Evolutionary Perspectives on Rural Australia

An enduring concern within Australian rural geography has been to understand the nature and implications of change. Much of the intellectual effort has been focused on interpreting how rural economies, populations, social institutions, cultures, and land uses have been transformed through processes operating across a range of spatial and temporal scales. This paper offers a critical appraisal of recent rural research in Australia and how this body of work has attempted to make sense of change. It argues that despite an ongoing focus on the nature of change, it is often reduced to a relatively simple historical narrative. We suggest that some of the emerging ideas in ‘evolutionary economic geography’ might offer an alternative means of conceptualising the trajectories of rural economies, institutions, and communities. The paper outlines the contours of evolutionary economic geography and the ways in which some of its key conceptual foundations might offer a means of understanding not only rural change, but also continuity.     

20世纪安徽两次农村改革不同命运解析

在当代中国农村改革的历史进程中,安徽具有特殊的地位和影响,先后于20世纪60年代初和70年代末推行了"责任田"和"大包干"的改革。但是,由于政治背景、群众基础、两代领导人态度的不同,两次改革出现了完全不同的命运,"责任田"试行失败,"大包干"推广成功。     

Development for Whom? Rural to Urban Resettlement at the Three Gorges Dam,China

When farmers are dispossessed of their lands to make way for a development project it is often inevitable that there will not be enough land to go around. It is unlikely that parcels of fertile land are lying vacant in the surrounding areas awaiting distribution. It therefore becomes necessary for people who previously derived their livelihoods from the land to move into cities. This research explores what happens to a sample of such people and whether they are able to restore their livelihoods. It examines the Three Gorges Dam resettlement in China's Hubei province and discovers that while the Chinese government has devised an inspired toolbox of benefit-sharing initiatives, the gains accrue to a minority who live in the most amenable location of the Three Gorges area. It concludes that the availability of capital through benefit-sharing initiatives does not guarantee its productive use.     

指引小农经济通向现代化的灯塔——中国共产党农民合作经济的四大理论成果

中国共产党成立90年来,在农民合作经济方面形成了四大理论成果。毛泽东关于组织起来是必由之路的论断,指明了方向,解决了如何根据汪洋大海的小农经济的状况选择什么样的路径引导农民通向现代化的问题;邓小平关于农业两个飞跃的论断,明确了阶段,解决了如何适应生产力发展要求选择什么样的战略阶段推进组织化的问题;多种类型农民合作经济组织共同发展及规模经营形式多样化认识的形成,明晰了形式,解决了如何适应国情及农情选择什么样的模式推进组织化的问题;以民办、民有、民管、民受益为内核的原则及其相应制度的形成,探明了制度,解决了如何尊重农民意愿选择什么样的制度推进组织化的问题。     

江汉平原农户日常消费空间演变及影响因素研究

消费空间变化是透视当代乡村地域系统演变的重要视角.基于江汉平原公安县农户抽样调查和实地访谈数据,以微观分析描绘农户消费场景变化、宏观分析勾画农户消费空间演变,以多元线性回归解析乡村消费演变影响因素.研究表明:①微观上,农户消费区位频次趋于增加、区位类型趋于分化,低等级商品消费向低等级购物地扩散、高等级商品消费向高等级购...     

Migration and left-behind parents and children of migrants in Cambodia: a look at household composition and the economic situation

ABSTRACT

This paper examines composition of households formed after the outmigration of a household member in rural Cambodian and correlates household types with indicators of economic condition. The paper focuses on households containing left-behind parents and the children of migrants. Excess mortality in the 1970s due to war suggests the association between migration and economic condition may be gendered. This could be exacerbated when migration leads to a skip-generation household containing a left-behind parent and a child of migrant without an own parent of the child present. Data come from the Cambodian Rural-Urban Migration Project (CRUMP), a project designed to study migration in rural Cambodia. Most households formed after a migration contain a left-behind parent of migrant. While about 22 per cent of these households contain a left-behind child of migrant, the per cent is over 60 per cent when the migrant is themselves a parent. The economic situation tends to be worst for left behind solo mothers (mothers of migrants who do not live with a spouse) and best for left-behind coupled parents of migrants. There is evidence that the combination of left-behind solo mothers living with children of migrants in a skip-generation situation is the most disadvantaged.     

The Effects of Inter-generational Support on the Mortality of Older People in Rural China

As inter-generational support is the primary source of support for the Chinese elderly in rural areas, such support is likely to affect their physical and psychological health. This paper investigates the effects of four types of inter-generational support on the mortality risk of the elderly in Anhui Province. Results showed that mortality risk was influenced significantly only by receiving household support. Financial support and personal care had no effect. Results also indicated that household and emotional support were effective in reducing mortality when delivered at closer proximity, suggesting that quality of support may be enhanced by co-residence and ready access to children. Conclusions about the health benefits of tangible forms of support need to be tempered by an understanding that poor health predisposes inter-generational co-residence, and that the quality of household assistance and emotional support may be sensitive to the geographic distance between older parents and their adult children in rural China.     

Building economies from the bottom up: (mis)representations of poverty in the rural American Northwest

This paper examines interconnected processes of economic restructuring and representations of poor subjects that rely on imaginaries of race, ethnicity, class and rural space. We argue that poverty and privilege are mutually produced and so we focus on the representational practices of White leaders in persistently poor counties across the American Northwest. We draw from case study research to understand region-wide material and discursive processes that are contributing to economic distress and social marginalization. We interrogate the range of representational practices that White leaders employ to explain, deny and/or racialize poverty in their communities. We also draw attention to how poverty emerges from the intersection of political, economic and cultural processes operating across a range of scales and sites. We further analyze how representations of the poor and poverty rest on a host of imaginary landscapes about who belongs, who is an outsider and who has a right to a place and its services. We argue that these representations serve to invigorate neoliberal policies and silence a more critical debate about poverty in the USA.     

New challenges for old commons: The role of historical common land in contemporary rural spaces

In Scotland, as elsewhere in Western Europe, many examples of historical common land have endured to the present day, but are under major pressure from the economic restructuring, socio-cultural recomposition and changing policy context that characterise contemporary rural change. For the crofting common grazings of Scotland, two particular challenges have arisen in the form of: (1) the growing difficulty of gaining sufficient livelihood contributions from traditional agriculturally-based activities; and (2) the increasing heterogeneity of rights-holders. This paper elaborates the findings of a recent survey, which sought to identify the main implications of these challenges for common grazings use and governance. An overall decline in levels of use of common grazings was identified, as well as decreasing involvement and investment in associated local institutions. This informs a discussion of the factors shaping the role of historical common land in contemporary rural spaces, an area neglected in the common property literature.