I don’t usually get my agriculture news from The New Yorker, but their recent profile on King Charles is moving the dial. While I usually thumb through TNY for the fun of seeing what’s up with the arts, theatre, fashion and food in Manhattan, their writers have recently figured out that cities can’t exist without the products of the countryside. Almost every issue these days carries a review of a film or book on rural life. The March 6 issue took a shallow dive into the subject of phosphorous, an important fertilizer ingredient, and how the surplus of phosphorous from fertilizers and manure is poisoning everyone’s water.
“Lake Erie’s troubles can be traced to concentrated animal feeding operations, or CAFOs,” Elizabeth Kolbert writes in probably the first example of that word — CAFO — ever seen in a New York publication, “Millions of cows and pigs in these CAFOs spend their days converting phosphorous-fertilized soy and corn into phosphorous-laden manure …” Probably a city girl, Kolbert doesn’t go farther into the question of why these animals are getting heavy-grain diets instead of the diversity of pasture, but never mind. King Charles may move her to the next level.
The May 8 article paints the new king as quite the ruralist, with interests in “the active state of balance which is just as vital to the health of the natural world as it is for human society.” His book, Harmony, attempts to reject corporate intrusions into nature. A quote: “Real wealth is good land, pristine forests, clean rivers, healthy animals, nourishing food and human creativity … but the money managers have turned land, forests, rivers, animals and human creativity into commodities to be bought and sold.”
Bravo to the king for moving into this difficult area. It seems the fellow knows what’s right, but will his passion turn into policy? His kingly power can’t take lawmaking out of the hands of industry. There’s a whole other British government to do that, and a national identity as plunderer.
But Charles has substantial power as a commentator. It’s exciting that a leader with this power has taken the stage.
About a year ago, a Progressive-Populist reader sent me a fascinating book, The Finance Curse by Nicholas Shaxson. It’s a beautifully written book, serving up history and contemporary life in thoughtful, tasty bundles, but it’s pretty dense and, in fact, I’ve been reading it a second time to get it settled in my head. And Shaxson—a native of Malawi—takes on the national identity.
Long story short: The recent money manager trends have moved society away from production of goods and into investment. Results: The news leads off with the Dow-Jones Average. Kids choose business and law as college majors rather than the liberal arts. The City of London led the charge with its ability to disguise dirty dealings as gentlemanly pursuits.
Today, we all are in touch with interest rates and stock share prices, but we have lost touch with real values. That course has led us to dismantle decades of good public benefit including ordinary infrastructure. Our new systems are based on hoarding capital and avoidance of using capital for social good. Tax avoidance is fashionable, supported by banks and the legal system. Our infrastructure has been destroyed while the clever lawyers and accountants advise the rich on how to avoid responsibility.
As Shaxson writes, “Back in the 1960s and early 1970s, bankers didn’t earn that much more than teachers or doctors … by 1990, the average financial sector worker earned three times as much as the average American … top players earn hundreds of times more.” With pressures on students to pay back loans and earn as much as possible, there’s been a brain drain out of literally all other sectors of the economy.
The City of London, once the hub of resource-extraction from America, Asia and Africa, is now a hub of banking and of the tax-avoidance industry that is making the corporate world rich, and the natural world, and sustainable farms and homesteads, poor.
Enter King Charles and his absolutely practical statements, which now come off as lofty and out-of-touch. He gains power at a time when we must learn to dial back our destruction of air, water and land. At the risk of being disregarded, he speaks out for sustainability and local production for local markets.
And from that scary place, he treads farther. In Harmony, he dares to state, “perhaps the time has come … to think very carefully how large our families should be . . .”
In 2015, Pope Francis ventured into this family-planning area, suggesting that Catholics don’t have to breed like rabbits. His words were widely quoted, then mostly forgotten. With another voice in the choir of leadership, we may begin to think more deeply about family size. With a pope and a king on our side, the planet may have a chance at last.
Margot Ford McMillen farms near Fulton, Mo., and co-hosts “Farm and Fiddle” on sustainable ag issues on KOPN 89.5 FM in Columbia, Mo. Her latest book is “The Golden Lane: How Missouri Women Gained the Vote and Changed History.” Email: margotmcmillen@ gmail.com.
From The Progressive Populist, June 15, 2023
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