Zoopolis offers a new agenda for the theory and practice of animal rights. Most animal rights theory focuses on the intrinsic capacities or interests of animals, and the moral status and moral rights that these intrinsic characteristics give rise to. Zoopolis shifts the debate from the realm of moral theory and applied ethics to the realm of political theory, focusing on the relational obligations that arise from the varied ways that animals relate to human societies and institutions. Building on recent developments in the political theory of group-differentiated citizenship, Zoopolis introduces us to the genuine "political animal". It argues that different types of animals stand in different relationships to human political communities. Domesticated animals should be seen as full members of human-animal mixed communities, participating in the cooperative project of shared citizenship. Wilderness animals, by contrast, form their own sovereign communities entitled to protection against colonization, invasion, domination and other threats to self-determination. 'Liminal' animals who are wild but live in the midst of human settlement (such as crows or raccoons) should be seen as "denizens", resident of our societies, but not fully included in rights and responsibilities of citizenship. To all of these animals we owe respect for their basic inviolable rights. But we inevitably and appropriately have very different relations with them, with different types of obligations. Humans and animals are inextricably bound in a complex web of relationships, and Zoopolis offers an original and profoundly affirmative vision of how to ground this complex web of relations on principles of justice and compassion.

蘇·唐納森（Sue Donaldson）和威爾・金裏卡（Will Kymlicka）都是加拿大女王大學的政治哲學教授。蘇·唐納森住在加拿大的金斯頓市。她寫過很多散文、戲劇和書籍，包括一本素食主義者的食譜，即2003年齣版的《不會反咬一口的美食》（Foods That Don't Bite Back）和一本寫給年輕人看的偵探小說，即2004齣版的《小小的欺騙》（Thread of Deceit）。

威爾・金裏卡，加拿大著名哲學教授，1984年獲女王大學哲學和政治學學士學位，1987年獲牛津大學哲學博士學位，現為加拿大女王大學哲學係教授。

金裏卡著作頗豐，主要著作有：《自由主義、社群與文化》（1989）、《當代政治哲學》（1990）、《多元文化公民》（1995）、《探索之路：反思加拿大的族裔文化關係》（1998）、《少數的權利》（2001）。另外，他還是《政治哲學的公正》（1992）、《少數群體文化的權利》（1995）等著作的主編，其中一些著作已被翻譯成21國文字。