Ethics in the Organic Movement - Re-Thinking Organic Food and Farming in a Changing World - page 11

Chapter 2
Ethics in the Organic Movement
Bernhard Freyer, Jim Bingen, and Milena Klimek
In the last two decades, several publications have addressed the ethical foundations
of the organic movement. 1 Papers on the ethics in, and of the organic movement
have been especially sensitive to human-nature interrelationships, and the equality
of all living things. Many of these discussions of ethics are integrated into, or arise in
the latest IFOAM Principles. 2 Other publications review the historical development
of organic agriculture (e.g., Conford 1995 ; Vogt 2000 ; Heckman 2006 ; Lockeretz
2007 ).
Our aim in this chapter is to offer a review that lays the groundwork for the
ethical discussions and development of ethics in the organic movement that are
illustrated in the contributions to this volume. We begin with the development and
introduction of the most recent version of the IFOAM Principles (IFOAM 2009 ).
Then we discuss the relationship between ethical concepts and their significance
in the IFOAM Principles. A comprehensive historical overview of the ethical roots