Rural Communities: Legacy and Change

Communities in rural America are a complex mixture of peoples and cultures struggling to survive by implementing innovative approaches to their problems. These people range from miners who have been laid off in West Virginia, to Laotian immigrants relocating in Kansas to work at a beef processing plant, to entrepreneurs drawing up plans for a world-class ski resort in California's Sierra Nevada.This thoroughly revised edition of Rural Communities focuses on various capitals in rural areas-natural, cultural, human, social, political, financial, and built. This integrative approach provides students with a framework for understanding rural society based on the concepts and explanations of social science. Issues covered include racial and cultural diversity; globalization and rural communities; the central role of communities in organizing a sustainable future; and building community in the context of ubiquitous change. Updates to the third edition include a new chapter on governance, as well as new material on increasing tensions over international immigration, the differential impact of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan on rural communities, and the rural impacts of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in the south. The authors also examine the international trade regime, economic restructuring, and the choices for communities and regions in the face of these changes.

This core text for rural sociology courses is now updated to include major conceptual and topical developments of the past several years, presenting a practical framework for understanding the internal and external forces shaping rural communities today.

Cornelia Butler Flora is director of the North Central Regional Center for Rural Development and professor of sociology at Iowa State University, where she is also Charles F. Curtis distinguished professor of agriculture.

Jan L. Flora is professor of sociology and extension community sociologist at Iowa State University.