Agrarian Vision, Industrial Vision, and Rent-Seeking: A Viewpoint
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Agrarian Vision, Industrial Vision, and Rent‑Seeking: A Viewpoint Johanna Jauernig1 · Ingo Pies2 · Paul B. Thompson3 · Vladislav Valentinov1 Accepted: 21 July 2020 © The Author(s) 2020
Abstract Many public debates about the societal significance and impact of agriculture are usefully framed by Paul Thompson’s distinction between the “agrarian” and the “industrial vision.” The key argument of the present paper is that the ongoing debate between these visions goes beyond academic philosophy and has direct effects on the political economy of agriculture by influencing the scope of rent-seeking activities that are undertaken primarily in the name of the agrarian vision. The existence of rent-seeking activities is shown to reflect the fact that the agrarian vision is not universally supported, which is certainly true of the industrial vision as well. The key argument of the present paper is that these two philosophical visions of agriculture are not radically incongruent. Rather, they share a common ground within which they are even mutually supportive. If agricultural policy making is oriented toward this common ground, it may reduce overall dissatisfaction with the resulting institutional regime of agricultural production. Such an agricultural policy may also stimulate the emergence of new business practices that not only enable efficient agricultural production but also minimize negative ecological impact and preserve cultural landscapes. Keywords Agrarian vision · CSR · Rent-seeking · Business ethics
* Johanna Jauernig [email protected] 1
Leibniz Institute of Agricultural Development in Transition Economies (IAMO), Halle (Saale), Germany
2
Martin-Luther-University Halle-Wittenberg, Halle (Saale), Germany
3
Departments of Philosophy, Community Sustainability and Agricultural, Food and Resource Economics, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI, USA
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Introduction In a seminal book that was widely discussed on the pages of this journal, Thompson (2010) introduced a distinction between the “industrial” and “agrarian visions” of the societal significance of agriculture (cf. Graffy 2012). These visions are interpretive frameworks that situate or structure expectations for the institutions, practices, and performance of a food system. The industrial vision (Thompson 2010, pp. 31–36) takes agriculture to be just another industry branch with no special position in society and therefore subject to the same market rules as the rest of the economy. In the industrial vision, farmers make economic decisions guided by the goals of efficiency and competitive survival. To achieve these goals, farmers may pursue a variety of strategies such as specialization and large-scale industrialized production. However, the industrial vision is likewise compatible with other strategies, such as maintaining high standards of animal welfare and limiting the use of chemicals, biotechnology, and antibiotics if consumers are willing to pay the premium needed to cover the increased costs.
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