Agriculture is a human activity that takes shape through interaction with nature and with the rest of the society in which it is practiced. An analysis of the social goals for any social subsystem, such as the agrifood system, depends on a comprehensive understanding of the natural and social systems in which human activities are practiced and reproduced. The principle of basic rights holds that a society should not go about securing the right to education for a few until it has secured more basic rights for all. Achieving environmentally safe agriculture, then, is accomplished as the collective result of every farmer acting morally, which in Aiken's view means acting in conformity with this principle of basic rights.