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Operationalizing evil: Christian realism, liberal economics, and industrial agriculture

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  • Leland Glenna

Abstract

The Enlightenment marked a shift inmoral debates away from notions of sin and eviltoward the more secular concept of virtue basedin reason. Perhaps the most notable example ofsuch liberal thought can be found in JohnDewey's 1934 A Common Faith, where he arguesthat people should set aside bickering overreligious differences and work in a utilitarianspirit to achieve public good through science.Hitler's Germany, Stalin's Soviet Union, theChinese cultural revolution, and the Cold War'sthreat of mutually assured destruction haveinspired philosophers and theologians to revivethe concept of evil to explain atrocities tooextreme to be incorporated into conventionalunderstandings of virtue and reason. In theirstruggle to explain the enormity of humancapacities for destruction, they have replacedtraditional religious definitions of evil witha more secular one: the construction anddefense of a systemic contempt for life.Assuming that bad consequences are simply theunintended result of good intentions, socialscientists have resisted employing such aconception of evil. Persisting in thisassumption may prevent us from seeing theperversity of the liberal economicjustification for promoting and perpetuatingdestructive tendencies in the industrialagricultural system. This paper seeks tooperationalize a conception of evil and toapply it to policy debates surrounding the 1985Food Security Act in the hope of evaluating oursociety's inability to resolve social andenvironmental consequences generated byindustrial agriculture. Copyright Kluwer Academic Publishers 2002

Suggested Citation

  • Leland Glenna, 2002. "Operationalizing evil: Christian realism, liberal economics, and industrial agriculture," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 19(3), pages 205-216, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:agrhuv:v:19:y:2002:i:3:p:205-216
    DOI: 10.1023/A:1019985003236
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Alessandro Bonanno, 1998. "Liberal democracy in the global era: Implications for the agro-food sector," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 15(3), pages 223-242, September.
    2. Lawrence Busch, 1989. "Irony, tragedy, and temporality in agricultural systems, or, how values and systems are related," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 6(4), pages 4-11, September.
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    Cited by:

    1. Corné J. Rademaker & Henk Jochemsen, 2019. "Faith in international agricultural development: Conservation Agriculture in sub-Saharan Africa," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 36(2), pages 199-212, June.
    2. Gilbert Gillespie, 2010. "2009 AFHVS presidential address: the steering question: challenges to achieving food system sustainability," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 27(1), pages 3-12, March.
    3. Douglas H. Constance, 2023. "The doctors of agrifood studies," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 40(1), pages 31-43, March.

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