As Farber put it, “in reality, both market and political mechanisms have flaws as expression of the public interest. Accordingly, eco-pragmatism seeks to create decision-making processes that take advantage of all relevant and useful knowledge while treating respectfully the diversity of perspectives that humans embrace to evaluate such knowledge.

Whereas bean counters and tree huggers seem to share “a belief that environmental policy can be based on a single overriding value, whether that value is economic or environmental,” 5 eco-pragmatism instead acknowledges the plurality of values, perspectives, and knowledges that might be brought to bear on contested social issues. In addition to his prescient diagnosis, Farber offered a practical, ecumenical framework as cure, one that eschews any attempt to find the one right way to analyze environmental law and policy matters. Reflecting on what has happened politically in the United States since his book was published, one can imagine Farber today allowing himself a vigorous scholarly attaboy. As a result, the two “ontesting ogmas” 4 work to prevent coherent, balanced environmental policy from emerging, leaving the United States instead with ad hoc compromises between extremes or, perhaps worse, wild polar swings as one side or another fleetingly occupies power.

3 Neither camp seems to admit to any legitimacy in the other’s position. In contrast, bean counters favor “willingness to pay,” on the assumption that law and policy should be governed by neoclassical economic analysis rather than inarticulate and potentially irrational public views. At the close of the last century, Daniel Farber articulated a powerful case in favor of what he called “eco-pragmatism.” 1 In Farber’s view, environmental protection is plagued by a stark and seemingly irreconcilable divide between “tree huggers” and “bean counters.” 2 The former camp believes that environmental law and policy should be determined by “willingness to vote,” on the assumption that the public tends to value environmental conservation and robust and equitable human health and safety protection.

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