Marie Anouk: How can internal conflicts be prevented?

Antoine F. Goetschel: Through self-criticism — by consistently questioning one's own position and claims; by applying the principle of two eyes and two hearts; by looking at the association's external image. How does it come across? Is it well received when a zoo, for example, drives a construction company into insolvency — could that have been avoided? One should seek open conversation and also ask: is this person comfortable in the association? If not, a collegial parting of ways is often wiser than continuing.

Marie Anouk: For what is an association board liable and for what is it not?

Antoine F. Goetschel: If the statutes state that the board is essentially not liable, it is already on safe ground. The board is liable for intentionally caused damage; it is liable for wage contributions; and it must face questions when controls fail entirely — when a neighbourhood association suddenly has hundreds of thousands of francs missing and the treasurer's reports were always waved through. Can the whole board then be held accountable for the dissipated public funds, membership fees and donations? The duties of association boards and foundation bodies have increasingly come to resemble those of a company board of directors.

Marie Anouk: Which points must be clearly regulated in good statutes?

Antoine F. Goetschel: The Swiss Civil Code prescribes the minimum content, and the cantonal commercial-register templates are drafted so that an authority will accept them. The question of tax exemption for the association on account of its non-profit purpose should be addressed early. I strongly advise formulating the association's purpose so that the prospect of tax exemption is genuinely high — including preliminary discussions with the tax authority: «If we structure the association like this, would you confirm tax exemption?» The bar has risen steadily; tax authorities have repeatedly seen abuse — associations used as vehicles for the enrichment of their officers.

Marie Anouk: When must an association be entered in the commercial register?

Antoine F. Goetschel: If it conducts a commercial business, registration is mandatory. Other mandatory requirements follow from the Commercial Register Ordinance. An association may also voluntarily register to enhance its credibility — so that members and third parties can see who has signing authority and exactly what the purpose is. The Global Animal Law GAL Association, for example, is registered so that one can see which respected figures sit on the board, independent of my own person, and so that the credibility of the organisation is demonstrated when dealing with property or other significant transactions.

Marie Anouk: What is often quickly decided at the founding but difficult to correct later?

Antoine F. Goetschel: The signing rules need careful thought: who has joint signing authority with whom? Once entered in the commercial register, this determines who can deal with the bank. It can be agreed that the managing director may act alone for small amounts without requiring a second signature each time. Expense regulations — as boring as they sound — also need to be submitted to the tax authority where non-profit status is sought. If someone is paid from association funds for special tasks, conflicts of interest must be addressed, with no single person deciding alone on their own remuneration. All these matters — conflict accumulation, conflicts of interest — require the same careful advance thinking in an association as in a foundation.

Marie Anouk: Regarding your external legal department — when is it advisable to involve legal questions early?

Antoine F. Goetschel: It seems to me very practical to seek outside support as early as possible. A change of perspective — the openness to talk to someone with an external view — very often proves its worth, and when neglected, as a closed door. Through conversations with friends in reputation management I frequently see companies unable to assess the impact of their own decisions: who they choose as spokesperson, how they argue externally, how they respond to the growing importance of media and social media. Employment contracts and project descriptions should also comply with the law rather than simply being copied from old templates. For all these reasons I regard it as entirely practical for a company to obtain ongoing external legal advice. Where my own expertise has limits I work with specialists — in trademark law or in the international arena.

Marie Anouk: What risks arise from postponing legal matters for too long?

Antoine F. Goetschel: One hopes they resolve themselves. Some concerns do — if an aggressive lawyer's letter arrives and you let it sit for a few days and allow what I call the Prussian night to pass before replying, some problems arising from negative emotion dissolve on their own. In tax law, however, the costs of failing to report can be far higher when undeclared money in an estate community is not disclosed promptly. Smouldering conflicts can also erupt. It seems wise to sense, recognise and articulate concerns early — in employment law too, when things start to slip, when overtime breeds mistrust — to address it, regulate it and reframe it.

Marie Anouk: How do you help companies prioritise legal matters?

Antoine F. Goetschel: I want to warn against over-weighting legal questions. In America — my brother lives there — people sometimes say «lawyers are useless»: the moment lawyers appear, everything becomes heavy and hundred-page contracts appear that no one understands. As a Swiss or European company, if you find the right balance and keep the economic focus primary, part of that balance is regularly weeding the legal landscape. Every person must keep their own garden in order. Some employment contracts are no longer fit for purpose, or land badly in public or with shareholders. Golden parachutes that may once have been contractually agreed are now problematic. It pays to entrust accumulated contractual arrangements to an external legal body — external, because advisers are not subject to instructions, and an internal employee who uncovers a problem risks her own position in a badly run company. External review often yields a clearer answer.

Marie Anouk: What do you expect from a good collaboration with management or the board of directors?

Antoine F. Goetschel: Openness about their own concerns — honest reporting and a willingness to name the real core of potential disputes. Beyond transparency, a degree of self-restraint — not always present in executives who have worked their way to the top. And genuine cheerfulness: the ability to laugh about the current situation. One of my favourite philosophers, or should I say comedians, Karl Valentin from Munich, said: «Hopefully it won't be as bad as it already is.» Cheerfulness allows one to speak about sensitive things and create clarity by setting aside what one had previously taken for granted.

Marie Anouk: What decision in your career has shaped you most?

Antoine F. Goetschel: I chose animal welfare law — the legal position of animals — in the sense that I fell into it as if by providence, when writing my third book, my doctoral thesis on the subject, and working for an animal welfare association. Channelling that focus into the law, first in Switzerland and now globally, was a decision to advocate for minorities in society — one I do not regret, and one that has accompanied me for over 40 years.

Marie Anouk: What still drives you after so many years?

Antoine F. Goetschel: The joy of being active — the possibility of contributing, even modestly, to alleviating suffering and promoting wellbeing in the world, and of opening joy in the hearts of people and animals.

Marie Anouk: What significance do art and culture hold for your legal work?

Antoine F. Goetschel: They are great nourishment, a broadening of the horizon — law matters to me, but I do not regard it as the sole path to salvation. I pursue various projects in art and culture: as executor of a large estate I worked with the heirs of a very well-known composer on important cultural projects. It means a great deal to me to contribute, however modestly, to bringing these values into society — not merely by subscribing to a concert series, but by genuinely resonating with what writers and artists have suffered and wished to express.

Marie Anouk: If you had to describe your work in three words — what would they be?

Antoine F. Goetschel: Trust, impact and cheerfulness.

Marie Anouk: What motivates your commitment to animal welfare?

Antoine F. Goetschel: It fills me with satisfaction to contribute, however modestly, to alleviating suffering and promoting wellbeing in the world. Animals are the largest minority on earth — they have no voice, they suffer in silence. And in valuing human health, I believe that working for animal welfare is also a foundation for human health.

Marie Anouk: Which legal and ethical principles stand at the centre of your work?

Antoine F. Goetschel: Reverence for life seems paramount to me — the dignity of the creature, a term from Karl Barth — as the ethical background for the will to promote animal welfare and to prevent animal suffering in the living animal. Animal rights are not my primary or most foregrounded focus, because the concept is often linked to veganism and the complete renunciation of animal products. An approach I may personally welcome — I have been a vegetarian for 30 years — but which is politically, in terms of finding a majority in national and global parliaments, currently not very promising.

Marie Anouk: What impact does animal welfare have on humans and the environment?

Antoine F. Goetschel: An enormous impact — grossly underestimated. Animal health is a vital foundation for human health. And it is not only animal suffering that must be eliminated: our efforts also extend to antimicrobial resistance. This is a topic that is globally acknowledged yet underestimated in public consciousness. Antibiotics are working less and less effectively; we face a future with few potent medications. We saw with Covid-19 that the next pandemic — a zoonosis, an animal disease transmissible to humans — will come, with increasing frequency, as animal habitats are destroyed. These are major problem areas that urgently need our full attention.

Marie Anouk: What sets you apart from conventional animal welfare organisations?

Antoine F. Goetschel: There are over 20,000 animal welfare and animal-rights organisations worldwide — certainly some overlap exists. I believe the legal focus is important, because law can be enforced. However, I have noticed in my work that law captures only a small aspect of societal change. Through conversations with business leaders and veterinarians I concluded that we should use the financial flows of animal-using industries to alleviate animal suffering, promote animal health and advance human health — flows that should in turn make it possible to bring vital concerns such as animal welfare and animal health to the United Nations. If the animal-use industry clings to old thinking, the consequences will be very costly and very difficult, and the prospects very poor.

Marie Anouk: What influence do business and individual companies have on animal welfare?

Antoine F. Goetschel: Animal-using companies — in agriculture, pharmaceutical testing, sport — have a very direct influence and can, with comparatively modest effort, reduce slaughter frequency, reduce antibiotic use, provide substantially more space through extensive farming, or make the keeping of laboratory animals more humane. They actually have the power to act. And the concerns they have generated for economic reasons can, in the homeopathic spirit of Paracelsus, be resolved through money as well.

Marie Anouk: How do economic interests influence animal welfare legislation?

Antoine F. Goetschel: To a degree that can hardly be overstated. Speaking plainly from 40 years in Swiss animal-welfare politics: major concerns that would, on the surface, be majority-friendly — in agriculture, for example — are repeatedly undermined by industry associations. The farmers' union knows how to play its interests at the expense of animals and to deploy a blocking majority in a cantonal vote against a popular initiative. In the genetic-protection initiative, for example, the animal-welfare side had a budget of two million and the pharmaceutical industry one of 25 million. The playing fields are not level. Business associations in Switzerland and worldwide are well advised — for the sake of pandemic prevention, antibiotic resistance and the One Health concept — to take animal welfare as a business factor far more seriously. If a farm is shut down overnight because of a zoonosis and a pandemic, I regard that business model as holding little promise.

Marie Anouk: What does an ideal future for animals in our society look like?

Antoine F. Goetschel: Thinking of Jeremiah and Isaiah as Old Testament prophets — the vision that wild animals and humans live in friendship — one speaks almost of a Utopia in the spirit of Thomas More. That would be the ideal: a kind of friendship, a kind of equal worth; a worldwide consensus across different cultures devoted to avoiding unnecessary animal suffering and promoting animal welfare, with a view to the health of the animal, the human and the entire planet. On that basis I am less sceptical of a dignified use of animals than the current conditions of keeping, transport, breeding methods — in farm, laboratory, domestic, wild and sport contexts — would suggest.

Marie Anouk: How can an interested citizen or investor participate in your project?

Antoine F. Goetschel: The idea of contributing to animal welfare through financial flows — particularly in industries that use animals — is still in its early stages despite years of effort. We have concluded that we would like to offer animal-friendly investment products, which requires drawing lessons from the sustainability movement around environmental protection. The criticisms of greenwashing and marketing tools we take seriously: if we develop criteria to identify which animal-keeping practices are acceptable or genuinely animal-friendly, those criteria must be robust, verifiable and part of corporate compliance, including the supply chain. This is a criterion not yet covered by ESG or sustainability frameworks. If it is taken seriously, then with the help of early-stage investors we can develop those criteria and then approach asset managers and banks worldwide — offering investors who care about animals the option of saying: why should I not invest in an animal-friendly way, if the return is roughly the same and I am contributing long-term to the wellbeing of animals and of humans through health?

Marie Anouk: What do investors receive in return — financially, reputationally and socially?

Antoine F. Goetschel: Reputationally, a great deal. We want to give investors the opportunity to participate, to show their face, to commit to doing good — even if in the business world such commitments are rarely a priority for open discussion. Working with specialists we will develop what first-mover benefits can be offered so that investors can also benefit financially. It is too early now to speak of higher returns or other incentives — that must be worked out with experts so that investors say: «That sounds interesting; I am on board, well-positioned reputationally, financially and status-wise.» They will also meet philanthropists and other companies who say: «We genuinely take our responsibility seriously.» Responsible entrepreneurs can make a substantial contribution to improving animal welfare conditions and human living conditions — and we can promote that by bringing them together.

Marie Anouk: What qualifications do you and your team bring?

Antoine F. Goetschel: Self-praise stinks. As a lawyer for 40 years I engage with economic questions and have also pursued further training in business consulting in Austria with senior managers. Animal welfare law is part of my — I can barely put it any other way — part of my DNA. According to The Guardian I am the world's leading attorney in the field of animal protection. I have written 13 books, received an honorary doctorate and serve as president of the Global Animal Law GAL Association with 130 professors of law worldwide in the field of animal welfare and animal law. I bring the animal-welfare perspective; I bring in specialists from reputation management, in identifying which incentives are attractive for companies to address concerns and position themselves well. The financial products will be developed with experts. I aspire to engage globally recognised companies — or companies with decades of outstanding reputation — to develop criteria, similar to what MSCI does, but now including animal welfare, which has so far been off the radar. Extending sustainability in that direction is something many conversation partners, including executives at financial institutions, immediately find easy to say: «Yes, that makes sense — that could be done well.» With these specialists, who command high credibility precisely because they come from business rather than philanthropy or the NGO world, we are on our way — and we want to broaden, lengthen and deepen that path.

Marie Anouk: How is your project organised and how is compliance and governance ensured?

Antoine F. Goetschel: Organisationally, we plan to create a subsidiary of the Global Animal Law GAL Association — Aninvest — as the required financial entity, with legal-entity status and website protection. We place the very highest value on compliance — ensuring accountability. Many people are just waiting for the chance to disparage and damage a project's reputation. The vegan movement is very strong and globally important, and might question any cooperation with animal-using industries. That is why complete transparency about the criteria is needed, along with credibility of those responsible and the personalities involved — chief veterinary officers, global organisations, the World Bank — and in the financial sphere, well-reputed advisers whose endorsement signals that funds will not be wasted, that no one will enrich themselves inappropriately, but that the funds will be invested and a share — the exact flow we still need to work out — will serve to improve animal welfare structurally, to bring animal protection to the UN, and to implement the UN convention we have developed with business behind us, not against us.