Social Change in An Urban-Rural Fringe: Marques,Brazil

Communities at the fringe of cities in southeastern Brazil are characterized by rapidly changing social values associated with elements of economic modernization. The economy of the small rural village of Marques, situated near Piracicaba, a city of 500,000 population, has been transformed from one based on local subsistence and cash crop farming to one of diversified urban employment. Migration to the city has been significant. Despite diminished economic output, family and institutional ties have kept many from moving away from Marques and draw former residents back for special occasions.     

On the Linkage Between the Demographic Processes and Economy of a Region: (with particular reference to Pskov Oblast)

A low rate of natural increase, deriving from a disrupted age-sex structure, and net out-migration combine to account for a steady depopulation of Pskov Oblast. The introduction of industries providing additional male employment is recommended in the two principal cities—Pskov and Velikiye Luki—to correct the present predominance of women in industrial towns. Several measures (modernization of the countryside, promotion of truck-produce farming around the major urban centers) are suggested to keep more young people in rural areas and thus correct the lop-sided age structure there. Economic decision-making is viewed as a key factor in improving the demographic situation of a region.     

劳务经济模式与地域发展对策研究——以河南省为例

论文论述了发达国家农村劳动力转移的三种模式,即英国模式、美国模式和日本模式,并以劳务经济大省河南省为例,总结出河南劳务经济发展的六种模式,即候鸟式劳务型,团体转移型,打工创业型,求学就业型,海外就业型,工业吸引型。根据国内外经验与未来发展趋势,提出了促进我国劳务经济健康发展的对策。     

Job polarization in the new economy in Danish cities: location,size, and the role of the public sector

ABSTRACT

In this paper we examine the geographic patterns of employment growth and employment polarization in small and medium-sized cities (SMCs) in Denmark during the rise of the new economy. The geography of employment polarization in Danish cities is examined using register-based employment data on occupations and wages divided into the public and private sectors in the period 1993–2006; it therefore covers a long period of transformation and growth in the Danish economy. We conclude that employment growth is characterized by employment polarization combined with growth in low- and high-wage employment and a decline in medium-wage employment. However, these patterns of polarization differ across the public and private sectors, as well as by geography. While local labour market (LLM) size, city position and city specialization influence the geography of private-sector employment growth and polarization, municipal population and composition influence the geography of public-sector growth patterns across wage levels. Finally, public and private employment are positively associated within SMCs, predominantly driven by the positive association between public employment and private-sector low-wage employment. However, public employment is not associated with an increase in private low-wage employment in more remote areas.     

COMMUTING LINKS AT LOWER LEVELS OF RURAL SETTLEMENT

The study of commuting links in rural areas of the Non-Chernozem Zone offers a useful approach to the redesign of settlement patterns. Commuting to work is analyzed in 80 primary settlement systems (farm systems) in five rayons of Vologda Oblast. Most of the commuting streams are found to occur toward the central farm settlements within systems and also between adjacent systems, with rural nonfarm places (both industry-based and transport based) offering the principal opportunities for employment. Commuting is analyzed in terms of two indices: a labor-balance index (relating resident population and employment opportunities) and a commuting intensity index (relating the number of commuters to resident population).     

Red rural,blue rural? Presidential voting patterns in a changing rural America

This paper examines individual and aggregate data to document the growing political diversity in rural America. This political diversity is evident in the various economies within rural America. The new rural economy is reflected in recreational counties, where natural and built amenities combined with the provision of services to residents and visitors are the basis for the local economy. Residents of recreational counties tend to be more liberal than their rural peers on a variety of political issues, and supported Barack Obama at significantly higher levels in 2008 and 2012. In contrast, in regions dominated by the old rural economy of farming, political views are more conservative and there is far less support for Democrats in general and President Obama in particular. An analysis of survey data combined with multivariate spatial regression analysis demonstrates that these differences between the old and new rural economy persist even when a variety of demographic, economic, social and geographic variables are controlled.     

DEVELOPMENT POLICIES,URBAN UNEMPLOYMENT AND DEFORESTATION: THE ROLE OF INFRASTRUCTURE AND TAX POLICY IN A TWO-SECTOR MODEL*

ABSTRACT. We model an economy of a developing country that produces an exportable manufactured good in an urban sector and a nontradable rural good. Manufacturing faces a fixed wage, which encourages urban unemployment. Changes in cultivated area in the rural sector involve deforestation or reforestation at frontiers. Government taxes to pay for urban infrastructure that assists the manufacturing sector. Increases in urban infrastructure may relieve or exacerbate frontier deforestation but expands manufacturing employment and reduces urban unemployment. Rural transportation improvements exacerbate frontier deforestation but expand employment in the urban manufacturing sector. A larger population, ceteris paribus, widens the rural-urban wage gap and exacerbates deforestation, but may cause manufacturing employment to expand or contract.     

Towards the Construction of a Typology of Management Models of Shooting Opportunities in Scotland

In Scotland, the shooting industry has a significant impact on the economy, the environment and rural communities. However, styles of land management vary widely, and this is likely to have an effect on the benefits of shooting management. Here we construct a typology of management models, and test its utility in explaining economic benefits. Based on semi-structured interviews with 24 stakeholders representing 28 estates, three management models were defined: ‘Commercial Shooting Estates’ (CSE), ‘Non-commercial Shooting Estates’ (NSE) and ‘Diversified Estates’ (DE). DEs are differentiated from the other models as forestry, farming or biodiversity conservation, rather than shooting, is the main management objective. CSE and NSE are differentiated based on the degree of commercialisation of the shooting: CSEs let almost all of their shooting whereas NSEs do not let any shooting. Were the typology to be applied to a wider, systematic sample of estates, other factors may become more clearly differentiated. We found little variation between the three models in terms of spending and employment directly related to shooting activities. This study presents a typology of shooting management models that can be used to help identify pathways towards a new social contract between Scottish society and its landowners and managers.     

THE USE OF ANALYTICAL METHODS OF MATHEMATICAL STATISTICS FOR IDENTIFYING RURAL PLACES WITH GROWTH PROSPECTS: (with particular reference to Kaliningrad Oblast)

One of the key objectives in the rural development program for the Nonchernozem Zone of the RSFSR is the consolidation of rural settlement in larger places. An example of the dispersed settlement pattern is Kaliningrad Oblast, which has a total of 1,527 rural places ranging from fewer than 5 to more than 2,000 inhabitants, with a total rural population of 195,529 (1970 census). The author shows that growth prospects are dependent on a combination of five factors—geographical setting and level of development; population; fixed assets in agriculture; nonfarm fixed assets; availability of services—and, using correlation analysis, identifies 283 places with prospects of future growth, ranging from 32 in the 51–100 size class to one of more than 2,000 population. The preservation of some small rural places is termed inevitable because many serve as outlying settlements for livestock subdivisions of collective and state farms, and dairy and beef cattle represents a characteristic type of farming in Kaliningrad Oblast.     

走向知识经济时代的新型城乡关系

21世纪,知识、技术的竞相发展,使社会范式发生转变,从而使整个人类社会走向知识经济时代。在知识社会中,封闭、地区性社会向开放、全球性社会递进,城乡间公平享受社会公共资源。城市与乡村加速发展,城乡关系由传统的对立、两极化向新的协调、一体化发展,市场型城乡关系形成。本文在分析中国城乡关系演变历史的基础上,指出经济关系是城乡关系的主体,城乡社会关系趋于复杂化,城乡生态环境日益形成一个利益共同体,城乡政治关系民主化。     

The Impact of Land Reform on Rural Household Incomes in Transcaucasia

An agricultural economist specializing in the countries of the former Soviet Union (FSU) assesses changes in land use and their impact on rural incomes in Armenia, Georgia, and Azerbaijan. The paper compares developments in these countries with core CIS (Russia, Ukraine) and Central Asian states of the FSU. The author's premise—that agricultural growth, and hence higher well-being of the rural population are positively linked to individualization of farming structure and commercialization—is tested on the basis of survey results linking increases in farm size with higher rural incomes and accelerated sales of farm products. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: Q15, Q18, Q24. 4 figures, 4 tables, 19 references.     

Ecological Knowledge and the Regional Economy: Environmental Management in the Asesewa District of Ghana

This study examines perceptions of the environment in farming communities in the forest ecotone of Ghana. It places local knowledge within a socio-economic and historical context and argues that knowledge is continually evolving, attempting to solve existing problems and discovering new ones. It maintains that favourable conditions exist in farming communities for environmental actions and development approaches based on sustainable development, since these areas have suffered from the negative effects of degradation. However, major constraints exist within the wider political economy and policy framework, which is still locked into environmentally-hostile export-oriented production, and political models which marginalize rural people.     

The specifics and spatial structure of circular migration in Russia

Abstract

This article aims at distinguishing recurrent population movements within the territory of the Russian Federation between urban localities of different sizes and rural areas in connection to the processes of urbanization, suburbanization, and de-urbanization. Incomplete urbanization and the strong polarization of socio-economic space in Russia have resulted in two powerful contradictory population flows: centrifugal seasonal sub- and de-urbanization and centripetal labor migration from rural and small towns to large urban centers. The article discusses three forms of recurrent population mobility in Russia: (1) daily commuting of urban and rural inhabitants within metropolitan areas; (2) commuting to large cities and their suburbs for long-term employment intervals (weekly, monthly, etc.), (3) second-home commuting to countryside dachas. Unfinished urbanization in Russia not only attracts rural and small towns’ population to major cities but also keeps it within the latter. It slows down the real de-urbanization and induces specific dachas (second-home) suburbanization/de-urbanization, with these processes being closely interrelated. An opportunity to earn money in cities together with the impossibility of moving to major centers due to expensive housing encourages households to remain in small towns and rural areas. Meanwhile, inhabited rural localities (even ones distant from cities) attract seasonal population (dachniks).     

传统平原农区人口非农化对耕地利用方式的影响

传统平原农区是我国重要的粮食产区和人口集聚区,也将是我国未来人口城镇化的快速发展区。本文基于农村劳动力就业转移与农户家庭总收入之间的数量关系,提出农区发展演化三阶段的理论,并选取不同发展阶段的河南省吴庄村和山东省东店村进行验证。结果表明:微观层面的人口非农化特征与农户家庭总收入存在相关性,宏观层面的县域经济发展能力是农户兼业行为特征的重要外因;兼业农户通过土地流转,种植结构调整改变传统耕作方式,优化了农业与非农业收入结构,并推动农区进一步的发展演变。通过分析传统平原农区人口非农化对耕地利用方式的影响机理,对于保障粮食安全、推进该类型区的社会经济转型具有一定的现实意义。     

The peasantariat and politics: migration,wage labor,and agriculture in Botswana

This article examines Botswana's wage labor migration in terms of 2 reigning theories: 1) as a dichotomy between traditional and modern society, with workers viewing agriculture as an alternative to more desirable wage employment; or 2) as a subordination of colonial society to capitalist society, with workers drawn from the resulting underdeveloped and impoverished areas and divorced from their agricultural potential. Approximately 90% of Botswanan households have a wage worker; less than 1/4 of households rely on the agricultural economy alone. 80% of the population works in agriculture in some way, but agriculture contributes only 35% of total rural income. Over 50% of households are below the poverty level, and most must rely on a variety of income sources for subsistence. 68% of rural households (Botswana is 84% rural) have absent wage earners while 45% have 1 or more wage earners present. Absent wage earners work mainly in unskilled and semi-skilled jobs in Botswanan towns (44%) and villages (22%), and lands and cattlepost locations (5%) in South African mines (19%), and other jobs in South Africa (8%). Individuals with low socioeconomic status tend to migrate to South Africa; those with higher status move to Botswanan towns. Working for wages has become customary for most Botswanans. This article undermines conventional development theories by showing the close interweaving of the modern and traditional societies, and arguing that traditional retention of communal land rights and cattle ownership served the capitalistic system by becoming the basis for wage earning; previous income source (agriculture) did not disappear, but their use was altered. South African mining returns to the Botswanan government since 1965 largely benefited a growing petty-bourgeois class and marginally improved the life styles of the peasant labor class. Botswana's development depends on the relationship between the peripherial laboring class and the dominating petty-bourgeois and its internal structure.     

近代华北农村人口消长及其流动——兼论黄宗智“没有发展的增长”说

清代咸丰朝以后 ,华北四省的人口数量一直呈增长趋势 ,这一地区出现了人满为患的局面。严重的人口压力和由此产生的谋求基本生存条件的迫切需要 ,造成了华北地区人口成百万地向东北和内蒙古地区迁移。在人口压力的驱动下 ,近代华北农村技术经济作物的扩大 ,亦农亦商的普遍趋向 ,以副补农的普遍存在等 ,都可以视为农业经济发展的表征。判断明清以来中国农业有无发展 ,并不能仅仅局限于单位工作日劳动生产率的狭窄范畴。衡量农业发展的标准 ,应当包括生产力和生产关系两个方面     

Consider the daughters,they are important to family farms and rural communities too: family-farm succession

Over the last 25 years, researchers have engaged extensively with members of farming families on issues of farm succession. Farmers, their spouses, sons of farmers and daughters-in-law who move into the farming family have been the focus of much of this research. Daughters of farmers (hereafter daughters), except in the unusual cases of being inheritors or successors to the farm enterprise, are for the most part ignored as subjects who may have something to contribute to sociological understanding and theory of farm succession and practice, and also of rural population decline. This article presents the results of a qualitative pilot research project undertaken in 2012 in the Western District of Victoria, Australia, to explore daughters’ perceptions of their families’ decisions about and management of intergenerational family-farm transfer. The results show that many daughters have a keen interest in farming, have developed farm skills and would consider the occupation of farming if given the opportunity. However, daughters are commonly overlooked when it comes to decisions about family-farm succession and/or inheritance; hence, indicating patriarchy remains strongly influential in determining family-farm succession. This article provides a different perspective from previous discussions of the dynamics within farming families and farming communities, and it contributes to wider discussion of changes in and sustainability of rural society. It recommends further research on rural social issues attributable to patrilineal intergenerational farm transfer.     

东北地区城乡结构的演变机理与统筹发展

由于历史、文化、政治、经济和地理等方面的原因,东北地区的城乡二元结构是我国最突出、最奇特的地区。本文简要回顾了计划经济时期的二元城乡结构,然后从经济结构、居民收入与消费、城乡规模结构和社会发展水平等方面深入分析了改革开放后东北地区城乡结构的演变过程与动力机制。最后从区域经济结构调整、城乡发展战略和制度创新等方面,提出了促进城乡统筹发展的策略。     

Geographical Preplanning Studies of Economic Complexes in the South of Krasnoyarsk Kray

The planning of the Sayan economic complex, a major development region in the South of Krasnoyarsk Kray, is found to have focused mainly on the use of local resources without adequately considering the complex interplay of man-nature relationships. In particular, little work has been done on problems of landscape ecology, including a determination of landscape budgets and of the ecological functioning of geosystems. The results of relevant investigations are presented, focusing on the present distribution of production and settlement within the study region, the natural landscape and forest use, land and agroclimatic resources, types of farming and levels of farm equipment, and some aspects of human ecology. The study region is found to suffer from excessive concentration of production and settlement in the center of the Minusinsk Basin, a net out-migration exceeding natural increase of population, and an extensive type of farming that is less economical than the dairy economy and truck produce required for a growing urban population.     

Rural population change in Nova Scotia, 1991–2001: bivariate and multivariate analysis of key drivers

Depopulation is a major demographic and economic issue in Nova Scotia, as it is in many of Canada's hinterland areas. Indian Reserves excepted, two-thirds of rural census subdivisions declined in population between 1991 and 2001, and this decline has serious economic and social consequences. By contrast, a small minority of seemingly 'rural' areas is experiencing excessive population growth through exurbanisation. This article combines map and graph analysis with simple regression and multivariate techniques to analyse the key drivers of recent population change. It is shown that such change is strongly and predictably related to unemployment rate, income and population density and moderately related to resource-industry employment, proximity to a major urban centre and commuting. These six variables are interrelated, however, and their separate contributions are explored through principal component analysis and multiple regression. Two variables—resource-industry employment and urban proximity—are identified as key root causes, indicative of separate factors. Findings are related to the Drudy–Gilg model of rural decline, and their policy implications are briefly discussed.