Rural women in politics

This piece by Marie Wilson in the Star Tribune last week, promoted on The White House Project website, talks of the value women bring to politics. Significantly for purposes of this blog, it also documents the path of women in rural northeastern Minnesota who are seeking or have been elected to local public office. I found their diversity, undertakings, and causes inspiring.

Could the housing slump represent good news for rural places?

A story on NPR this morning reported that, in the recent housing slump, houses in the suburbs and exurbs have fared worst in terms of loss of value. The values of homes in neighborhoods with short commutes and/or available public transportation have proven more stable. Analysts are seeing a halt in sprawl, previously believed to be inexorable: sprawl.

This is good news for families, the environment, and the preservation of rural places, though experts caution that it may prove temporary.

The rural/urban axis in China

I heard a story on NPR yesterday about the rural-urban divide in China and how the burgeoning urban middle class are increasingly drawn to rural China for week-end getaways. It sounded similar to the way we use rural America, but is a more recent trend there. The story highlighted some aspects of the rural-urban divide in China that I've given some thought to -- specifically how vast the divide is there, compared to here, economically and otherwise. For example, 10 million rural Chinese do not have electricity, according to the story. Educational and economic opportunities are so much greater in cities than the in the country that migration to the former is overwhelming. Somewhat more related to law are the reports I have read of disparities between rural and urban enforcement of the one-child policy.

So what do the rural Chinese think about the influx of urbanites, seeking inns and tranquil getaways, but also altering the landscape? According to the reporter, they say "bring it on." They see the urbanites' presence as an opportunity to sell their produce and crafts and to improve their own lot.

It's a good thing I was jotting down notes as I listened to the story because I couldn't find it on the NPR website when I wanted to add the link to this post. What I did find when I searched for "rural" and "China," however, was a long list of recent stories using both of those words -- which is interesting in and of itself.

Housing in rural Appalachia gets a helping hand in memory of a Virginia Tech victim

This poignant story on the eve of the first anniversary of the Virginia Tech massacre is a reminder of the poor conditions in which so many rural Americans live.

The program featured in this story is Appalachian Service Project (ASP), which is now being endorsed by Bryan and Renee Cloyd, parents of slain Virginia Tech student Austin Cloyd. Cloyd had participated in four, week-long work projects with the program, which repairs dilapidated houses in Appalachia. Upon her death, Austin Cloyd's parents asked that donations be made in her honor to the program, and some $70K came in almost immediately. They realized they were on to something, and they have since escorted 150 Virginia Tech students and faculty on week-end house repair trips.

Austin's father said his daughter's experiences with ASP shaped her goals and that he is now honoring her passion for social justice. A Virginia Tech accounting professor, he comments about those who died there a year ago: "They should be known for how they lived rather than how they died." Thanks to the Cloyds' efforts, many residents of Appalachia will reap the rewards of that legacy.

And here's Bob Herbert with a plausible explanation for the gaffe

See Herbert's column here.

And here's William Kristol asserting the elitism of Obama's gaffe

Here's the editorial page piece from the New York Times. In it Kristol notes a number of points on which Obama's comments to that San Francisco audience appear inconsistent with both his positions on issues and the person he has held himself out to be.

But is the elitism Kristol asserts about the urban/rural (a/k/a small town) divide? Or it more of a class thing? On this issue, I found interesting the comments of Sherry Linkon, co-director of the Center for Working Class Studies at Youngstown State University, and other guests on today's Talk of the Nation.

This piece on the rural/urban political divide was published a week before Obama's "small town ... bitter" gaffe

This story from the Daily Yonder uses recent events in Oregon to illustrate its thesis that "Rural/Urban Political Division is 'Recipe for Resentment.'" In March, the Oregon legislature took away money that funded rural development programs in the state. At about the same time, the Oregon governor closed the Office of Rural Policy, which he had opened only four years earlier. The story seeks to explain why rural voters, who previously voted Democratic, now tend to vote Republican.

It was an interesting fore-runner -- albeit in an admittedly obscure outlet -- to the comments about small-town voters that have Obama in hot water. What he said (bitterness of small town voters who've suffered economically for a quarter century explains why they cling to their guns and religion) and the audience to which he said it (San Franciscans) further illustrates the rural-urban political divide. It also illustrates the perils of trying to explain that divide in a way that seems to pit the interests -- and indeed character -- of one group against the other. Just as the high density of acquaintanceship associated with rurality means that rural residents know their neighbors are likely to hear gossip about themselves, in this age of media saturation about every word uttered by the candidates, Obama should have known that what he said about those small town voters would get back to them . . .

The fishbowl of rural life, exaggerated for a former president

A few aspects of this story about the "fishbowl" in which South Korea's former president is living struck me as interesting in relation to the rural. Journalist Choe Sang-Hun notes that Roh Moo-Hyun, who left office only in February, returned to live in his natal town, the tiny village of Bongha in Southeast Korea, population 121. While his approval rating was once as low as 30%, crowds now throng to the small town and chant outside his gate for him to make an appearance, which he does several times a day. Choe notes that, while many of the nation's presidents have hailed from rural areas, they have chosen to make their homes in Seoul once out of office.

How interesting that in a country associated with such a single massive city, Seoul, that a number of presidents have hailed from rural places. Indeed, in a country so densely populated, I find it amazing that "rural" places still exist. When I visited South Korea about a year ago, I was driven through the area where the former President now lives. I recall our guide talking about these "rural" parts of Korea, although the Koreans I met tended to refer to their entire county outside Seoul and the country's second city, Busan (less than an hour from the former President's home in Bongha), as "rural." Indeed, some areas through which I passed did look "rural." Some small-scale farms still exist, and in many ways, "country life" looks quite different to that in the city. Plus, at least in the Southeast where I visited, vast areas are essentially unpopulated and apparently unusable for agriculture because of the country's mountainous terrain.

Here's a passage from the story that reflects various rural themes or stereotypes:

“I didn’t particularly like him when he was president,” said Lee Soo-in, 22, a college student. “But it really feels good to be able to see a former president up close and see where he lives. He feels like an uncle next door. We don’t have such intimacy with other former presidents. They all maintain an authoritative, boring persona.”

Other visitors included a kindergarten teacher and her 67 students. The teacher said she brought the children so that they could be inspired by Roh's "rags-to-fame" story. The former president's family was too poor to send him to college so he was self-educated, even passing the bar exam without attending a law school.

These comments raise a few questions and observations related to the rural:

• While the former president's presence has improved the economic lot of some locals, I wonder how they feel about the crowds who come day in, day out, apparently all day. It must be disrupting their routines in ways that are not altogether pleasing.
• Would the former president seem "like an uncle next door" if he were living in Seoul? To what extent does his decision to return to his obscure, rural home cloak him in this persona?
  
• In what ways does Mr. Roh's rural origin enhance his "rags-to-fame" persona? Perhaps his return to his home town gives Koreans a reason to wax sentimental about their own rural past, something I observed many doing when I visited last year. Indeed, from the generation who came of age after the Korean war, an era of rapid industrialization for the nation, I heard nostalgia for their rural past, even as they also acknowledge the wealth associated with their urbanized and high-tech present and future.

Ah, the delights of out-of-the-way places (even in Texas)

I enjoyed this story about "The Texas Country Reporter," a television program comprised of human interest features from obscure corners of Texas, mostly rural and non-metro places that would otherwise go unnoticed, unknown. Host Bob Phillips has produced more than 2,000 programs in his 35-year career, and he's about to go national.

Here's a nice quote about what the program represents culturally, and in the context of 21st century journalism.

“For many of us who grew up here, Bob tells us about the Texas we remember and that is probably vanishing,” said Tony Pederson, professor and Belo Distinguished Chair in Journalism at Southern Methodist University, Mr. Phillips’s alma mater. “His is a stop-and-smell-the-roses style of reporting that is so deceptively simple and yet so effective in terms of the quality of storytelling he produces. There’s a pretty good journalism lesson in that.”

Ah, there's that rural nostalgia thing again . . . I was also interested to learn that, in addition to being broadcast weekly on 25 Texas stations, the program is beamed eight times a week on the "rural satellite and cable network RFD-TV," which reaches 30 million households nationally. I'd never heard of this network, but then I don' t have cable. It's a clever name, though. For those of you who don't know, RFD stands for "rural free delivery," an initiative of the U.S. postal service early in the 20th century to deliver mail to rural residents, rather than require them to pick it up at a post office.

In light of all this, I assume the word "country" in the program's name is meant to connote "rural" (as in city mouse and the country mouse), rather than Texas's sense that it is a country (nation-state) unto itself.

Bandana Project -- Raising Awareness of Sexual Harassment and Violence against Farmworkers

The link to a story about an initiative of the Southern Poverty Law Center is here. (Photo by Dave Bunder, Montgomery Advertiser).

Polish Farmers Frustrated by EU Regulation

A story about Polish farming in today's NYTimes depicts its practices as either hopelessly outdated or on the cutting edge of sustainable, organic production.

The tale is one of small-scale farmers who have not adapted-- and in many cases have no plans to adapt -- to EU agricultural regulations. The story is chock full of information about the delights -- and sustainability-- of Poland's agricultural tradition. Did you know, for example, that Poland boasts a tradition of what we now tout as organic farming? Journalist Elisabeth Rosenthal reports that Poland is "a rare bastion of biological diversity, with 40,000 pairs of nesting storks and thousands of seed varieties that exist nowhere else in the world." It's therefore not surprising that long-time Polish farmers eschew genetically modified varieties. Indeed, contrary to EU and WTO mandates, all 16 Polish states have banned genetically modified organisms.

One reason that this story resonated so greatly with me is that it reminded me of how my maternal grandparents farmed in rural northwest Arkansas: a dirt-floor barn, hand milking, slaughtering on the property, not at a slaughterhouse; plowing with a horse or mule. Like the Polish farmers, they would have pleased Wendell Berry in their sustainable practices.

In Poland now, however, these practices fail to meet EU sanitation standards, which prohibit hand milking and require certain equipment for slaughtering. A consequence of the Polish tradition, a trend to which the small farms cling, is a failure to meet EU regulations, which leads in turn to a reversion to subsistence. Why not enjoy designation as organic farms? The answer, apparently, is too much EU paper work.

Rosenthal queries: Are farmers like these visionaries or Luddites? Are they behind the times -- or ahead of them? Are they a "nostalgic throwback" or the future, assuming they survive? Advocates of these farmers find broader importance in their practices, such as not contributing to climate change and not polluting the environment.

I wonder what this trend portends for the Polish countryside? Without farm income, the reversion to subsistence will surely hurt rural economies, which must already be endangered in an over-crowded Europe.