Principle 3

A New Agrarian tends to be conservative in philosophical and practical terms, if not necessarily politically.

Politically, many agrarian ideas would be radical, even revolutionary. Philosophically, however, a New Agrarian may be quite conservative, preferring the practical over the fantastic and the simple over the unnecessarily complex.
Forget, for a moment, the usual political meanings of "conservative" and "liberal." Philosophically speaking, I think that a liberal is essentially optimistic about human nature while a conservative is essentially pessimistic. A liberal, in other words, believes that people are basically good; a conservative believes they are basically rotten, or at least highly corruptible. (What a liberal or conservative might choose to do about those beliefs is anyone's guess; a conservative, for example, might believe that people are rotten and must be kept under control—or that people are rotten and therefore not fit to be put in charge of anyone else.)
A New Agrarian need not go so far in condemning human nature—optimists are more than welcome—but no pie-in-the-sky let's-all-live-in-harmony crap (see principle 1) will be tolerated. An agrarian philosophy must begin with a realistic acceptance of human nature and of nature itself, and learn how to work within the world we inhabit.

Practical conservatism is easier to define. Although change is certainly not to be feared—a New Agrarian is not hidebound—it is also not to be valued merely for its own sake. When a problem has multiple solutions, the agrarian employs a workaday version of Occam's Razor and chooses the simplest. The tool to use for a particular job is the best one for that job, and a new tool should be demonstrably better than the one it replaces, not merely newer. If a new tool or method or idea is demonstrably superior to the old one, however, it should be readily adopted. What is right for the New Agrarian is what works, so long as it is consistent with his or her values.

>> 4. virtues