Many rural areas in the United States find themselves struggling to build local assets and create wealth, and, when this wealth is created, they often struggle to hold on it. Previous approaches to community and economic development have been inadequate in attempting to reverse these trends. Shifting to a new way of enabling economic development requires supporting innovative community leaders as they explore new ways of approaching the task at hand. It also requires thinking anew about the role of rural areas, based on valuing multiple forms of wealth natural, social, and human. There is a real need for an approach that can help stem the potential loss of existing wealth, and attract new investment that will allow rural areas to become valued partners in regional economies. This book provides an important insight into rural wealth creation as a sustainable economic development strategy. At the same time, a number of compelling issues are raised that merit future research effort and discussion. This book was originally published as a special issue of Community Development.
Introduction: Rural wealth creation as a sustainable economic
development strategy
1. Facilitating community wealth building: understanding
the roles played and capacities needed by coordinating institutions
2.
Socioeconomic development in an ultra-peripheral European region: the role of
a food regulatory council as a social anchor
3. Community forests as a wealth
creation strategy for rural communities
4. Community development and other
extra-religious functions of Islamic schools: a contemporary perspective from
the voices of stakeholders in two madrassas in Pakistan
5. International
amenity migration: implications for integrated community development
opportunities
6. A story about storytelling: enhancement of community
participation through catalytic storytelling
Shanna Ratner is the founder of Yellow Wood Associates, a woman-owned small business, based in St. Albans City, VT, USA, which specializes in community economic development in rural America.
Deborah Markley is the co-founder of the Center for Rural Entrepreneurship, a national non-profit based in Lincoln, NE, USA, which works with communities across North America to create and implement entrepreneurship development strategies.
