Ethical issues in private and public ranch land management and ownership

Abstract

"Can you manage?" "Sure, I 'ii manage just fine. " "But your rake is in ruin, your bailer is broken and the part for your stacker is out of stock." "It's all right." "I know I'll manage." Well maybe he did, but chances are he was not able to do it while exercising good management. Getting by somehow, coping, is managing in some sense. But it is not what we are concerned with here. Instead, the present purpose is to investigate some of the principles and particulars of good management of private and public ranch land. More specifically, I shall begin to explore what might be called the ethics of ranch land management. Just what all falls under this heading can be understood more clearly by looking at the management process itself. The first task of managing private and public ranch lands is to identify and decide the relative merits of the goals we might pursue there. To do this we need two tests: one for deciding which goals are legitimate, worthwhile or justif'iable considered in and of themselves, and another for deciding which competing goals override others. Let me call these the tests of worthwhileness and relative merit. Having used these tests to identify the most important uses for our ranch lands we need to establish a way to monitor our progress toward those goals. Through this monitoring we should be able to minimize our opportunity costs, as the economists say. That is, by careful planning and by closely watching our activities we should be able to avoid practices that will limit the land's capacity to serve us in the pursui£ of our abiding goals. stating and defending these prioritizing and progress checking procedures are tasks in ethical theory. Foundational to any management activity are ways of telling what possible resource uses are worthwhile, which are most important, and when we are making efficient progress toward these goals. Ethical theory is concerned and able to pr ovide us with just such procedures.