Free people and free markets are the engine of a cleaner, healthier, and safer environment.

We all appreciate America’s bountiful natural resources and environment. Few public policy issues are as seemingly complex as how we manage our natural resources and improve our environment. What big ideas can help us do it right?  

Big government environmental policies aren’t working

The federal government owns more than 657 million acres of American land, an area larger than France, Spain, Germany, Poland, Italy, the United Kingdom, Austria, and Switzerland combined. It can control the use of even more land through environmental laws, regulations, and guidance.

The current Administration has continued this heavy-handed legacy, with sweeping executive orders on environmental justice, climate, and land conservation.

​Liberty is the best environmental policy. The Heritage Foundation’s Index of Economic Freedom shows that nations with greater economic freedom have better environmental quality. There is also a positive correlation between economic freedom and the creation of wealth—as well as between wealth and human life span, one of the most important environmental measures. Economic freedom fuels technological innovation, which leads to more e­fficient ways of managing natural resources. 

To set us on the right track, leading voices in public policy have crafted the American Conservation Ethic—eight guiding principles based on reality, decades of experience, and the enduring values of a free people.

Eight Principles of the American Conservation Ethic

1. People are the most important, unique, and precious resource. To be a good environmental policy, a policy must be good for people.
2. Renewable natural resources are resilient and dynamic, responding positively to wise management. This means that we can both use resources and ensure that they are available for future generations.
3. Private property protections and free markets provide the most promising opportunities for environmental improvements. Ownership inspires stewardship. People take care of what they own.
4. E­fforts to reduce, control, and remediate pollution should achieve real environmental benefits. Science and technology allow us to assure that our actions improve the human condition measurably rather than wasting precious resources on bureaucracies and lawsuits.
5. As we accumulate scientific, technological, and artistic knowledge, we learn how to get more from less. In other words, the learning curve is green. While American agricultural production more than doubled over the last century, the total amount of cultivated land decreased by more than 50 million acres—an area larger than the state of Idaho now available as a wildlife habitat, for recreation, or other productive purposes.
6. Management of natural resources should be conducted on a site- and situation-specific basis. Environmental solutions should respect the rights of individuals and generally rely on decisions of states and communities—reflecting their unique needs, values, and priorities.
7. Science should be employed as one tool to guide public policy. Other factors beyond science—like human well-being, ethics, good judgment, and technical knowledge—must be taken into account when Congress writes new laws and regulatory agencies enforce them.
8. The most successful environmental policies flow from liberty. Free people, not centralized policies and mandates, come up with superior solutions to environmental problems.