The objective of CORASON was to study the dynamics of interaction between different types of knowledge (primarily expert and local) in projects for rural development, and to interpret the extent to which such projects aim for sustainable development. We used a case study approach to rural development projects (both state-based and civil society- generated) across the 12 participating countries. 7 thematic areas were covered: land use, regional and spatial planning; demographic conditions and the state of rural civil society; management of nature protection and biodiversity conservation policies and practices; local food production and distribution; conditions in the non-agricultural rural economy; innovation in rural development; and the use and maintenance of natural resources for livelihoods in rural areas.
We understand sustainable development as a knowledge-based practice, and as a site of disagreement over who is entitled to produce the relevant knowledge for its interpretation, which knowledge is accessible and understandable for whom, how knowledge sharing and integration is to be negotiated etc. A key issue is to understand the knowledge dynamics operating in projects for rural development as rural areas are increasingly drawn into the new 'knowledge economy' emerging across Europe. Three central issues emerge from our findings:
I: Rural areas in contemporary Europe.
CORASON areas are sites of interaction between homogenising and differentiating forces. Strong pressures exist towards homogeneity, from globalised markets and from EU and national policy goals, but in responding to them rural locations continue to produce and reproduce diversity. What nearly all the areas studied do have in common is a process of de-agriculturalisation: contraction in agricultural land use and reduction of the number of farmers in the local labour forces However, even de-agriculturalisation is differentially encountered and responded to in different communities, depending on their past history as ‘rent-seeking’, ‘dependent’ or ‘entrepreneurial’ economic orientations.
How should current Europeanisation of policies for rural development and for sustainable development respond to, and how can they negotiate, the high level of economic, social and ecological diversity which characterises rural localities in Europe today?
II: Sustainable Development for rural communities
How is ‘Sustainable Development’ understood by different actors in policies, programmes and projects for rural development?
CORASON analysed SD at two levels: as articulated in the discourses of policy actors at European, national and regional levels, and as understood by local actors addressing problems of rural development. We conclude that two models of Sustainable Development can be found in operation: an 'institutional' model, emphasising technological solutions to resource problems, which recognises distinct social, economic and ecological dimensions to sustainability but does not specify the relations between and priorities of these different dimensions in ways which would enable interests (economic, social, cultural) and resources to be managed together; and a local, livelihood-oriented model and practice of SD, which takes a more diffuse or 'holistic' form oriented to the creation or maintenance of 'sustainable livelihoods'.
The first model attaches little importance to the specifics of rural areas within sustainable development processes. The second, starting from the assumption that a sustainable use of natural resources is embedded within, enabled and constrained by other local social, economic and human resources, implies strengthening the power, rights, knowledge and interests of local resource user groups and rural populations. A 'differentiating adoption' of SD, countering the adoption of a standardised interpretation diffused by EU policies and global discourses, is congruent with the rationale of the concept, which requires regionally and locally specific interpretations and applications based on the given situation.
III Knowledge dynamics in rural sustainable development
Does ‘local knowledge’ exist within rural European societies today? What relations between local and other forms of knowledge may best contribute to rural sustainable development?
Two significant forms of local knowledge appeared in action in our case studies: ‘tacit’ knowledge, which is oriented to social relationships and helps to generate relations of trust and social capital; and ‘lay’ knowledge, a non-scientific form of empirical knowledge about ‘how things work’ in the natural world. Both are important resources for rural development, but in different ways.
Lay knowledges are found in variable and non-standardised forms and are transmitted between individuals in variable informal situations. Use of these knowledges for development purposes often transforms them into standardised, codified forms, which can produce selectivity in knowledge, social exclusion of some knowers, and commodification of the products embodying the knowledge. For sustainable development, variability and non-standardisation might be considered a strength rather than a weakness.
Local networks emerged as important sites for knowledge circulation and for encounters between expert and lay knowledges. Some form of expertise (professionally certified or ‘citizen expertise’) is important for generating development projects; however most important are the social structures created for the project (hierarchical, co-operative, participatory etc) which influence knowledge encounters in constructive or destructive directions. The mobilisation of civil society (e.g. social movements) plays an important role in creating public spaces for ‘natural’ rather than formalised learning occasions.
CORASON Participants
Ireland: Trinity College Dublin (Hilary Tovey)
Sweden: Goteborg University (Karl Bruckmeier)
Hungary: Institute of Political Sciences, Hungarian Academy of Sciences (Imre
Kovach)
Spain: Universitat de Valencia Estudi General (Javier Esparcia)
Poland: Jagiellonian University, University of Lodz (Krzysztof Gorlach)
Italy: Universita degli Studi di Napoli, Universita di Trieste (Maria Fonte)
Greece: Agricultural University of Athens (Charalambos Kasimis)
Portugal: Instituto Superior Agronomia Technical University of Lisbon (Isabel Rodrigo)
UK (Scotland): University of Newcastle upon Tyne (Mark Shucksmith)
Norway: Centre for Rural Research (Karoline Daugstad)
Germany: Leibniz-Centre for Agricultural Landscape and Land Use Research
(Rosemarie Siebert)
Czech Republic: Czech University of Agriculture (Vera Majerova)
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