Posts by Laura Huggins

What are the ethical foundations of free market environmentalism? This week we sat down with Kate Blanchard and Kevin O'Brein, two of this year's PERC Lone Mountain Fellows, to explore these questions and others. Blanchard is Associate Professor of Religious Studies at Alma College and O'Brien is Associate Professor of Christian Ethics at Pacific Lutheran University. They are currently working on a book about the connections and tensions of ethics, environmentalism, and economics.

Thanks to Blanchard and O'Brein for taking time to answer our questions. For more PERC Q&As, visit the series archive. 

What does Christian ecological ethics have to say about the environment?

Christian ecological ethics includes a diverse group of scholars from many denominations and across the world, and while we cannot speak for all Christians, we do believe that traditional Christian teachings have significant environmental implications. Most generally, we argue that human beings have a responsibility to God and all of God’s creation, which includes not just other human beings but also the entirety of the nonhuman world. So, just as Christians are called to treat our human neighbors with respect and love, we must also learn to respect and love the animals, the plants, the ecosystem, and the earth God made. 

Some Christians would call this stewardship, emphasizing that humans have a special responsibility to be the caretakers of other creatures. Others resist even that anthropocentric division, and would say that human beings should try not to manage other creatures, but instead work toward a more egalitarian community with them. The common theme is that Christian faith calls for loving care for all of creation. 

Where, if at all, do free market environmentalism and Christian ecological ethics have common ground?

There is more common ground than it might first seem! There are disagreements, of course, the most important being that Christian ecological ethics tends to emphasize the intrinsic or God-given value of the nonhuman world, and to be suspicious of the corrupting influence that markets can have on things we would consider priceless. However, we share with FME a profound appreciation for human freedom, a celebration of diversity in human communities, a suspicion of the ways power can corrupt human relationships, and a preference for local solutions. And obviously we share a concern for the conservation and well-being of the earth.

How are markets useful for protecting earth’s long-term health? How does this relate to Christian ecological ethics?

We appreciate the ways markets provide clear and quick feedback mechanisms: property owners see the results of their management decisions and have the flexibility to adapt as they learn. They are also held accountable for their own imprudent behaviors, and if markets are structured fairly they can’t pass the costs of their mistakes on to someone else. Christian ethicists have thought long and hard about the importance of love and respect for the nonhuman world, but we are always looking for ways to actually put that love and respect into action. We suspect that markets may be more useful for smaller, local problems than for global questions or crises, but we see that markets can be one path to the goal of environmental integrity, and no environmental proposal is complete unless market mechanisms have been carefully considered. 

Stories of my ancestors interacting with families of the Northwestern Shoshone tribe enthralled me as a girl. The idea that the native people were self-sufficient and often helped the early settlers survive by trading goods, such as animal skins, and by sharing their knowledge of water sources and hunting grounds was inspiring. Today, however, many “First Nations” are stuck in a welfare state. PERC's latest issue of PERC Reports looks at past and present trends in indigenous life, shining a light on how property rights and individual initiative can help create a higher standard of living and improve environmental quality on reservations and beyond.

PERC president TERRY ANDERSON points out that American Indians and First Nations people can reach back into their rich cultural heritage and find institutions that rewarded individual initiative. The key is for tribes to take this initiative again and for Congress to give tribal nations the rights that were once theirs.

Why is it that reservations are so poor asks JOHN KOPPISCH with Forbes. People are quick to point to alcoholism or underdeveloped land, but as Koppisch wisely writes, “those are just the symptoms. Prosperity is built on property rights, and reservations often have neither.”

Tribal governments can help solve the poverty problem. ROBERT MILLER draws on his experience as Chief Justice of the Grand Ronde Tribe and as a citizen of the Eastern Shawnee Tribe to explore how native governments can establish the laws and court systems necessary to attract investment.

In the past, native nations built their economies via extensive trade networks. Arctic tribal historian, JOHN BOCKSTOCE, reveals how the Eskimos and Chukchi in the greater Bering Strait region had been trading for thousands of years before the Russian and American trading vessels arrived.

Beyond North America, IAN BOISVERT, with BlueSky Mediation & Law and a former PERC graduate fellow, introduces the idea of “Tradable Occupation Rights” for the Maori in New Zealand. Creating these rights would offer both commercial and customary ocean users a market to resolve conflict and promote more efficient uses of resources.

This special issue of PERC Reports is made possible by the generous support of the M. J. Murdock Charitable Trust. PERC is continually grateful for their investment in tribal issues and free market solutions.

The mood at PERC is somber this morning due to the news of the loss of an extraordinary woman. Elinor Ostrom was the first woman to receive the Nobel Prize in Economics.

Ostrom received the 2009 Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences for her groundbreaking research demonstrating that ordinary people are capable of creating rules and institutions that allow for the sustainable and equitable management of shared resources. She shared the prize with Oliver Williamson, a University of California economist.

The recipient of numerous international awards and honorary degrees, Ostrom was selected in April as one of the Time 100 for 2012, Time magazine’s annual list of the world’s 100 most influential people. In May, the IU Board of Trustees renamed the Workshop in Political Theory and Policy Analysis to honor Elinor Ostrom and her husband and colleague, Vincent Ostrom, who founded the center in 1973.

No doubt her contributions will continue to shed light on free market environmentalism. “Calling on Communities” is a chapter inspired by Ostrom’s research and will appear in the forthcoming edition of Free Market Environmentalism.

She is survived by her husband and by an international extended family of colleagues, collaborators, staff and friends who worked closely with her during an extraordinary 50-year career. Read more here.

The big brown trout I was fishing for yesterday on the Limay River in Patagonia was nowhere to be found but I did manage to come across an old hang out of Butch Cassidy.

Being from Montana, where the Hole-in-the-Wall Gang pulled off their last job—a holdup of a Union Pacific train—before fleeing to South America, I was happy with this historical catch.

Legend has it that Butch became friends with Jarred Jones who ventured down to Argentina from Texas in 1887 to make his fortune. Jones didn’t find gold but he did manage to open a general store at the mouth of the Limay. The old store, which is now a friendly restaurant, still holds the shops books, old photos, and a frontier atmosphere of a century ago.

Jones earned enough money at the store to purchase two big ranches, which he fenced off with barbed wire—the first to be seen around these parts. Today, barbed wire is strung across much of the 98 million hectares of the Patagonian Steppe to enclose vast quantities of sheep.

Unfortunately, a flock of sheep can gobble up great expanses of native grasses, and in southern Argentina, they’re clearing some serious vegetation. In addition to vegetation loss, overgrazing equates to lost habitat for other animals, and damages waterways with runoff and silt from erosion, which affects the fish, which affects tourism.

Paradoxically, sheep—the slayers of grasslands—could become the saviors of the same landscapes and in turn protect fish and other species. It turns out that because the plants of the grasslands co-evolved with herbivores, such as guanacos, a little munching is good (and necessary) for the flora. It is also true that companies that have environmental components to their business plans and seek to create goods from natural products, including merino wool, would like to see grasslands flourish for the long term. And tourists like me who want to fish and recreate in Patagonia would be willing to pay a price premium for this outcome.

Enter The Nature Conservancy, Patagonia, Inc. and Ovis XXI. Armed with scientific knowledge and market tools, this trilogy is working to conserve more than 15 million acres of land in Patagonia by 2016. Ovis XXI works directly with the woolgrowers. These consultants know the industry, and how to raise sheep without destroying grasslands. The Nature Conservancy brings its science-based knowledge and environmental credibility to help build the sustainable grazing standard through planning and subsequent monitoring of conservation outcomes. And Patagonia Inc. brings the market perspective—buying the wool, networking with others in the supply chain, creating the final products, and using its brand strength to help publicize Patagonian wool.

The majority of the land targeted by the Patagonian Grasslands Conservation Project is privately owned, and remains in large and undivided properties of intact native grasslands. Because most landowners face ongoing political and economic challenges that affect their ability to stay in business, an incentive is needed to gain commitment from landowners to manage resources sustainably. In this case, the carrot comes in the form of a payment to ranchers for grazing less sheep and or for using more modern and environmentally friendly grazing practices.

In November 2011, the first shipment of sustainable wool (29 tons) left Patagonia for Asia to be turned into socks for Patagonia, Inc. So far this scheme has worked to place two million acres under sustainable grazing agreements. Time will tell if the environmental protection purchased by conservationists from sheep ranchers will protect grasslands and associated waterways in the future, but signs look promising. Stay tuned...