Global Integration and the Industrialization of the Countryside

Abstract

The last quarter of the 20th century has been defined by the growing integration of enterprises and regions into a global network of production and distribution. Advances in information and communication technologies have unleashed new contacts, and intercourse among people, transnational corporations pnd governments. During the late 18th century Adam Smith (1776) advanced the notion that the division of labour, and consequently economic prosperity, was limited by the extent of the market. The concept of proto-industrialization is used in order to provide an explanation of the transition from handicraft to factory production. During the thirty years there has been a revival of interest in the populist approach from researchers studying the process of rural development in Greece. The advance of rural industrialization was seriously hampered partly due to the limited and fragmented character of the market, and partly on account of the free trade policy implemented by the Ottoman Empire.