Homo agricola considered as homo economicus and homo politicus

Open Access

Abstract

The paper is of descriptive character and is based on literature review. It reviews the concept of homo economicus and homo politicus in the history of economic thought and tries to discover their characteristics in homo agricola. As demonstrated, one component of homo agricola can be of economic and another one of political nature. Those components can be separated or can be together. Agricultural economists, however, in their sophisticated mathematical models seem to reduce farmers' behaviour to economic behaviour or rather to self-interested homo economicus. Institutional economics, social economics and socio-economics are closer to actual human nature, than homo economicus. The further research challenge before agricultural academia is to develop the model that will be able to fully explain the questions involving all human behaviour of homo agricola, that is farmer or rural man with set of different objectives.