Community Sustainability In Rural Australia

Each of the case study chapters presents an analysis of sustainability in the context of rural communities.

By addressing themes such as social and economic change, government policy and gender relations, this volume tackles the thematic complexities of sustainability. It attempts to understand how small rural communities have survived in the past, what factors shaped them, and how these factors will impact on their future survival.

There has been a recent expansion of interest in cultural approaches to rural communities and to the economic and social situation of rurality more broadly. This interest has been particularly prominent in Australia in recent years, spurring the emergence of an interdisciplinary field called 'rural cultural studies'. This collection is framed by a large interdisciplinary research project that is part of that emergence, particularly focused on what the idea of 'cultural sustainability' might mean for understanding experiences of growth, decline, change and heritage in small Australian country towns. However, it extends beyond the initial parameters of that research, bringing together a range of senior and emerging Australian researchers who offer diverse approaches to rural culture. The essays collected here explore the diverse forms that rural cultural studies might take and how these intersect with other disciplinary approaches, offering a uniquely diverse but also careful account of life in country Australia. Yet, in its emphasis on the simultaneous specificity and cross-cultural recognisability of rural communities, this book also outlines a field of inquiry and a set of critical strategies that are more broadly applicable to thinking about the "rural" in the early twenty-first century. This book will be valuable reading for students and academics of Geography, History, Literary Studies, Cultural Studies, Anthropology and Sociology, introducing rural cultural studies as a new dynamic and integrative discipline.

There has been a recent expansion of interest in cultural approaches to rural communities and to the economic and social situation of rurality more broadly. This interest has been particularly prominent in Australia in recent years, spurring the emergence of an interdisciplinary field called 'rural cultural studies'. This collection is framed by a large interdisciplinary research project that is part of that emergence, particularly focused on what the idea of 'cultural sustainability' might mean for understanding experiences of growth, decline, change and heritage in small Australian country towns. However, it extends beyond the initial parameters of that research, bringing together a range of senior and emerging Australian researchers who offer diverse approaches to rural culture. The essays collected here explore the diverse forms that rural cultural studies might take and how these intersect with other disciplinary approaches, offering a uniquely diverse but also careful account of life in country Australia. Yet, in its emphasis on the simultaneous specificity and cross-cultural recognisability of rural communities, this book also outlines a field of inquiry and a set of critical strategies that are more broadly applicable to thinking about the "rural" in the early twenty-first century. This book will be valuable reading for students and academics of Geography, History, Literary Studies, Cultural Studies, Anthropology and Sociology, introducing rural cultural studies as a new dynamic and integrative discipline.

This book examines the interaction of the dimensions of economy, society, and environment in the context of rural systems. It embraces a wide range of topics, including globalization and reregulation in sustainable food production, conservation and sustainability, the development of sustainable rural communities, and sustainable rural-urban interaction. It is relevant to advanced-level students, teachers, researchers, policymakers and agency workers.

In a neo-liberal era where society in the Developed World is reliant on mass-produced cheap foods, and living standards are based on high consumption of non-renewable energy and materials, this book investigates the growing significance of sustainable systems in rural areas. Drawing on a wide range of topical case studies, primarily in the UK, it provides an in-depth analysis of the progress made towards sustainability within rural systems, focusing specifically upon sustainable agriculture and sustainable rural communities. The authors provide an overview of the various systems of sustainability currently being applied in the Developed World. They highlight key environmental, economic and social issues, including post-productivism, 'alternative' food networks, organic farming, GM foods, conservation, rural development programmes, sustainable tourism, local training schemes and community participation. The various studies provide important lessons in the ongoing search for greater sustainability and suggest positive directions for future policy practice.

A key, intensifying change affecting rural areas in the last few decades has been a decline in the proportion of national populations whose principal livelihood is farming. The corresponding re-distribution of population has typically resulted in a net population loss to rural areas, and diversification of rural activity. The corporatization and technological modification of food production has prompted new policy challenges, and has bound rural and urban populations together in new relationships articulated in moral discourses of custodianship, food safety, and sustainability. Contributors to this volume came together in the attempt to stimulate collective insight into trends of rural change in Australia, New Zealand and Europe. The first two countries have been characterised by avowedly `neoliberal' rural policy - with considerable departures from it in practice; Europe, on the other hand, by a mix of policy measures which attempt to integrate land management and sustainability, diversification and maintenance of a competitive farming sector within an overarching policy framework more overtly, though only partially, oriented towards sustaining rural society. Aiming to build on research relating to the character of rural transitions, this volume offers substantive and critical contributions to the understanding of the sources of unpredictability, instability, and continuity, that underpin rural transition. The papers explore changes and continuities in policy, the governance of rural spaces, technological developments relating to rural areas and populations, and social forms of subjectivation and participation in increasingly diverse rural settings.

This book provides an overview of interdisciplinary approaches that have applied social science to research focused on issues around food, agriculture and natural resource management. The book demonstrates that those who work in rural sociology either as researchers or practitioners apply community development and participatory techniques to socio-environmental interaction. The book discusses how the evolving concept of interconnected social and ecological systems (SES) emerged, recognizing the inherent complexity, adaptive nature, and resilience of such systems. This book engages with contemporary theory, as well as new cutting-edge transdisciplinary research evidenced in case studies from three continents.

"In our progressively globalised economy thre has been a decisive shift from resource-based investment to knowledge-based investment; from assembly-line production to flexible specialisation; from semi-rigid nationally controlled and regulated production to flows of images and ideas in an increasingly deregulated world market; and from regionally disconnected national production to globally-coordinated regional production (Waters, 1995; Lash and Urry, 1994; Crook et al., 1992). As global citizens are fed an endless (and seamless) stream of images of waste dumps, oil spills, nuclear explosions, and Jurassic Park monsters, they are concerned with the risks asssociated with Big Science (Beck, 1992). They become disenchanted and lose trust in it. They begin to turn 'green', demanding unpolluted streams, national parks, more trees, rights for animals and, most of all, chemical-free foods for themselves and their families. And where do they get that food?"--p. 1.

This book illustrates the benefits of integrating different approaches to community and regional development for rural Australia. The key theme is community capacity building through lifelong learning, seen as integration of formal, nonformal, and informal education and training at all levels. Other foci include the local-global context, issues related to learning for change, best practice in community learning, and specific issues of rural Aboriginal communities. The 24 chapters: "Challenges Facing Rural Regional Australia in New Times" (Ian Falk); "Regional Economic Decay and Regeneration under Structural Change" (Jerry Courvisanos); "Life beyond Economics: Learning Systems and Social Capital" (Richard Bawden); "Sustainability for Regional Development: Integrating the Models" (Barbara Geno); "Community Psychology, Planning and Learning: An Applied Social Ecology Approach to Sustainable Development" (Douglas Perkins); "Education as Economic and Individual Development: Toward Education through Occupations" (W. Norton Grubb); "Youth and Unemployment: Educational Pathways or Tracks That Lead Nowhere" (John Williamson, Angie Marsh); "Using Communication and Information Technologies To Empower Women in Rural Communities" (Margaret Grace); "Working Smarter Not Harder: Regional Disability-Based Organisations" (Harvey Griggs); "Support Networks and Trust: How Social Capital Facilitates Learning Outcomes for Small Businesses" (Sue Kilpatrick, Rowena Bell); "Groups That Learn and How They Do It" (Elizabeth Kasl); "Spiritual Impact Statements: A Key to Sustainability" (Patrick Bradbery, G. Fletcher, R. Molloy); "International Models of Community Sustainability" (Allen B. Moore, Lilian Hill, Rusty Brooks); "A Group Action Learning Model for Sustainable Rural Community Development: Reflections on an Indonesian Case" (A. Muktasam, S. Chamala); "Enabling Communities through the Arts: Case Studies from the Community Cultural Development Fund of the Australia Council" (Onko Kingma); "Community Strategies: Addressing the Challenges for Young People Living in Rural Australia" (Johanna Wyn, Helen Stokes); "A Regional Approach to Youth Employment: The Role of Young People in Renewing Regional Communities" (James Mulraney, Peter Turner); "What Does the Business Sector Get out of Investment in Communities?" (Marc Bowles); "Learning, Change and Sustainability: Exploring the Learning Processes of Pastoralist Stakeholders in the Tropical Savannas" (Allan Arnott, Rebecca Benson); "Learning Partnerships in the Workplace" (Jo Balatti); "Building Social Capital and Community Learning Networks in Community Internet Access Centres" (David Bruce); "Newspapers and Health Centres: Selected Short Stories of Community Development Case Studies" (Rosa MacManamey, Ian Falk, David Bruce, and Others); "Enabling Leadership: A New Community Leadership Model" (Ian Falk, Bill Mulford); and "Learning To Manage Change in Communities: A Way Forward" (Onko Kingma, Ian Falk). (Most papers contain references.) (SV)