Mediterranean agriculture is by and large envisaged as a landscape of small farms of high nature value producing worldwide recognisable quality food products that make up the basis of the famous Mediterranean diet and shape Southern European cultures. However, the dynamics developing in the Mediterranean countryside are further complex and diverse; comprising differentiated agricultural systems which have been scarcely analysed in an integrated fashion. This volume illustrates and deepens the understanding of current agrarian dynamics developing in Mediterranean countries in the light of recent theoretical contributions. The book compiles and analyses a set of Mediterranean case studies that show the range of transformations shaping contemporary agriculture in Southern Europe, which allow considering the usefulness of recent theoretical frameworks in explaining the array of dynamics underway; contributing to the refinement of contemporary conceptualizations.

Community involvement is now at the centre of the UK government's social inclusion, neighbourhood renewal and health development programmes, resulting in many challenges for managers involved in such work. The bestselling first edition of this book discussed the meaning, principles and application of managing community practice, focusing on the role and skills needed by managers. This will be required if ambitious regeneration and social inclusion programmes are to work in partnership with the active involvement of communities and exploring a wide range of examples from practice. Since the first edition, there has been a perceptible increase in the structured involvement of communities in developing, delivering and evaluating public policies and projects. In this new edition all chapters have been fully updated in the light of recent developments and new case examples have been included to illustrate such changes. A new chapter on The Managers Role in Community Research has been added and a new concluding chapter explores key challenges which need to be addressed. This book is an essential resource for operational and strategic managers in local government, housing, health and other service delivery agencies, social inclusion and community regeneration projects. It will be essential reading for tutors and students on a wide range of undergraduate and Masters courses.

Development schemes are common throughout the third world. Many fail, but the reasons for failure or success are only too often not adequately studied. In this monograph two schemes started in Basutoland - now Lesotho - are intensively analysed and compared: the first, which was abandoned in 1961, primarily by means of documentary material; the second, which was and still is successful in at least part of the area, mainly through observation and field research. The analysis reveals the factors making for success or failure, particularly in the fields of politics, economics, and communication. The relevance of the study extends beyond Lesotho and even Africa, the analysis dealing with problems common to introduced social change and development in any part of the world.

In Minding Spirituality, Randall Sorenson, a clinical psychoanalyst, "invites us to take an interest in our patients' spirituality that is respectful but not diffident, curious but not reductionistic, welcoming but not indoctrinating." Out of this invitation emerges a fascinating and broadening investigation of how contemporary psychoanalysis can "mind" spirituality in the threefold sense of being bothered by it, of attending to it, and of cultivating it. Both the questions Sorenson asks, and the answers he begins to formulate, reflect progressive changes in the psychoanalytic understanding of spirituality. Sorenson begins by quantitatively analyzing 75 years of journal literature and documenting how psychoanalytic approaches to religious and spiritual experiences have evolved far beyond the "wholesale pathologizing of religion" prevalent during Freud's lifetime. Then, in successive chapters, he explores and illustrates the kind of clinical technique appropriate to the modern treatment of religious issues. And the issue of technique is consequential in more than one way -- Sorenson presents evidence that how analysts work clinically has a greater impact on their patients' spirituality than the patients' own parents have. Sorenson brings an array of disciplinary perspectives to bear in examining the multiple relationships among psychoanalysis, religion, and spirituality. Empirical analysis, psychoanalytic history, sociology of religion, comparative theory, and sustained clinical interpretation all enter into his effort to open a dialogue that is clinically relevant. Turning traditional critiques of psychoanalytic training on their head, he argues that psychoanalytic education has much to learn from models of contemporary theological education. Beautifully crafted and engagingly written, Minding Spirituality not only invites interdisciplinary dialogue but, via Sorenson's wide-ranging and passionately open-minded scholarship, exemplifies it.

This book bridges a major gap in knowledge by considering, through a range of reflexive chapters from different disciplinary backgrounds, both theoretical and practical issues relating to community research methodologies. The international contributors consider a number of key epistemological, ontological and methodological questions. They explore what community peer research means in a range of settings, for a range of people, for the quality of data and subsequent findings, and for the production of rigorous social research. The collection will also stimulate thinking about how methodological advancement can be made in the field. It is the first book of its kind to combine practical and methodological reflections with clearly presented recommendations about how the approach can be used. Presenting the latest thinking in the field and providing summaries, case studies and review questions, 'Community research for participation' will be invaluable to students, researchers, academics and practitioners who aim to place community members at the centre of their research.

Gay men often face struggles in the conservative world of rural life, due to the pervasive social stigmas associated with homosexuality and the lack of anonymity in a small-town setting. In this book, Preston and D'Augelli present the results of in-depth interviews and surveys with rural gay men, providing unique and hitherto unknown perspectives on their experiences coping with intolerance. With sensitivity and humor, the authors narrate their attempts at accessing this hidden population in bars, campgrounds, social clubs, and political groups. This volume is a must-read for researchers, academics, and graduate and post-graduate students in health care, nursing, health policy, and social and psychological science.

Democratic rural organizations can play an important role in helping their members, who are frequently poor farmers living in the margins of the economy, to escape their disadvantaged starting point and to gain access to financial services, political influence and profitable markets for their product. Democratic Rural Organizations: Thresholds for Evolution in Africa and Asia traces the evolution of democratic rural organizations from small groups to larger, NGO financed, multi-tier democratic rural organizations in recent years. Rural citizens have historically formed democratic organizations by their own initiative, to enhance economic and social wellbeing, but in recent years rural mobilization processes are frequently initiated and supported by national Civil Society Organizations (CSOs), who are financed and guided by international NGOs, a process which has had mixed results. Using rich empirical material from Uganda, India, Bangladesh and Cambodia, Democratic Rural Organizations: Thresholds for Evolution in Africa and Asia identifies eight thresholds which represent practical stages in the development pathway of democratic rural organizations and influence success or failure. Both development practitioners and researchers of development and rural policy will find this book a useful guide to the deployment of democratic organization as a strategy for economic and political empowerment.

Community development emerged as a recognisable occupational activity in the United Kingdom in the 1950s. Since then, whilst struggling to remain true to its basic values it has often been manipulated to serve differing policy and political purposes. This unique Reader traces its changing fortunes through a selection of readings from key writers. It will be invaluable to those pursuing community development careers, for activists, and for all those teaching, training and practising community development.

This book debates the emergent proprieties of rural and peri-urban South Africa since land and agrarian reforms were initiated after the transition to democracy in 1994. It explores how these reforms have broadened options for the use of land and natural resources. Reform-minded policies in South Africa have assumed that if access to land and other natural resources is less problematic, the use of these resources would be intensified which in turn would alter the structure and dynamic of rural and urban poverty. Reforming Land and Resource Use in South Africa examines in detail, and from several disciplinary perspectives, whether and how this has occurred, and if not, why not. A key argument that this collection pursues is whether land reform has resulted in transformed use of natural (i.e. land, crops, cattle, rangeland, wild products etc.) and other strategic resources (labour, knowledge, institutions, networks etc.), and the value communities and household place on them. The contributions explore a combination of new or alternative meanings of land, including a look beyond crops and cattle per se to include the collection and selling of wild products, as well as a discussion of how land for agriculture has become redefined by land reform beneficiaries as urban land, for settlement and urban employment opportunities, in addition to urban-based agricultural activities. Unlike most analyses and commentaries on land reform, this book pursues an analysis of land reform dynamics at various levels of aggregation. National and regional level analyses of poverty and the ramifications of the property clause are combined with analyses at disaggregate levels such as the land reform project or village. The book will be of interest to both researchers and policy makers with an interest in rural development and social change.

AIDS epidemics continue to threaten the livelihoods of millions of people in sub-Saharan Africa. Three decades after the disease was first recognized, the annual death toll from AIDS exceeds that from wars, famine and floods combined. Yet despite millions of dollars of aid and research, there has previously been little detailed on-the-ground analysis of the multifaceted impacts on rural people. Filling that gap, this book brings together recent evidence of AIDS impacts on rural households, livelihoods, and agricultural practice in sub-Saharan Africa. There is particular emphasis on the role of women in affected households, and on the situation of children. The book is unique in presenting micro-level information collected by original empirical research in a range of African countries, and showing how well-grounded conclusions on trends, impacts and local responses can be applied to the design of HIV-responsive policies and programmes. AIDS impacts are more diverse than we previously thought, and local responses more varied - sometimes innovative, sometimes desperate. The book represents a major contribution to our understanding of the impacts of AIDS in the epidemic's heartland, and how these can be managed at different levels.

The metropolis has been the near exclusive focus of queer scholars and queer cultures in America. Asking us to look beyond the cities on the coasts, Scott Herring draws a new map, tracking how rural queers have responded to this myopic mindset. Interweaving a wide range of disciplines--art, media, literature, performance, and fashion studies--he develops an extended critique of how metronormativity saturates LGBTQ politics, artwork, and criticism. To counter this ideal, he offers a vibrant theory of queer anti-urbanism that refuses to dismiss the rural as a cultural backwater.

Impassioned and provocative, Another Country expands the possibilities of queer studies beyond its city limits. Herring leads his readers from faeries in the rural Midwest to photographs of white supremacists in the deep South, from Roland Barthes's obsession with Parisian fashion to a graphic memoir by Alison Bechdel set in the Appalachian Mountains, and from cubist paintings in Lancaster County to lesbian separatist communes on the northern California coast. The result is an entirely original account of how queer studies can--and should--get to another country.

White Folks explores the experiences and stories of eight white people from a small farming community in northern Wisconsin. It examines how white people learn to be 'white' and reveals how white racial identity is dependent on people of color-even in situations where white people have little or no contact with racial others. Drawing on in-depth interviews with Delores, Frank, William, Erin, Robert, Libby, and Stan, as well as on his own experiences growing up in this same rural community, Lensmire creates a portrait of white people that highlights how their relations to people of color and their cultures are seldom simple and are characterized not just by fear and rejection, but also by attraction, envy, and desire. White Folks helps readers recognize the profound ambivalence that has characterized white thinking and feeling in relation to people of color for at least the last two hundred years. There is nothing smooth about the souls of white folks. Current antiracist work is often grounded in a white privilege framework that has proven ineffective - in part because it reduces white people to little more than the embodiment of privilege. Lensmire provides an alternative that confronts the violence at the core of white racial selves that has become increasingly visible in American society and politics, but that also illuminates conflicts and complexities there.

This edited book contains salient papers presented at the XII World Congress of Rural Sociology held in South Korea in 2008. These papers have been selected for their quality and have undergone a peer review process. The rationale behind this book rests on the desire to share the wealth of research presented at the World Congress with interested individuals who could not attend the event and it reflects the empirical work and thinking characterizing contemporary rural sociology. As this sociological sub-discipline evolves along with society and the rural world, it appears of paramount importance to make available ground-breaking research to the international scientific community. Rural sociology is changing and this volume testifies of this change by documenting the introduction of new themes of research as well as the evolution of established ones. In this regard, it provides a unique and uniquely international view of the most recent advanced production in rural sociology. The volume consists of eighteen chapters representing original pieces of research and an introduction that frames them in the context of the evolution of the discipline.

Research on welfare has tended to focus on the national scale with relatively little attention given to the differential impacts of welfare restructuring in rural places and the difficulties faced by disadvantaged groups with limited provision of welfare services in many rural areas. This book seeks to significantly extend previous research work on the rural impacts of national welfare reform and position it in a broader context. "International Perspectives on Rural Welfare" provides a critical, comprehensive and comparative account of the rural dimensions of welfare in a number of developed countries. The book brings together recent research from Europe, North America, Australia and New Zealand to provide the seminal international book on rural welfare. As well as being international in its outlook, it provides an inter-disciplinary focus on rural welfare by including contributors from sociology, human geography, social policy and social anthropology. The definition of welfare used within the book is broad, encompassing overarching welfare and workfare agendas, as well as more specific welfare policy areas such as anti-poverty, health, housing, social security, social work and education.

It is now almost impossible to conceive of life in western Europe, either in the towns or the countryside, without a reliable mains electricity supply. By 1938, two-thirds of rural dwellings had been connected to a centrally generated supply, but the majority of farms in Britain were not linked to the mains until sometime between 1950 and 1970. Given the significance of electricity for modern life, the difficulties of supplying it to isolated communities, and the parallels with current discussions over the provision of high-speed broadband connections, it is surprising that until now there has been little academic discussion of this vast and protracted undertaking. This book fills that gap. It is divided into three parts. The first, on the progress of electrification, explores the timing and extent of electrification in rural England, Wales and Scotland; the second examines the effects of electrification on rural life and the rural landscape; and the third makes comparisons over space and time, looking at electrification in Canada and Sweden and comparing electrification with the current problems of rural broadband.

Vu tells the story of Vietnamese farmers who have survived a 30-year war of independence and unification, its damaging legacies in their living environment, and the unfamiliar pressure of the market economy. Vietnamese famers are neither simply obedient beneficiaries of policy decisions made by higher authorities nor convention-ridden cyphers. Rather, they are sophisticated decision-makers capable of navigating the changes threatening to disrupt their lives over multiple generations. Vu's research pays particular attention to those farmers whose families have suffered from direct and indirect exposure to the toxic herbicides popularly known as Agent Orange. She demonstrates that their priority has tended to be the protection of their existing assets, rather than pursuing the promise of new riches, and that this tendency has helped them maintain stability in a turbulent economic environment. A fascinating study for scholars of Vietnamese anthropology and society, the book will also be of interest to sociologists and economists with a broader interest in the impact of economic and political change on rural lifestyles.

Seeking to challenge negative perceptions within Japanese media and politics on the future of the countryside, the contributors to this book present a counterargument to the inevitable demise of rural society. Contrary to the dominant argument, which holds outmigration and demographic hyper-aging as primarily responsible for rural decline, this book highlights the spatial dimension of power differences behind uneven development in contemporary Japan. Including many fi eldwork-based case studies, the chapters discuss topics such as corporate farming, local energy systems and public healthcare, examining the constraints and possibilities of rural self-determination under the centripetal impact of forces located both in and outside of the country. Focusing on asymmetries of power to explore regional autonomy and heteronomy, it also examines "peripheralization" and the "global countryside," two recent theoretical contributions to the fi eld, as a common framework. Japan's New Ruralities addresses the complexity of rural decline in the context of debates on globalization and power differences. As such, it will be of interest to students and scholars of sociology, anthropology, human geography and politics, as well as Japanese Studies.

Rural policy has presented some of the most difficult and unexpected challenges to the New Labour government. From the Foot and Mouth crisis to the rise of the Countryside Alliance, from farm protests to concerns about rural crime, rural issues have frequently seized headlines and formed the basis of organized opposition to the government. Yet, the same government, elected with a record number of rural MPs, has also proactively sought to reform rural policy. This book critically reviews and analyses the development and implementation of New Labour's rural policies since 1997. It explores the factors shaping the evolution and form of New Labour's rural agenda, and assesses the impact of specific policies. Contributions examine discursive restructuring of the rural policy agenda, the institutional reforms and effects of devolution, the key political debates and challenges around hunting, agricultural reform, Foot and Mouth, housing development and the 'right to roam', and review policy developments with respect to crime, social exclusion and employment in the countryside, rural community governance and national parks. "New Labour's Countryside" will be of interest to students of contemporary British politics and of rural studies, and to anyone involved in the government and politics of the countryside.

In Downeast, Gigi Georges follows five girls as they come of age in one of the most challenging and geographically isolated regions on the Eastern seaboard. Their stories reveal surprising truths about rural America and offer hope for its future. "It's almost impossible not to care about these fierce young women and cheer for their hard-won successes" (Kirkus) in this "heartfelt portrait" and "worthy tribute" (Publishers Weekly). Nestled in Maine's far northeast corner, Washington County sits an hour's drive from the heart of famed and bustling Acadia National Park. Yet it's a world away. For Willow, Vivian, Mckenna, Audrey, and Josie-five teenage girls caught between tradition and transformation in this remote region-it is home. Downeast follows their journeys of heartbreak and hope in uncertain times, creating a nuanced and unique portrait of rural America with women at its center. Willow lives in the shadow of an abusive, drug-addicted father and searches for stability through photography and love. Vivian, a gifted writer, feels stifled by her church and town, and struggles to break free without severing family ties. Mckenna is a softball pitching phenom whose passion is the lobster-fishing she learned at her father's knee. Audrey is a beloved high school basketball star who earns a coveted college scholarship but questions her chosen path. Josie, a Yale-bound valedictorian, is determined to take the world by storm. All five girls know the pain and joy of life in a region whose rugged beauty and stoicism mask dwindling populations, vanishing job opportunities, and pervasive opioid addiction. As the girls reach adulthood, they discover that despite significant challenges, there is much to celebrate in "the valley of the overlooked." Their stories remind us of the value of timeless ideals: strength of family and community, reverence for nature's rule, dignity in cracked hands and muddied shoes, and the enduring power of home. Revealed through the eyes of Willow, Vivian, Mckenna, Audrey, and Josie, Downeast is based on four years of intimate reporting. The result is a beautifully rendered, emotionally startling, and vital book. Downeast will break readers' hearts yet offer them hope, providing answers to what the future may hold for rural America.

This volume looks at the construction of gendered citizenship in different rural contexts. These contexts represent different welfare state and gender regimes, and different rural/agricultural conditions as characterized in different countryside types. This is a study of gender, citizenship and gender regimes, in a rural context with an international list of contributors.

Using the narratives of women who use(d) drugs, this account challenges popular understandings of Appalachia spread by such pundits as JD Vance by documenting how women, families, and communities cope with generational systems of oppression. Prescription opioids are associated with rising rates of overdose deaths and hepatitis C and HIV infection in the US, including in rural Central Appalachia. Yet there is a dearth of studies examining rural opioid use. RX Appalachia explores the gendered inequalities that situate women's encounters with substance abuse treatment as well as additional state interventions targeted at women who use drugs in one of the most impoverished regions in the US.

For seven years in the 1970s, the author lived in a village in northeast China as an ordinary farmer. In 1989, he returned to the village as an anthropologist to begin the unparalleled span of eleven years' fieldwork that has resulted in this book-a comprehensive, vivid, and nuanced account of family change and the transformation of private life in rural China from 1949 to 1999. The author's focus on the personal and the emotional sets this book apart from most studies of the Chinese family. Yan explores private lives to examine areas of family life that have been largely overlooked, such as emotion, desire, intimacy, privacy, conjugality, and individuality. He concludes that the past five decades have witnessed a dual transformation of private life: the rise of the private family, within which the private lives of individual women and men are thriving.

The connections between communities and forests are complex and evolving, presenting challenges to forest managers, researchers, and communities themselves. Dependency on timber extraction and timber-related industries is no longer a universal characteristic of the forest community. Remoteness is also a less common feature, as technology, workforce mobility, tourism, and 'amenity migrants' increasingly connect rural to urban places. Forest Community Connections explores the responses of forest communities to a changing economy, changing federal policy, and concerns about forest health from both within and outside forest communities. Focusing primarily on the United States, the book examines the ways that social scientists work with communities-their role in facilitating social learning, informing policy decisions, and contributing to community well being. Bringing perspectives from sociology, anthropology, political science, and forestry, the authors review a range of management issues, including wildfire risk, forest restoration, labor force capacity, and the growing demand for a growing variety of forest goods and services. They examine the increasingly diverse aesthetic and cultural values that forest residents attribute to forests, the factors that contribute to strong and resilient connections between communities and forests, and consider a range of governance structures to positively influence the well being of forest communities and forests, including collaboration and community-based forestry.

Local regeneration, and action on local issues, is fundamental to the sustainability of local communities. This is especially the case in the UK, with the Government focus on such approaches as Local Enterprise Partnerships and neighbourhood development plans, and further devolution proposals in the pipeline. The Local Regeneration Handbook meets the needs of today's practising "regeneration workers", broadly including anyone from regeneration partnership or development project officers to housing association neighbourhood officers, parish councillors, or other active local citizens, who all share a concern for the wellbeing of the community where they live or work, and a need to work with others for the best possible future for that community. Containing practical advice, templates, and real-life case studies for different stages in local regeneration, including fundraising, partnership development and project management, as well as support for personal development, and illustrations of key points by cartoonist Kipper Williams, this is an essential guide for anyone in local regeneration.