John Ikerd's Common Sense

—Maura McDermott

John Ikerd (left) has had a long association with the Kerr Center, and served as a trustee for the last three years. In December Kerr Center president Jim Horne presented him with a plaque for his service. Another outgoing trustee, Dan Nagengast, was also honored.

On paper, John Ikerd is a highly successful man: he has a BA, a MA, and a PhD in Agricultural Economics; he worked for Wilson Foods in two cities; he was a professor at several universities, including Oklahoma State and the University of Georgia; and finally, was named Professor Emeritus of Agricultural Economics at the University of Missouri.

But he would tell you that for many years now he has not measured his success by titles conferred or grants received. Ikerd is a man with a mission: to talk to people about a new vision for society, a vision based on what he
calls “common sense.”

Ikerd’s common sense is not conventional wisdom, not something learned, but, as he puts it, “something we know—instinctively, intuitively—an innate sense of truth and fallacy, right and wrong, good and bad, that comes to somewhere within us, from somewhere beyond us.” It is something we all share in common.

This kind of common sense compels us, he says, to care for others and to care about nature. Applying this common sense to agriculture, the natural environment, and society, will help bring about a better world.

These days Ikerd’s sense of accomplishment is tied to how well he can convey to others his positive vision for the future. He is spending much of his retirement speaking to people across the country that he believes are becoming more and more receptive to his message.

He also has been writing. He has 129 short papers on his website. Each paper sets forth its argument with clarity and conviction. They are easy to read and infectious in their optimism. Subjects run the gamut from the philosophical to the practical.

He also has completed two books. One of these, Sustainable Capitalism: A Matter of Common Sense, is forthcoming in August from Kumarian Press (see sidebar).

His other book, his magnus opus, The Case for Common Sense: The New Economic, Ecological and Social Revolution, is online at his website.

In The Case for Common Sense, Ikerd tells the story of his own transformation—from a conservative, bottom-line,
free market economist to an advocate for an “economics of sustainability.”

He weaves together the personal and the professional, revealing how his addiction to work and control, and lack of balance and harmony in his life, contributed to the destruction of his health and marriage.

He makes the case that his personal experience is emblematic of the narrow “industrial mindset” pervasive in American society (and in conventional agriculture) that he says “values money and efficiency above personal relationships and the natural environment.”

Ikerd’s social conscience began to awaken when he was head of Extension Agricultural Economics at the University of Georgia in the mid to late 1980s. “We were not developing ag programs that would do the most for the public good,” he recalls.

He came to this realization as he worked all day long, face to face with farm families, helping them with budgets.

“It hit me that what we had been teaching wasn’t working and wasn’t going to work for many farmers,” he asserts.

Focusing on the short term, he says, and a narrow bottom line forced farms to get bigger and bigger. The result: “We had to face a large number of farmers going out of business.”

“This was not what I had set out to do,” he says. “My priority was to help people succeed. Furthermore, we were not helping farmers develop a land stewardship ethic, protect water quality or maintain rural communities.
“We were making agriculture more efficient, but we weren’t helping people.”

Ikerd began to be interested in an agriculture that “would enhance the overall quality of life of people.” This led him directly to the sustainable agriculture movement.

He returned to the University of Missouri, where he had been educated, to work with the Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education (SARE) program and to coordinate the university’s sustainable agriculture Extension programs.

From this experience he came to believe that Extension programs need to “embrace a greater diversity of thought,” than they have in the past.

He says Extension should return to its roots as a people organization with a focus on families and talk about “a legitimate land ethic,” whereby ecological concerns are integrated with economics.

What does he see down the road? He sees a new “vertical coalition” forming—between family/sustainable farms, independent food processors and retailers, consumers, and those concerned about health and nutrition.

He counsels those impatient for change to remember that change happens one person at a time. As he discovered, “change has to come first in a person’s mind— a person has to say, ‘I want to do something different and give it my best.’ ”

Success, he says, will then depend upon “an individual’s creativity and imagination.”

By that common sense measure, John Ikerd can truly be considered a success.

John Ikerd’s online papers can be read at: www.ssu.missouri.edu/faculty/jikerd/

Back to top