The fields of environmental ethics and of religion and ecology have been shaped by Lynn White Jr.'s thesis that the roots of ecological crisis lie in religious cosmology. Independent critical movements in both fields, however, now question this methodological legacy and argue for alternative ways of inquiry. For religious ethics, the twin controversies cast doubt on prevailing ways of connecting environmental problems to religious deliberations because the criticisms raise questions about what counts as an environmental problem, how religious traditions change, (...) and whether ethicists should approach problems and traditions with reformist commitments. This article examines the critiques of White's legacy and presents a pluralist alternative that focuses religious ethics on the contextual strategies produced by moral communities as they confront environmental problems. (shrink)

Environmental ethics is the discipline in philosophy that studies the moral relationship of human beings to, and also the value and moral status of, the environment and its nonhuman contents. This entry covers: (1) the challenge of environmental ethics to the anthropocentrism (i.e., humancenteredness) embedded in traditional western ethical thinking; (2) the early development of the discipline in the 1960s and 1970s; (3) the connection of deep ecology, feminist environmental ethics, and social ecology to politics; (4) the attempt to apply (...) traditional ethical theories, including consequentialism, deontology, and virtue ethics, to support contemporary environmental concerns; and (5) the focus of environmental literature on wilderness, and possible future developments of the discipline. (shrink)

This paper suggests that lessons from the field of environmental ethics and sociological perspectives on knowledge are important tools for rethinking what type of ethical analysis is needed for building up further the field of development ethics and, more generally, for addressing some of the most fundamental ethical problems related to global poverty and development. The paper argues for a methodologically pragmatist approach to development ethics that focuses on the interplay between facts, values, concepts and practices. It views development ethics (...) as a hybrid between a public moral?political philosophy and a public conception of social science. Ethical analyses of poverty and development must lead to fundamental changes in the ways knowledge is produced and justified and must challenge the dominance of global institutions and orthodox economics as the single sources of expert knowledge for development. Two of the main tasks of ethical analysis is to provide tools for the formulation of alternative knowledge for development centred on the equal moral worth of all human beings, and to influence global policy making as well as multilateral institutions' goals and policies. The last section of the paper argues that Amartya Sen's version of the Capability Approach is already methodologically pragmatist and points to some convergence between Sen's work and John Dewey's. Further sociological and methodologically pragmatist analysis of the approach is needed to assess the ways in which it is influencing debates on human development and leading to policy changes, and the possible distortions it suffers when adopted by multilateral agencies and policy makers. An earlier version of this paper was presented at the international conference on Ethics and Development at Michigan State University, East Landing (USA) 8?15 April 2005. The section on methodological pragmatism draws from an unpublished paper written with Andrew Light called ?A Pragmatist Methodology for Development Ethics,? presented at the American Philosophical Association (APA) meeting in New York, December 1999. I have updated, transformed and used some parts and insights developed with Light in a way he may not recognize. (shrink)

This paper re-introduces the georgic ethic and the role it has historically played in debates about new agricultural practices. Public engagement, participatory research, and greater local involvement in crafting new means to work the land flood the literature of agrarian studies. Putting the experience- and place-based georgic into that discourse can help deepen its character and future possibilities. The paper draws from recent sociological research into the acceptance and resistance to new practices to show the georgic’s explanatory, descriptive utility in (...) studies of those controversies. It also highlights how agricultural and environmental ethicists can draw from the georgic tradition for its prescriptive and normative possibilities to put practitioners back into the agricultural policy process and to draw more firmly from the notion that knowledge of the environment is constituted in practices of living in it. Placing the language and terms of the georgic ethic more centrally into public conversations about agricultural ethics and policy can enrich those conversations by structuring them with attention to experience, place-based values, and the moral space of interaction between humans and the land. (shrink)

Like much of his work, Albert Borgmann’s Real American Ethics defies easy categorization. Neither analytic nor Continental in style, it bridges these traditions while remaining firmly connected to the issues and concerns facing real people in contemporary life. In particular, the book is of deep relevance to the development of an ethics that attends to the material conditions of human existence. In its attention to the physical, social, and technological dimensions of moral life, the book emphasizes issues of central importance (...) to environmental ethics. Professor Borgmann integrates philosophy, culture, and everyday life into his work in an original spirit that counters much of the contemporary philosophical orthodoxy. Borgmann exchanges the abstractness typical of mainstream Anglo-American philosophy for a theoretically-informed but practically-grounded philosophy that takes seriously both popular culture and the mundane aspects of everyday life. In doing so, Borgmann invites us to a philosophy that is engaged rather than detached, and more synthetic than analytic. Real American Ethics exemplifies this practical and engaged approach to philosophy in its clarity of style, breadth of sources, and use of specific, real world examples, many of which are grounded in Borgmann’s own experience. The book interweaves philosophical theory with vignettes recalling Saturdays at the Missoula, Montana farmer’s market, observations on architecture, design, and ways of life, and reflections on the distractions faced by writers in the internet age. These features give the book a refreshing and down-to-earth quality. Rather than attempt to construct an impenetrable fortress of argument, Borgmann lays out for his readers a framework for thinking about ethics in the 21st century United States. While critical, he is also constructive, and he refrains from the temptation to rant and to polarize, instead appealing to a set of ideals that he believes will resonate with most, if not all, Americans. As signalled by the title, Borgmann opens his book by arguing that ethics must be made real, and that neither theoretical nor practical ethics has achieved this task. In the theoretical ethics of Kant, Mill, and Rawls, we find frameworks for approaching moral decisions and moral life. But theoretical. (shrink)