Abstract
Community resilience is central to reshaping the role and functions of rural areas; and development has increasingly come about via the capacity of communities to be resilient in the face of challenges. When policies designed and adopted in rural areas are place-based; these policies should rely on resilient actors; belonging to resilient communities. The aim of this article is to focus on factors that can trigger or re-activate mechanisms that help to actively build resilience in areas that are heavily economically and socially impoverished using as a case study a very active and dynamic rural community. From the case study; three aspects emerge; all of which are closely interrelated; as having been particularly significant for building community resilience. The first was the rebuilding of previously frayed social ties within the community (growth of social capital and increased trust). The second was the ‘cascade effect’ of the first project started in the community; which led to the creation of many other initiatives. The third was the adoption of a systemic approach; able to bring together areas and sectors that had previously been disconnected (breaking down technical-legislative barriers).
Highlights
In recent decades, inner rural areas have experienced major economic and social changes that have sometimes resulted in increasing marginalization associated with primary sector dominance, insufficient infrastructure in terms of roads and public services, economic and demographic transition and population decline, and, rising unemployment, outmigration of economically active groups, and ageing (Copus et al, 2011 [1] in [2]) [3,4]
For those localities caught in ‘under-development traps’, it is argued that external public policy action can be used as a trigger for endogenous change, in that local actors are tasked with developing their own development projects, which are tailored to the local reality, whilst general conditions for local actors to follow are set by levels of higher governance [6,15].The premise of the place-based approach, especially when dealing with rural development, is that creating local development strategies that capitalize on local uniqueness will enable territories to develop products and services matched to local assets, which can create a niche market in the increasingly globalised markets of modern times [16]
Opportunities linked to farming and tourism (31%), quality of grape vines What are the positive characteristics of Caggiano? (30%), environmental quality (18%), and the chance to live in a community where people help each other out (19%)
Summary
Inner rural areas have experienced major economic and social changes that have sometimes resulted in increasing marginalization associated with primary sector dominance, insufficient infrastructure in terms of roads and public services, economic and demographic transition and population decline, and, rising unemployment, outmigration of economically active groups, and ageing (Copus et al, 2011 [1] in [2]) [3,4]. In more recent times, the role of localities and regions in fostering economic growth has increasingly taken centre stage [9] as well as the idea that achieving sustainable development goals and viable economic development strategies in rural areas is dependent on viewing the unique aspects of the social, institutional, and economic fabric of localities as the filter through which all economic activity takes hold in a particular region [10,11,12,13] This has led bodies like the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) to adopt a “place-based” perspective [14] where policy design is focused on increasing competitiveness in defined geographical areas by developing and enhancing the local community’s unique assets and attributes [7]. Local assets can be fixed attributes which policy intervention can in truth do little to change, e.g., physical geography, climate, natural resources, previous infrastructure investment, population structure, or more malleable attributes which can certainly be modified, e.g., leadership capacity, community ties, and quality of local governance [17]
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