Making Common Cause With the Upchuck Rebellion.

Ralph Waldo Emerson said that, "Common sense is genius with its work clothes on." There's no question that genius abounds within ASA, CSSA, and SSSA's vibrant and essential community of agricultural scientists, but the question for America's larger community is: Genius for what end? For too long, the answer from the agricultural establishment has been very narrowly focused: Productivity, efficiency, profit. This focus has produced a food economy that is heavily industrialized, conglomeratized, monopolized, chemicalized, globalized, and subsidized. It has also produced an "upchuck rebellion" in the larger society, led by consumers, small farmers, chefs, artisans, entrepreneurs, environmentalists, nutritionists, community organizers – and, very significantly, a feisty contingent of soil, crop, and environmental scientists.

These millions form a loosely knit "good food" movement that wants scientific genius applied to much broader goals, including sustainability, flavor, diversity, deconcentration, conservation, and economic democracy. Corporate agribusiness and its governmental protectors claim that ag scientists should view this spreading movement as troublesome meddlers, if not outright enemies. In fact, though, these innovative, enterprising, and politically active people are your future. They are creating something big – a historic shift in the food economy that serves the common good and gives a new, socially-important sense of mission to your work. They need you, and you need them.