From oasis to outlier: sugar beets, an endangered fish, and the moral economy

Abstract

AbstractFarmers in the arid high plains of Eastern Montana had long irrigated with water shunted into their fields by a dam on the Yellowstone River. Growing water‐hungry sugar beets processed at a factory in a nearby town, they created a verdant and prosperous oasis: a good life nested within a satisfyingly moral economy. However, in short order, the economic basis of this life was challenged: the dam was threatened with removal because of claims that it adversely affected an endangered fish; and the factory was threatened with closure because of claims that it was insufficiently profitable. As farmers and townsfolk confronted these challenges and the motives of those making them, they were compelled to probe the fundamental questions of what is ‘moral’ and what is ‘economy’. Confronting their uncertain future, they wondered whether their oasis was to become an outlier.