Abstract:
The article dealt with the moral and political problem of international food justice in which
the deep contradiction between the present situation of malnourishment and starvation
in large parts of the global population on the one hand and the biblical notion of the
preferential option for the poor on the other hand was described. This ecumenically widely
accepted notion was clarified in several aspects. How deeply this is rooted in the history
of Christian social thought was shown by Martin Luther’s writings on the economy which
have remained relatively unknown in the churches and in the scholarly world. The article
then presented three models of Christian economic ethic: the technical economic model, the
utopian economic model and the public theological economic model. On the basis of the
public theological model seven challenges for international food justice were presented.
The basis for these challenges is an understanding of globalisation which guarantees just
participation for everyone and deals with nature in an ecologically sustainable way. The
interests of small farmers are the basis for judging the activities of big agro-corporations.
Public theology is the background for an active involvement of the churches as agents of a
global civil society to promote international food justice.
