On loss of services--aka "desertification"--as a reason for rural disgruntlement

"In the French Countryside, a Deep Discontent Takes Root" is the headline for the pre-election story by NYTimes Paris bureau chief Roger Cohen.  The subhead is "In northern Burgundy, services have collapsed and the far-right National Rally has risen."  What's striking to me about this story is the similarity between this French form of rural neglect/resentment and what we have seen in the United States of a similar ilk.   Here are some relevant quotes: 

Residents in this sparsely populated region of France — the Yonne district in northwestern Burgundy has only about 335,000 inhabitants — describe what is happening to their community as “desertification,” by which they mean an emptying out of services, and of their lives.

Schools close. Train stations close. Post offices close. Doctors and dentists leave. Cafés and small convenience stores close, squeezed by megastores. People need to go further for services, jobs and food. Many travel in their old cars but are encouraged by the authorities to switch to electric cars, which are priced way beyond their means.

At the same time, since the war in Ukraine, gas and electricity bills have shot up, leading some to switch off their heating last winter. They feel invisible and only just get by; and on their televisions they see President Emmanuel Macron explaining the critical importance of such abstract policies as European “strategic autonomy.” It is not their concern.

Along comes the National Rally, saying its focus is on people, not ideas, the purchasing power of people above all.

The story quotes National Rally party candidate Sophie-Laurence Roy, whose reference to territory I read to be linked to "place," even land. 

My party is anchored in this territory, it is not, like our president, trying to give moral lessons to the whole world.

As for the receptivity to these appeals, here is a quote from André Villiers, "a centrist allied to the party of Mr. Macron — and Ms. Roy’s opponent in Sunday’s runoff":  

Our French heartland has the feeling of being forgotten.  What you see here in the National Rally surge is anger and alienation.

Note how similar some of these thoughts are to what has been labeled rural resentment--and often dismissed as unreasonable--in the United States. Another relevant post is here.   Recall that Kathy Cramer's 2016 book about the shift in Wisconsin politics was titled The Politics of Resentment. 

The yellow vest protests of a few years ago also seem relevant.  Some posts about those protests are here.

In Wisconsin, Democrats aren't neglecting rural voters. It may be making a difference

The Washington Post reported a few days ago under the headline, "In Wisconsin, Biden tries to hold on to White voters without degrees." As if often the case in reporting and in our national imaginary, the white working class (here, those without college degrees) gets conflated with rurality.  This article discusses both.  Bottom line:  the Wisconsin Democratic Party is not neglecting rural America--and has set up offices in many nonmetropolitan counties, but Joe Biden is still focusing his attention on urban areas.  

Here are the excerpts with the word "rural" in them: 

Wisconsin Democrats attribute part of Biden’s relative strength with White voters without degrees to a rural progressive tradition that has faded but not disappeared — and part of it to tenacious organizing, including in rural areas where many of those voters live.

* * * *

Biden’s campaign is relying on an existing base of volunteers who know how to reach voters who might be willing to back him. Local Democrats send out 1,000 to 1,400 handwritten postcards each election to reach voters in rural areas whose doors are hard to knock on, Sandy Rindy said.

* * * *

Biden’s strategy: Out-organize Trump

Biden’s strategy for winning Wisconsin is built around state Democrats’ year-round, volunteer-run door-knocking operation. Most of Biden’s campaign offices are in counties Trump won in 2020 but where Biden outperformed given the underlying demographics.

Biden lost rural Lafayette County, where he has an office in tiny Darlington, by 14 points in 2020. But he ran 19 percent stronger there than one would expect based on the share of its population that is White and does not have a bachelor’s degree, according to a Post analysis.

“When you’ve got a Democratic Party office in a small town, it’s much easier to get people engaged,” said Tanya Bjork, a senior adviser to Biden’s campaign in Wisconsin who has worked on the past four presidential campaigns there. “And getting more people engaged means more doors and more phone calls and more conversations.”

Biden has campaigned in only one county Trump won in Wisconsin, and some Democrats grouse that they would like to see more of him in rural areas.

“Tammy Baldwin wins, but she works the state,” said John Waelti, a retired economist who writes a column for the Monroe Times. “She always has hard hats and farmers in her photos. When Biden and [Vice President] Harris come, it’s Milwaukee and Madison.”

Most of Biden’s 11 trips to Wisconsin since taking office have been to Milwaukee or Madison, although he’s traveled twice to Superior, a city of about 26,000 in northern Wisconsin where the infrastructure law he signed is funding the rebuilding of the John A. Blatnik Bridge. 

“It’ll be up to their campaign to bring [accomplishments like the infrastructure law] from the macro level of visionary policy to benefit generations to come to the micro level,” she said. “What did it do in Green County?”

Baldwin said she has encouraged Biden to campaign across the state.

Rural resentment over neglect (perceived or real) was a theme first associated with Wisconsin after the 2016 election.  It was described in Kathy Cramer's book, The Politics of Resentment: Rural Consciousness in Wisconsin and the Rise of Scott Walker. 

You'll find lots of related content here on the blog under the labels rural politics (446 posts) and rural vote (571 posts).  

Cross-posted to Working-Class Whites and the Law.  

Rallying to keep post office closure brought community group together

The headline in my hometown newspaper, The Newton County Times, a few months ago was "Mt. Judea Alliance mission:  Advocate for community and rural way of life."  It's a feel-good story about a group in my home county, but no where does the story use the word rural or otherwise suggest precisely what is distinctly rural about what the community group is doing or protecting.  

Here's the story, for which there is no link on the newspaper's website: 

The Mt. Judea Area Allieance never does anything political nor takes a position on issues.  "Except that's how we started," laughed Beth Ardapple, of the Cave Creek community. 

Ardapple is a member of the Alliance and she spoke about the organization during the April 25 meeting of Community Matters, a coalition of non-profit organizations serving the residents of Newton County.  The meeting was held at the Jasper First Baptist Church.  Each month a member organization is asked to present itself to the group. 

The Mt. Judea Area Alliance originally formed in 2011 when community residents joined together to successfully fight the U.S. Postal SErvice's plan to close rural post offices including the one at Mr. Judea.  Ardapple said she delved into the history of the organization and found documentation noting that residents had written and sent 192 letters to a postal manager asking that ht epost office be spared.  It worked.  

It was a positive experience and community members continued to meet and address issue of local relevance and importance.  It came up with a mission to be an advocate of the community and the rual way of life.  Early leaders included the late Donna Dodson and teh late Sharon Pierce. Anita Hudson, Ima Jean Freeman, Bertie Wells and Ardapple continue to be the core group.  It has about ten active members today. 

Projects have involved community beautification, a mini senior center, street music and dancing, back to school breakfasts for teachers and staff, summer learning camps, participation in the Arkansas Quilt Trail and helps offer community service hours to area students. 

The most successful project was the initiation in the county of the Dolly Parton Imagination Library.  Wells, a former school librarian, took it on as personal project. 

It grew and was adopted into the programs offered through the Newton County Library.  Library Director Kenya Windel reported later in the meeting that Newton County was recently recognized by the state organization for the county's volume of memberships.  About 90% of Newton County children are enrolled. 

"That was a one-woman show," said Ardapple.  She was determined that all children aged birth through 5 could get a free book every month from the Dolly Parton Imagination Library.  

"That's kind of the way we work.  If somebody has something they are interested in doing, everybody says that's fine and if they want to join us, they join in."

Current projects are the annual Heritage Days held at the Mt. Judea School and the annual community yard sale also on the school grounds.  This year's yard sale is scheduled for Saturday, May 4.

The only time these events were suspended was during the pandemic.

The group maintains a blessing box at the Mercantile.  There is also a little free library in the old post office building. 

The Alliance also provide some amenities for the visitors who came to Mt. Judea to watch the April 8 solar eclipse.  

Members have also recently taken on the restoration of the Sam Davis Cemetery.  Davis is the historical figure behind Sam's Throne the local geological and historic landmark just outside Mt. Judea.  

Rural Legal Scholarship: Magassa and Friedman's "Toward Inclusive Justice"

 Lassana Magassa and Batya Friedman of the University of Washington just published "Toward inclusive justice: Applying the Diverse Voices design method to improve the Washington State Access to Justice Technology Principles" in the ACM Journal on Responsible Computing.  Here's part of the abstract: 

We situate our work in literature on inclusive justice, public interest technology in the courts, value sensitive design, and experiential experts. Then we present our research context, the Washington State ATJ-TPrinc, and our method, the Diverse Voices. We provide details on our methods, including our project genesis and implementation of the Diverse Voices process. We conducted experiential expert panels with four stakeholder groups: legal professionals, currently/formerly incarcerated people, immigrant communities, and rural communities. We then report key concerns and insights which surfaced during the panels as well as the review process and adoption of the revised Principles by the Washington State Supreme Court.

Here is what the authors say about why they chose to include rural stakeholders as one of the four groups of stakeholders in their study:

Panel 4: Rural Communities. Selected to balance the historical leaning for urban communities to be at the center of discussions about technology in the courts [35, 68]; the needs of people in rural areas, their distance from judicial bodies, their digital capabilities, and other factors are likely to differ from those who live in urban areas in Washington State.

This is from the Rural Communities Panel, which features the subhead "Experiential Experts" 

We recruited three experiential experts from rural Western Washington state with the help of public librarians and held the panel in a local public library. Panelists included: (1) an attorney who practiced family law, counseling, and mediation; (2) the city attorney in a town with a population less than 5,000; and (3) a legal assistant who worked as a parenting coach.

Panelists were concerned about bias in the justice system – both bias introduced by technology and bias introduced by human actors. The Scope and Access to Justice for All principles state that technology should not create unfairness or bias. Panelists concurred but also felt that it was important to acknowledge that technology could keep human bias in check.

From "Key Concerns and Insights"

“Human beings are massively biased too, so it's really balancing ... maybe using the two [humans and technology] to help balance out.” – Rural communities panelist

Panelists insisted that having the technology available is useless if the judicial system's actors are not sure how or when the technology can or should be used.

“Oh, one thing before I forget, on phones ... I don‟t know if they still do, but I did a trial down there two years ago, and they have a hard and fast rule that you cannot use a phone in the courtroom. I did a trial, and my assistant was doing research on her phone. The judge said, put that phone away. I said, wait a minute, that‟s impairing my ability to represent my client. The judge said, f**k you, you put that phone away.” – Rural communities panelist

The panelists went on to say that when they used a laptop for the same purpose, the judge had no objections. To this end, panelists proposed that the Maximizing Public Awareness and Use principle should advocate for training for those who interact with or are a part of the justice system.

Panelists also questioned the ATJ-TPrinc focus on "high-tech." They countered with the term "high-touch" to bring the focus back to the people who carry out activities in the judicial system.

“High-tech is great, but this is human beings we're dealing with and relationships. People need to be heard to feel justice. When I see people talking about tech stuff, that rarely comes in.” – Rural communities panelist

The panelists expressed disappointment with the focus on technology over people. While acknowledging that the ATJ-TPrinc went some distance to affirm the justice system's users are people with human problems, nonetheless, panelists believed that if justice is to be experienced and felt, more could be done.

Elsewhere, the article notes the difficulty in recruiting rural informants for the study: 

The time and effort to recruit and schedule panelists varied by community, with some being more challenging than others: Legal Professionals (10 hr), Currently/Formerly Incarcerated (15 hr), Immigrant Communities (20 hr); and RuralCommunities (30 hr).

Table 2 shows the location, duration, and panelist composition for each panel. Panels were held in physical locations convenient for panelists, either at an urban university or at a rural library.

Here are some of the rural findings: 

Rural Communities experts maintained that humans are an essential part of the rural justice system and were concerned that as more technologies are introduced, the rural courts might consider humans less important, in turn having a negative impact on rural court users.

* * * 

Rural Communities experts were concerned that lack of access to adequate translation services could result in people having no or inaccurate representation.

I recommend this article in its entirety to those interested in access-to-justice broadly speaking, as well as those interested in formerly incarcerated individuals and rural communities. 

Rural broadband in the news as Affordable Connectivity Program comes to an end

I've been hearing a lot about rural folks in relation to broadband the last few weeks because a federal program, the Affordable Connectivity Program, is expiring.  Here are a smattering of stories that acknowledged the rural angle on this event. 

First, here is some CalMatters coverage, which explains lots of basics and also acknowledges the rural impact. 

On April 30, a popular and widely used government program began the process of shutting down due to congressional inaction. With its demise, closing the digital divide becomes considerably more difficult.

The federal government first launched a broadband subsidy program during the depths of COVID-19 pandemic lockdown, where internet connections became many peoples’ only window into the outside world. That effort, the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP), was made permanent as part of the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. It offered a $30 monthly subsidy ($75 on tribal lands) to qualifying low-income households for broadband internet or cell phone bills. The program also offers up to $100 toward a computer or tablet.

However, it came with a major caveat: The $14.2 billion Congress allocated toward the program was a one-time thing. When the money ran out at some point in the future, Congress would have to infuse the program with more money or find a more permanent funding solution.

That future has officially arrived. More than 23 million American households, about 45% of all those eligible nationwide, will no longer receive the full subsidies that previously helped them get online. Two-thirds of those households had “inconsistent or zero connectivity prior to ACP enrollment,” a recent Federal Communications Commission survey revealed.

Partial subsidies of $14 ($35 for households on Tribal lands) will be available for some ISP customers for service in May, according to an FCC notice. But that will be the program’s last disbursement.

“Many recent press reports about the impending end of this program describe how ACP households across the country are now facing hard choices about what expenses they have to cut, including food and gas, to maintain their broadband access, with some households doubtful they can afford to keep their broadband service at all,” FCC Chair Jessica Rosenworcel wrote in an April letter to congressional leaders. “These press reports echo what the Commission has been hearing from ACP households directly, with many writing the agency to express their distress and fear that ending this program could lead them to lose access to the internet at home.”

Case in point: Alfredo Camacho, who lives in Guadalupe, California, told CalMatters that because he is no longer able to afford home internet service, he’s started taking his daughters to the parking lot outside a local library so the family can use the free wifi to do homework and look for jobs.

“This takes away grocery money,” said Camacho, who is one of around three million Golden State residents losing access to the subsidy. “Being a single father, $30 goes a long way.”

In anticipation of the shut-down, the program stopped accepting new sign-ups in early February. Participating households started receiving notifications about the program’s potential shuttering in January. After it ends, internet service providers are required to allow ACP-using households to cancel without termination fees.

The program has been an essential part of how millions of Americans get online, with nearly one-in-five U.S. households relying on the subsidy to keep their internet subscriptions active. Uptake has been especially strong in areas with high-poverty rates in both urban and rural areas.

Here is a Forbes story from May 6, 2024, with no acknowledgment of rural difference or disadvantage:

Congress first allocated $14.2 billion to the Affordable Connectivity Program in December of 2021, and that money—used to provide a $30 to $75 stipend toward internet bills per month and for a one-time discount toward the purchase of a laptop computer, desktop or tablet—is now running out.

The bill introduced to save the program would allocate $7 billion more to extend it through the end of the year and allow Congress to “work out the long-term changes that are needed for sustainable access,” according to Sen. Peter Welch (D-Vt.)

Before receiving the federal internet subsidy, almost 22% of program participants had no personal internet service and another 25% had only mobile internet, according to a 2023 survey by the Federal Communications Commission.

The same survey found that almost 77% of beneficiaries said they would need to make changes to their broadband plan if they stopped receiving the subsidy, with 30% saying they'd need to drop internet service altogether.

The New York Times reported on this pending wind-down in March.  

The program was tucked into the 2021 infrastructure law as a replacement for a pandemic-era program that provided certain households discounts on their internet bills. Although there is some bipartisan support to continue the subsidies, lawmakers have not passed an extension.

Interestingly, while it does not use the word "rural," it does include this somewhat counterintuitive quote from the Senator of South Dakota, a state popularly thought of as a rural place. 

But some Republicans have argued that the program is wasteful. In a December letter to the F.C.C., Senator John Thune of South Dakota and other Republican lawmakers raised concerns about the program subsidizing households that already had internet service. They have also pointed to findings from the F.C.C.’s Office of Inspector General, which has in recent months expressed concerns about some providers failing to comply with program rules and improperly claiming funds.

Finally, here's the Federal Communication Commission's webpage on the issue, which covers the basics, but/and also does not use the word "rural":  

The Affordable Connectivity Program stopped accepting new applications and enrollments on February 7, 2024. The last fully funded month of the program is April 2024.

All ACP households enrolled at the time of the enrollment freeze, February 7, 2024 at 11:59 PM ET, will be able to remain enrolled through the final month of ACP service if they are not required to be de-enrolled under FCC rules.

Households that are de-enrolled from the program, such as for failure to use their ACP-supported service, will not be able to re-apply or re-enroll in the ACP during the enrollment freeze.

ACP enrolled households are strongly encouraged to carefully review written notices from their internet company and from the Universal Service Administrative Company (USAC), the ACP administrator, about the ACP wind-down.

Households are also encouraged to consult their internet company to learn more about how the end of the ACP will impact their internet service and bills.

I'm glad that at least some of these sources recognize the rural angle on the digital divide.  

Community radio in rural India

Community radio has been gaining notable traction in India's rural regions. One reason is that rural communities in India suffer from lower literacy rates compared to urban areas. In 2018 rural areas in India had a 73.5% literacy rate compared to 87.7% in urban areas, making radio an effective way to communicate with the populace. 

Community radio is partially used to "bridge the information gap between urban and rural audiences." During large-scale flooding in 2013, three radio stations set up communication lines to allow people to call for help and reach their loved ones. In 2019, Radio Surabhi was able to alert people that a cyclone had hit Odisha, and it shared information about available shelters. 

Community radio became even more important during the first COVID-19 lockdown when it broadcast educational programs and spread community health guidelines, vaccine information, and more. Multiple community radio stations have popped up around India since 2008, many of which are products of NGOs and community service initiatives.   

One community radio station in particular has received worldwide attention. Alfaz-e-Mewat, which is loosely translated to "voice of the Mewati people" or "rural voices of Mewat." Mewat is the cultural region that spans the state of Haryana, Rajasthan, and Uttar Pradesh. Mewat district, a rural district in the foothills of the Aravali mountains, was renamed Nuh in 2016 and is one of the 22 districts in the northern Indian state of Haryana. 

Located roughly two hours south of Delhi, India, Nuh is "home to the country’s ethnic Meo Muslims and a minority Hindu population" and in recent years “has emerged as a hub of cyber crime and sextortion rackets.” 

Alfaz-e-Mewat broadcasts for 13 hours every day in Hindi, Urdu, and Mewati, reaching 225 villages. Millions of people listen in from all over Nuh as Alfaz-e-Mewat, through the Indian airwaves, provides various programs including group therapy, education, women's empowerment, and entertainment. 

This community station started raising awareness about the COVID-19 pandemic shortly before the first outbreak in India. Alfaz-e-Mewat's program "21 din 21 baatein," meaning "21 days 21 topics," hosted experts to speak on the importance of frequent handwashing, accessing healthcare, and social and physical distancing. They also encouraged spreading positivity and encouraged their listeners to try yoga. 

One Alfaz-e-Mewat reporter spoke about the importance of radio in disseminating this information saying, "In my village of 250 families, only one house has a television. So, you can understand how important our role is as reporters in this region."

This region of India has some of the lowest female literacy rates in the country. Only 1/3 of women in Nuh are literate and 90% of Nuh women have dropped out of school before the age of 10. The norm in Nuh is reportedly that of early marriages and violence against women. In this region, where women are considered beneath their male counterparts, Alfaz-e-Mewat is becoming the voice of change. 

Alfaz-e-Mewat was started in 2012 by the S.M. Sehgal Foundation, a nonprofit the government funded with $18,000. What started as a community radio station to promote water conservation and agrarian practices now helps women get connected to resources if they are experiencing domestic violence. It also helps stop the spread of disinformation and is transforming the lives of their female listeners. 

Alfaz-e-Mewat receives around 50 calls daily, many from women experiencing health-related problems. Dr. Yadav, who occasionally answers questions on the radio station, reported that women in this region are often neglected at home, leaving many of them with severe anemia. Anemia, which is a shortage of healthy red blood cells to carry the necessary oxygen to one's organs, can lead to weakness and dizziness. Increasing one's iron and protein intake is an antidote so Dr. Yadav instructed a listener on how to make protein-rich meals out of available ingredients like chickpeas.

Bhagwan Devi, a 51-year-old listener, was inspired by Alfaz-e-Mewat to start a campaign to build toilets inside houses in her village. Noor Mohmamd, a 65-year-old from Mubarakpur Rawalki village, says he's a fan of the radio station, which has led him to change his farming practices. Women across the district have been impassioned to get educated, get jobs, and gain protection from violence. 

“Community radio gives women a platform not only as listeners to get information, but as active participants" -Anjali Makhija, chief executive of S.M. Sehgal Foundation.

Moving backwards - Australia votes no for the indigenous voice to parliament

On Saturday 14 October, Australia was faced with a monumental opportunity to amend their Constitution with the nation's 45th referendum. The proposal was to recognise Australia's indigenous people - Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders - through a constitutionally enshrined body that provides non-binding advice to Parliament. This body is known as 'The Voice'. 

The Voice has been a project in the works since 2017, when the Uluru Statement from the Heart was presented to Australian's. The Statement was devised by a 16-member Referendum Council that travelled around Australia to consult with indigenous Australian's in regional areas, about what they believed would be the best step forward in creating a more equal future. The purpose of the Statement is for indigenous Australian's to actually be given the opportunity to have input over policies that directly effect on them. 

In the Referendum Council's final report released in 2017, they put forward two recommendations:

1. Constitutional reform to implement an advisory body that represents Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders; and

2. An extra-constitutional Declaration of Recognition enacted by legislation. 

After seven years of discussion, the first recommendation has finally been acted upon - but not in the way it was intended.

For what could ultimately be deemed as the most important referendum in Australian history, the 'Yes' campaign has been provided an immensely disappointing lack of promotion by the Australian government, while also having to battle against a wave of false information disseminated through various media platforms. The failure to adequately promote The Voice has left a frightening portion of the Australian population completely unaware of what it is, where it came from and most importantly, why it's desperately needed. 

To my absolute shock and horror, an alarming number of those unaware to The Voice are indigenous Australian's living in rural and remote areas. Yes, you read that correctly. The knowledge of The Voice that has been devised as an incredibly important mechanism to represent indigenous Australian's, has not been provided to Indigenous Australian's in remote areas. If this doesn't illustrate the inequality of the urban- rural divide, I really don't know what will. 

For a population that is already disadvantaged with basic, fundamental human rights such as access to health care and education, it appears that the remote Indigenous population is being further discriminated against based on their geographical location. While it can be argued this is not an intentional form of discrimination, it also demonstrates the lack of access to basic resources that rural populations face. 

Paul Kabai, an environmental activist based in Torres Strait, explained that access to any source of reliable information regarding The Voice was an extreme challenge.  

Nothing has been explained to the elders here on the [Sabai] Island ... talking with people about voting, it's all 'what is this referendum vote all about? What is the no, what is the yes?' Voting is just around the corner and there is nothing. 

The burden of seeking information was placed upon the remote communities, but with some of these areas not even having knowledge of The Voice's existence in the first place, there wasn't even the option to self-educate. As a young, white woman, with both a tertiary and private school education, I have come to realise the absolute privilege I have to be informed about national politics. For what I thought was just a factor of everyday life, is actually something I have taken completely for granted - and for this I feel completely ashamed and embarrassed. 

The idea that a constitutionally recognised body, devised to represent me, as an attempt to create a more equal future after centuries of intergenerational trauma and discrimination, was not even brought to my knowledge is simply beyond comprehension. This is not only an example of geographical discrimination, this is a shameful representation of Australia and its care towards remote populations. 

The result of the referendum was released in the late hours Saturday evening - an overwhelming 60.05% vote against The Voice resulted from a majority no vote within all six states and one territory. The one territory to have a majority vote for yes was the Australian Capital Territory (ACT), the home to the seat of the Australian government, and Australia's capital city, Canberra. 

I think it would be completely ignorant to believe that this is merely coincidental. At this point, it is well known that The Voice was not well promoted by the government and the push from the Yes campaign came far too late. The fact that the ACT has the easiest access to any parliamentary based information - with more than half of the population within the ACT are government workers - speaks volumes about what could have happened if every state and territory received the same amount of education. 

The ACT is known as Australia's only city-state. Almost all of its 472,000 population live within urban areas and its agricultural industry provides an insignificant input to the economy. As can be seen below, geographically, information doesn't have very far to travel within the ACT, which places them in a serious point of advantage when it comes to being educated on governmental based issues and incentives. 

Australian Capital Territory marked out on an Australian map. 

Image sourced from Getty Images.

While I strongly believe that self-education is the responsible thing to do when it comes to exercising your right to vote, the reality is, the majority of Australian's are lazy. If they are not spoon fed exactly what they need to know, they simply will not attempt anything further. The fact that the ACT voted yes isn't because they are most progressive out of all states and territories, its because they have the easiest access to all the relevant information.

A further factor of concern around the dissemination of information to rural areas, is that indigenous Australian's make up the majority of rural and remote populations. The lack of engagement with these remote communities has been expressed by Mulgyin Jaru-Kitja and Gooniyandi woman, Corina Martin, in what can only be described as an accurate, yet heart breaking summary:

That's a problem with anything to do with Aboriginal people, we are the last lot to get information on ourselves.

While there are strong arguments that The Voice wasn’t the best solution to centuries of abuse and oppression, it was going to be a step in the right direction and the platform for future development. The Australian government and politics has never been a perfect system. So why all of sudden are we wanting a perfect solution? 

As explored in a previous blog post, the theory of 'interest convergence' coined by an American law professor seems to be applicable in this circumstance. Black people only achieve civil rights victories only where white and black interests converge. White Australia has demonstrated in this referendum, that indigenous rights are not within their interests. 

Australia is allegedly the country of giving everyone a ‘fair go’; but this decision has showcased anything but. Just like the kangaroo and emu (our national animal and bird, which can only physically move forwards, not backwards) on the coat of arms, we are meant to be a nation that has the ability to only move forwards. Yet here we are, running back to our white, conservative origins.

Hollywood stereotypes of rural America

When I was a kid, I loved day trips to Chicago. I remember my grandmother having to sign a clearance contract because I "accidentally" stumbled onto the “Transformers 3” set and got picked up by a camera. Movies about Chicago, or even just ones filmed there, have always been my favorite because I get to see a little slice of my childhood on the screen. But when it comes to movies from my real childhood, tucked away in the rural Midwest, I often find myself cringing at the media stereotypes.

I was recently encouraged to watch the movie, “Hillbilly Elegy”, for a class about whiteness in Rural America. However, I fail to see how this movie was anything more than a jaundiced example of media tactics. Stories of underdogs overcoming poverty, abuse, and addiction can be found on any street in America, not just the rural backroads. Yet, Hollywood only uses this type of plot-line as a heartstring blockbuster for people of color, such as “The Blind Side”, or to further depreciate the image of rural whiteness.

Rural America is shown by the media to be either "hicks and hayseeds" or "criminal kingpins and murderers." Dramatic television shows such as Ozark and Sons of Anarchy depict a rural lifestyle of crime, whereas "reality" shows such as Here Comes Honey Boo Boo and Duck Dynasty uphold the hillbilly tropes. This is seen across Hollywood and has been around since the early 1900s. A 1904 film, "The Moonshiner", depicts rural Americans breaking the law in order to drink. The behavior shown in media such as this culminates and fosters these rural cliches to the point where Rosann Kent, Appalachian studies professor at the University of North Georgia, asks, "Why are we the last acceptable stereotype?" 

This cliche becomes particularly harmful when the political climate of America is considered. The US is increasingly politically polarized and this difference in opinion has been leading to violence. From the January 6 insurrection to protests that turned violent against speakers on college campuses, politics have become a method of assuming one’s moral character and can even determine one's safety and social acceptance. Rural Americans get portrayed as being alt-right and are even being credited as the reason Trump won in 2016. 

Rurality is painted by the media as being predominantly white, with a culture of poverty and addiction. Although there is some truth to both poverty and addiction rates in rural communities, many rural areas thrive culturally. A previous article can be found here describing how music is an integral part of Appalachian culture. By whitewashing rurality, Hollywood loses any appreciation for minority groups who inspire and elevate rural livelihoods.

Furthermore, there are many parallels exist in how rural Americans and people of color are depicted. Unwhite: Appalachia, Race, and Film examines this further and argues:

Appalachian people in cinema have been portrayed as phenotypically white, but using the same tropes that have long been used to portray non-whites in film . . . The similarity in the way these groups are portrayed draws a connection between the treatment of non-whites and the treatment of Appalachians, both of which maintain and protect a particular image of whiteness.

I have personally experienced the negative impact of this "white trash" stereotype. When I moved to California, I experienced a culture shock so large I felt like I was in a different country. Being thrust into high-level academia with a background that matched these stereotypes, I was set up to be looked down upon. After the intro week of law school, I began to state that I was instead from Chicago, hoping that people would think I belonged there. I recategorized my uncle's hand-me-down tees into "vintage thrift finds" and made an aesthetic out of never owning clothes nice enough to ruin. However, I can't blame the people around me for making those assumptions. Most of my classmates are from urban areas and likely gathered their understanding of rurality through their media consumption. Even though many of the Hollywood portrayals are hyperbolic, the cumulation of negative stereotypes is othering rural people, and the misunderstood cliches need to be retired.

On rural voter turnout in the Pennsylvania primary

Near Coburn, Pennsylvania (Centre County)
(c) Lisa R. Pruitt 2018

The Philadelphia Inquirer ran this Pennsylvania primary analysis by Aseem Shukla and Julia Terruso last week (and it was re-published by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette).  The headline is "Pa. primary election set voter turnout records. Here’s what else the data show," and the subhead is "More Democrats and Republicans voted than in any midterm primary election in the last 25 years. The voter turnout data show how the state’s political geography is shifting."  

Mural in Millheim, Pennsylvania
(c) Lisa R. Pruitt 2018

Here are some select excerpts focusing on geography and the rural vote:  

The state’s urban-suburban-rural divides are also growing between — and within — the parties. Pennsylvania Republicans are increasingly relying on rural areas, while Democrats are becoming a party of city dwellers and suburbanites. Those shifting coalitions have far-reaching effects.

* * * 

Geographic sorting between the parties is continuing

The parties’ long pattern of geographic self-segregation continues: Republicans are increasingly a rural and exurban party, while Democrats rely on urban and suburban voters.

What’s less obvious, but equally important, is that there are also important geographic divides within the parties.

Consider rural counties. They’ve always been more important in Republican primaries than in Democratic ones. But Democratic primary votes from rural counties now make up just one-sixth of the statewide total — half the share they did 20 years ago.

Penn Valley (c)Lisa R. Pruitt 2018 

By contrast, rural votes have consistently made up a third of the Republican primary electorate, even as overall turnout has increased and the rural population has significantly declined.

Many of these voters were mobilized by Trump’s 2016 campaign and have stayed engaged.

* * * 

Democratic growth continues in the suburbs. For decades, the four Philadelphia collar counties were a more significant source of primary votes for Republicans than for Democrats. But over the last decade, that pattern has reversed.

In 2000, Democrats got only 10% of their primary vote from these suburbs. Now, it’s almost 25%. Since Trump’s election, that’s been a bigger share than Republicans get from the suburbs.

 * * * 

Rural Republicans vote differently from urban and suburban ones

It’s clear rural Republicans aren’t just becoming more reliable voters — they also tend to vote for different candidates.

While Oz and McCormick [Republican contenders for the U.S. Senate; Oz was ultimately declared the Republican nominee] performed almost equally well in all regions of the state, smaller counties had a special affinity for far-right candidates Barnette [Republican candidate for U.S. Senate] and Mastriano [Republican nominee for Governor].

What’s more, rural voters — as well as supporters of Barnette and Mastriano more broadly — also voted heavily in person, shunning mail voting even more than other Republicans, who already generally avoid it.

Madisonburg, Pennsylvania
(c) Lisa R. Pruitt 2018

The three candidates with the lowest share of mail votes were Mastriano, Oz, and Barnette. The first two were endorsed by Trump, who has railed against mail voting. The third claimed Trump’s mantle all the same.

This analysis uses the definition of the Center for Rural Pennsylvania:  

The Center for Rural Pennsylvania's definition of rural and urban is based on population density. Population density is calculated by dividing the total population of a specific area by the total number of square land miles of that area. According to the 2020 Census, the population of Pennsylvania is 13,002,700 and the number of square miles of land in Pennsylvania is 44,742. Therefore, the population density is 291 people per square mile.

A county or school district is rural when the number of people per square mile within the county or school district is fewer than 291. Counties and school districts that have 291 people or more per square mile are considered urban.

A municipality is rural when the number of people per square mile in the municipality is fewer than 291 or the municipality is in a rural county and has fewer than 2,500 residents. All other municipalities are considered urban.

According to the Center's definition, there are 48 rural counties and 19 urban counties in Pennsylvania. In 2020, nearly 3.4 million residents, or 26 percent of the state's 13.0 million residents, called these rural counties home.

At the school district level, 238 of the state's 500 public school districts are rural. During the 2020-2021 school year, 374,732 public school students attended schools in rural districts, or 25 percent of the state's nearly 1.41 million public school students.

At the municipal level, 1,649, or 64 percent, of the state's 2,560 municipalities are rural and 911 municipalities, or 36 percent, are urban. In 2020, rural municipalities had a total of 2.9 million residents or 22 percent of the state's population. Urban municipalities had 10.1 million residents or 78 percent of the state's population.

Always going to bat for rural America--and making sure his rural constituents know it

This was going to be a post about Senator Jon Tester's (D-Montana) advocacy on behalf of a rural post office in northwestern Montana, so I had written this:  

Don't know the story behind the Corum, Montana Post Office--why it, specifically, was threatened with closure--but U.S. Senator Jon Tester was tweeting about it a few days ago, so I figure it really matters to folks in Flathead County.   Corum is a Census Designated Place with a population of 539.  

Tweet sent June 27, 2022

As he often does when talking about how important the U.S. Post Office is to rural folks, Tester mentions how it facilitates rural residents' access to prescription drugs and Social Security benefits. 

Threatened closure to U.S. Post Office locations has been a preoccupation of rural communities for a decade.  You'll find many posts here.  

I always appreciate the details in how Senator Tester communicates with his constituents--naming specifics, here tiny Corum, elsewhere the roads, bridges, water projects and so forth that are getting the benefits of Build Back Better.  

* * * 

Then, before I got that posted, Tester sent two other tweets, in quick succession, about how he is helping rural folks.  One is about keeping Veterans Administration (VA) clinics open in Montana, and the other is about policies that will keep skilled nursing facilities open.  

Tweets sent June 28, 2022 mid afternoon EST

I wish other senators paid as much attention to their rural constituents--and communicated with them as effectively.  I don't know of any other senator who uses the word "rural" as frequently in tweets as Tester does.  

More on cultivating the rural vote, from Maxmin and Woodward's Dirt Road Revival

The book Dirt Road Revival: How to Rebuild Rural Politics and Why Our Future Depends on It, by Chloe Maxmin and Canyon Woodward, will be released in a few weeks by Beacon Press.  I can't wait to read it.  Meanwhile, I picked up these nuggets from the authors' interview with Dorothy Wickenden of the New Yorker podcast.  

First, on urban arrogance (and attendant dismissiveness of the rural), there's this: 

[The national Democrats] totally abandoned grassroots organizing in these spaces and that was reflected at the highest level of party leadership. But, you know, folks like the chair Tom Perez, that you can't door knock in rural America and Chuck Schumer's that, you know, for every blue collar that we lose in Western Pennsylvania will pick up two in the suburbs of Philadelphia and largely Democratic leaders were nowhere to be seen in rural America. 

We weren't listening. We weren't cultivating relationships of trust. We were not telling a story that spoke to the sharp pain and struggles of the rural working-class and. So that just created a huge void and into that the young, contested battlefield crushed right wing activist groups, media personalities and that's what led to the rise of Donald Trump and the capture of state legislatures that we're experiencing today.

To this, I'll just note that ceding door knocking in rural America is like saying we can't be bothered to provide broadband or a quality education or a rural hospital because you can't achieve economies of scale in places with sparse population.  

And on that note, second, I was interested in Maxmin's estimate that you can knock on about 100 doors a day in rural Maine, where she won a state senate seat that included the place she grew up, Nobleboro, in Lincoln County:  

I think you know it sounds so basic, but it's the most human and humane thing we can do is just go talk to people, go have an honest conversation about why we're failing, why people don't believe in us and see if there's any space to repair that relationship. 

It's simple in theory. You know, putting it to practice can be tricky because it has been under 200 doors a day and it's easy and are distracting, not to take away our drive from end to end and you know 100 doors a day is what someone can manage. So, it requires more time. It requires more investment, more volunteers, more resources. But we just can't take the easy way out. We keep doing that for too long, we are facing incredibly dire consequences. So, we just got to go talk to folks and make sure that what we hear is being reflected and how we campaign, how we message, how we serve and office.

Third, there is this, connecting to what is happening in other states:

And I think of Beto in Texas and Stacey Abrams in Georgia are key examples of that where it's all about people power campaigns and building these huge communities of volunteers that feel excited and motivated to go out into their communities and do this. Not all canvassing is created equal. 

You know, I think oftentimes when we've seen, you know, the party establishment come out in the rural areas and with clipboard wielding very generically trained folks or kind of whacking people over the head with policy and reading a script that that doesn't resonate and so not. It's not all created equal, but it is really all about having strong grassroots people powered campaigns.

I like to say that things move at the speed of relationship in rural America. And that's just like an essential part of life and our culture. And it's got to be in the central part of our organizing. If we're going to succeed, if the Democrats of all kinds appear to agree that the party is in need of some very serious soul searching.

Don't miss the interview, which you can hear in its entirety here.  

Related posts are here and here--and really every post under the "rural vote" (422 posts in 15 years!) or "rural politics" label. 

Postscript:  On May 2, this essay by Maxmin and Woodward appeared in the New York Times.  The headline is "How Two Democrats Fought and Won in Rural America" and "What Democrats Don't Understand About Rural America."  I'm going to excerpt here some of the more practical aspects of the piece.  

In our two campaigns, we turned down the party consultants and created our own canvassing universe — the targeted list of voters whom we talk to during the election season. In 2020, this universe was four times larger than what the state party recommended. It included thousands of Republicans and independents who had (literally) never been contacted by a Democratic campaign in their entire time voting.

Our campaign signs? Hand-painted or made of scavenged wood pallets by volunteers, with images of loons, canoes and other hallmarks of the Maine countryside. Into the trash went consultant-created mailers. Instead, we designed and carried out our own direct mail program for half the price of what the party consultants wanted to charge while reaching 20 percent more voters.

Volunteers wrote more than 5,000 personal postcards, handwritten and addressed to neighbors in their own community. And we defied traditional advice by refusing to say a negative word about our opponents, no matter how badly we wanted to fight back as the campaigns grew more heated.

Also of interest are some of the voice memos Maxmin made to herself as she canvassed.  Here's that context:   

Chloe has knocked on more than 20,000 doors over the last two cycles, listening to stories of loss and isolation. One man told her she was the first person to listen to him; most campaigns, he said, didn’t even bother to knock on his door — they judged him for what his house looked like.

* * *

When we first embarked down this road, the path was rocky. Chloe came home from canvassing distraught one day and dictated a voice memo to herself: “I talked to a lot of people I’ve known my whole life, and they wouldn’t commit to vote for me.” They knew she was a good person; the only reason they refused to support her was that she was a Democrat.

Another day she met a couple who thought people should be able to snowmobile and hunt and fish and ride ATVs on protected lands. Chloe told them she agreed; while she considers herself extremely progressive, there are some things she thinks the left is too rigid on.

Here's another interesting observation:  

What much of the party establishment doesn’t understand is that rural life is rooted in shared values of independence, common sense, tradition, frugality, community and hard work.

Biden's rural infrastructure tour will publicize "Rural Playbook"

Here's a key paragraph from the White House's "Rural Playbook," which was publicized in a press release with a very unwieldy headline, "Biden Administration Releases Rural Playbook, Launches Building A Better America Rural Infrastructure Tour to Highlight Impact of Bipartisan Infrastructure Law on Rural America."  A key paragraph--listing lots of states that will benefit, all with significant rural populations--follows:   

Across the month of April, the Biden-Harris administration will announce billions for rural areas including rural water projects, flood mitigation, transportation, healthcare, and tribal community grants, along with new technical assistance programs for rural and tribal communities. Earlier this month, the Department of the Interior announced $420 million for rural water systems across six states: Iowa, Minnesota, Montana, New Mexico, North Dakota and South Dakota. Today, the President is also announcing a $1 billion America the Beautiful Challenge that will leverage Federal conservation and restoration investments with private and philanthropic contributions to accelerate land, water, and wildlife conservation efforts across the country. The America the Beautiful Challenge is anchored by an initial commitment of $440 million of Federal resources over the next five years to a new public-private grant program, administered by the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation (NFWF), that will support locally led ecosystem restoration projects that invest in watershed restoration, resilience, equitable access, workforce development, corridors and connectivity, and collaborative conservation, consistent with the America the Beautiful Initiative. The America the Beautiful Challenge will offer states, Tribes, territories, local groups, non-governmental organizations, and others the opportunity to apply for multiple grant programs through a single application that is managed by NFWF.

Note the key role of the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, among many federal agencies with a footprint in rural America.  Interesting.   

Meanwhile, Biden was in Iowa today to announce the relaxation of rules regarding production and sale of "E15," ethanol-infused gasoline, in light of sky-rocketing fuel prices due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine.  Here's what that looked like in White House publicity in advance of the trip (as picked up by a New Orleans news source because former New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu is involved in this initiative as infrastructure coordinator: 

The president will travel to Menlo, Iowa, on Tuesday, a small town about 40 miles west of Des Moines, to discuss the infrastructure law's impact on rural communities, as well as efforts to lower costs for working families and combat inflation.

Other officials participating in the rural tour include Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo, Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm, EPA Administrator Michael Regan, Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and Infrastructure Coordinator Mitch Landrieu.

Biden said that the tour will "double down on our unwavering commitment to building a better America where rural communities thrive."

And here's how the Washington Post and Des Moines Register covered the story today.  Here's the NPR coverage.  

Postscript:  Here is the Daily Yonder's coverage of the Rural Playbook, written by Bryce Oates.  

Postal Service Reform Act finally signed into law

This is a topic with big implications for rural America (as evidenced by dozens of past posts here on Legal Ruralism):  "USPS gets a financial overhaul: Here's what we know about the Postal Service Reform Act."  Ella Lee reported for USA today a few days ago.  Here's an excerpt:  

Under the law, the mandate that required the Postal Service to pay into future retiree health benefits will be dropped. Instead, retired postal employees will be required to enroll in Medicare.

In addition, the USPS must maintain a public dashboard tracking service performance and will report regularly on its "operations and financial condition," according to a summary of the bill. It will also be able to create "non-postal services" in partnership with state and local government, like fishing licenses and subway passes, said [Porter McConnell, chair of the Save Our Post Office coalition].

The bill will save the Postal Service almost $50 billion over the next decade, according to Michigan Sen. Gary Peters, chairman of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee.

"This bill, which has been 15 years in the making, will finally help the Postal Service overcome burdensome requirements that threaten their ability to provide reliable service to the American people,” Peters, a Democrat, said in a March 8 statement.

In surfing around the Internet for comments on the law in relation to rural America in particular, I found this on PBS:  

Lawmakers from both parties attended the signing ceremony and the mood was jovial, a big improvement from Kansas Republican Sen. Jerry Moran previously saying the service was in a “death spiral” that was particularly hard on rural Americans.

The USPS is a topic Senator Jon Tester (D-MT) often speaks of in relation to rural America, as in April 6 Tweet, where he notes that legislators have been working on this law for 15 years and that it ensures 6-day-a week delivery, which is especially important in places like Montana where so many rural folks rely on the U.S. mail for things like prescription drug delivery: 

 

Morning Consult poll on rural attitudes toward the Democratic Party, and what one rural U.S. Senator is doing to reach his constituents

We've seen lots of stories about how Democrats should seek and can win the rural vote in the past few weeks (see earlier posts here and here, along with late 2021 post), and a big one appeared a few days ago.  It's from Morning Consult titled, "The Culture War Has Democrats Facing Electoral Demise in Rural America. Can They Stop the Bleeding?"  The piece by Eli Yokley leads with these data points, which are sobering for the Democrats: 

• 65% of rural voters view the Democratic Party unfavorably — including 48% who do so strongly.
• Among 21 issues tested, a rural voter’s desire for candidates to support securing the U.S.-Mexico border had the strongest correlation with negative views about the Democratic Party.
• Only 23% of rural voters say the Democratic Party “cares more about my community” than the GOP.

These are drawn from the results of Morning Consult's mid-January survey of 1,525 self-identified rural voters.  This bit of the story explains why rural voters remain so important:  

The Democratic Party’s attrition in America’s shrinking yet politically powerful rural communities was obscured during Donald Trump’s presidency, with the GOP’s suburban decline ultimately helping deliver Democrats a governing trifecta in Washington despite state-level losses.

But Democrats may no longer be able to rely on the suburbs given President Joe Biden’s mounting struggles that threaten to again highlight his party’s weaknesses in rural communities, where new Morning Consult research reveals culture-driven displeasure with the party in power. Some prominent Democrats believe an immediate course correction is required for the party to avoid perhaps decades in the political wilderness.

“The root issue is that rural voters are worth more in both the Senate and the Electoral College,” said Democratic data scientist David Shor, a 2012 campaign guru for President Barack Obama who has spent years warning his party that it faces extinction in the country’s more remote areas. “Either Democrats make these adjustments and do better with working-class voters, or they get locked out of the federal government for a very long time.”

This piece in The Hill by Hannah Trudo does not focus on rural voters only, but rather on Democrat messaging.  Same regarding this piece from Politico.  Jeff Greenfield offers his opinion under the headline, "Democrats are Losing the Culture War.  A Messaging Shift Won't Change Them."  This piece by Stanley Greenberg, the famed Democratic pollster, focuses on cross-racial coalition building among working-class voters.  

Meanwhile, back specifically on the rural front, I follow U.S. Senator Jon Tester (D-Montana) on Twitter, and it strikes me that he does a brilliant job of reaching his rural constituents using social media.  I'm pasting screenshots of some of his recent tweets below, where he has been touring Montana cities and towns, from mid-sized ones like those in the Flathead/Kalispell region and small ones like Havre, on the so-called Hi-Line, which is the strip along the Canadian border.  I like the respectful way he listens to and communicates with his constituents--and the way in which he lets them know what he's doing for them.  The recent infrastructure bill has given him lots of opportunities to talk specifics with particular communities.  All of these screenshots were taken on February 23 and 24, which shows just how busy Tester stays when he goes home to Montana. 

Tester has also spearheaded an effort to rein in the power of meatpackers and thus protect ranchers:  

February 26, 2022

Tester also tweets regularly abut issues with the U.S. Post Office (reductions in service hit rural areas especially hard) and the need to expand broadband to all rural folks  

In short, it seems that Tester is out doing what Steve Bullock, former governor of Montana, said he could not do during his pandemic run for U.S. Senate against the state's junior senator, Steve Daines:  Tester is out talking to people, conveying his interest in them and their challenges.  He is also communicating his values and personally countering the negative stereotypes of Democrats in rural Montana--the stereotypes Bullock said he could not counter during the height of the pandemic.  

Here's Tester's Twitter bio, with his barn, near Big Sandy, MT, in the background.  His prior bio showed a photo of him in his tractor.  In this one, he's pictured in work clothes beside a big truck used to transport what he grows.  In sum, he is unabashedly and unashamedly rural and not in the least bit elitist or playing to coastal elites.  It's refreshing that he doesn't seem to care about what urban elites think.  He knows who his most important audience is. 

February 26, 2022

But Tester does "international" too.  Here's a Tweet stemming from his work on the defense appropriations subcommittee, related to the Ukraine crisis: 

February 26, 2022

And this tweet highlights his work on behalf of veterans.  He chairs the Veteran's Affairs Committee, which is a frequent subject of tweets, including when he visits veterans services facilities in Montana.    

February 26, 2022

Just goes to show that domestic and international service, action, and expertise are not at odds with each other. It strikes me that Tester is doing both--and he's doing them very well.  Indeed, he's not only doing a good job serving his constituents, he's communicating well to his constituents--and people like me who are not his direct constituents--what he is doing for them.   

Other posts about Tester are here, here, here, and here.