European Countryside Research Articles

The Women of Viharsarok: Peasant Women's Labour Activism in 1890s Hungary

AbstractThis article explores peasant women’s labour activism in 1890s Hungary, in the southeastern part of the Habsburg Empire, where repeated harvesters’ strikes and peasant uprisings took place during the second half of the nineteenth and early decades of the twentieth centuries, making it the first centre of agrarian workers’ socialist organizing in Hungary. Informed by a more inclusive approach to women’s activist histories and subaltern studies, this article develops a new perspective on the periodization and geography of the international and Hungarian history of women’s social movements, to contribute to the historiographies of peasant women’s labour activism in the Eastern European countryside.

Anniversary Editorial: 15 Volumes of European Countryside Issued

Abstract The paper evaluates the first 15 editions of the European Countryside magazine in relation to the EURORURAL conferences and international projects of the Department of Applied and Landscape Ecology of the Mendel University in Brno.

In Memoriam: Mats Morell

In Memoriam: Mats Morell

Sustainability and Agricultural Regeneration in Hungarian Agriculture

Generational renewal is a core issue in European agriculture. Despite the continuous efforts of governments and the EU Council, the ageing of farmers seems an unstoppable process, accompanied by land concentration, the decrease in agricultural activity and the transformation of the European countryside. Consequently, there is a very rich scientific literature analysing the problem; a great part of it argues that the young farmer problem consists, in fact, in a number of different problems, with these problems showing huge regional differences. Hungary, as a new member state, with a heterogeneous (both fragmented and concentrated) land-use structure offers a good field to analyse generational renewal. Our paper is based on the first results of an ongoing Horizon 2020 project analysing rural regeneration. As a part of the research study, 48 semi-structured interviews were conducted with young farmers, successors of farmers and new entrants into farming. In our paper, we explore how education, access to land and family traditions influenced generational renewal and how it impacts sustainability practices.

Urban sprawl into Natura 2000 network over Europe.

Urban growth is a major threat to biodiversity conservation at the global scale. Its impacts are expected to be especially detrimental when it sprawls into the landscape and reaches sites of high conservation value due to the species and ecosystems they host, such as protected areas. I analyzed the degree of urbanization (i.e., urban cover and growth rate) from 2006 to 2015 in protected sites in the Natura 2000 network, which, according to the Habitats and Birds Directives, harbor species and habitats of high conservation concern in Europe. I used data on the degree of land imperviousness from COPERNICUS to calculate and compare urban covers and growth rates inside and outside Natura 2000. I also analyzed the relationships of urban cover and growth rates with a set of characteristics of Natura sites. Urban cover inside Natura 2000 was 10 times lower than outside (0.4% vs. 4%) throughout the European Union. However, the rates of urban growth were slightly higher inside than outside Natura 2000 (4.8% vs. 3.9%), which indicates an incipient urban sprawl inside the network. In general, Natura sites affected most by urbanization were those surrounded by densely populated areas (i.e., urban clusters) that had a low number of species or habitats of conservation concern, albeit some member states had high urban cover or growth rate or both in protected sites with a large number of species or habitats of high conservation value. Small Natura sites had more urban cover than large sites, but urban growth rates were highest in large Natura sites. Natura 2000 is protected against urbanization to some extent, but there is room for improvement. Member states must enact stricter legal protection and control law enforcement to halt urban sprawl into protected areas under the greatest pressure from urban sprawl (i.e., close to urban clusters). Such actions are particularly needed in Natura sites with high urban cover and growth rates and areas where urbanization is affecting small Natura sites of high conservation value, which are especially vulnerable and concentrated in the Mediterranean region.

CROATIAN RURAL FUTURES IN 2030: FOUR ALTERNATIVE SCENARIOS FOR POSTSOCIALIST COUNTRYSIDE IN THE NEWEST E.U. MEMBER STATE

abstract The academic picture of a globalized European countryside, and particularly of rural areas in postsocialist, new member states of the European Union, is one of huge and increasing complexity, diversity, and uncertainties about the future. The aim of this research is to construct alternative scenarios for rural Croatia in 2030, acknowledging its postsocialist transition as an important framework. Future development scenarios were constructed by integrating quantitative and qualitative approaches. The main methods used were: factor and cluster analysis; Monte Carlo simulation; and Delphi method, involving 37 rural experts in two rounds of written questionnaires. Four scenarios were developed: Rural Renaissance, Shift, Road to Nowhere, and Growth without Development. These scenarios provide a set of well-documented and reasonable assumptions to aid in thinking about possible future paths for the Croatian countryside, while at the same time allowing for the discussion of rural development paradigms.

La petite exploitation agricole dans l’espace rural européen. Retour sur une figure controversée / The small farm in the European countryside. A look back at a controversial figure

Once considered to be on the verge of extinction, small-scale farming is regaining legitimacy through its contribution to the supply of fresh food via proximity relations. This note attempts to revisit conceptual and theoretical approaches by positioning the small farm in itshistory and context. New and recent typological studies show the great diversity of this social form in the European countryside. The attention paid to the social realities of the coming back of small-scale farming in Central and Eastern Europe, by decentring the gaze, enables to introduce other elements of analysis than those generally put forward.

The Risk of Losing Deserted Medieval Rural Settlements: Opportunities for Agroturism and Rural Development

Abstract A significant number of deserted medieval rural settlements have been identified in Europe. These sites are at risk of disappearance as a consequence of current urban development and cropping intensification implying that relevant features of the cultural landscape informing about past rural traditions in the European countryside may be lost. The objective of this article is to illustrate this fact by means of a case study consisting of a deserted medieval rural upland settlement in Wales. A field walk carried out in this site revealed that old rural traditions and past ways of living can be identified from its own bodily engagement with the surrounding landscape. This evidence is used to argue that strategies that involve personal experience of deserted medieval rural settlements such as agroturism may be implemented to protect these sites and the cultural information contained in them.

Is the European countryside depopulating? Case study Moravia

The paper investigates the recent population development of Moravian rural micro-regions. It divides all 72 micro-regions into four categories according to the relation of natural demographic balance and net migration in the period of 2012–2016. It showed that all size categories of the Moravian rural municipalities till 5000 inhabitants are gaining population by migration whereas small towns lose inhabitants. No relation between the demographic type of the countryside and unemployment was observed. It shows, that the Moravian rural areas are not depopulating in general, its demographic development does not depend on the unemployment. However, the Moravian countryside is differentiated. There are some extremely peripheral parts of Moravia often lacking any real urban centre, where the depopulation is the problem. Depopulating micro-regions can be found in the northern, south-western and eastern periphery of Moravia. Such territories should be solved individually according to the local conditions.

Winter Crones and Bread-Givers: The Northern Iberian Vieya

La Vieya (the old woman) is a figure from the oral tradition of north-western Iberia. She is portrayed as performing work traditionally perceived as feminine, such as spinning or baking. She lives on certain mountaintops and prominent rocks, often those containing caves. Her power over the climate gives her an almost divine stature. La Vieya reveals a web of symbols and meaning which connect femininity with prosperity and food production, while fitting these symbols into specific moments of the year cycle. Her cult is evidence that for centuries people in the Iberian north-west were able and allowed to discreetly keep alive what amounted to a non-Christian worship, alien to the state-sanctioned religion. A negotiation occurred between the more conspicuous manifestations of culture, as produced by literate elites, and the unnoticed folk culture. The Christianization of the European countryside remained an ongoing and perpetually unfinished process.

Demographic Challenges in Rural Europe and Cases of Resilience Based on Cultural Heritage Management. A Comparative Analysis in Mediterranean Countries Inner Regions

Abstract The project Cultrural+ (an Erasmus+ Strategic Partnership project in the field of Adult Education) is funding research and education to deal with major demographic challenges in some regions of the participant countries (Extremadura in Spain, Tràsos-Montes in Portugal, Central Massif in France, Thessaly in Greece and province of Latina in Italy). The paper will discuss the particular problems that European depopulated areas are facing and how cultural heritage and cultural tourism could act as resilience factors. Research is showing that though the different countries’ regions face similar demographic challenges, strategies and planned actions are different. The levels and indicators to measure and understand depopulation processes are also diverse, as are the levels of actualization of the data in each country. International comparative interdisciplinary research allows transfer of best practices cases and models as the “learning territories” and to deepen in the analysis and prospection of the socio-cultural major changes that are affecting the European countryside. This paper analyses the criteria that can help evaluate and acknowledge best practices.

An Integrated HBIM Simulation Approach for Energy Retrofit of Historical Buildings Implemented in a Case Study of a Medieval Fortress in Italy

The Italian building stock consists of buildings mainly constructed until the mid-20th century using pre-industrial construction techniques. These buildings require energy refurbishment that takes into account the preservation of their architectural heritage. In this view, this work studies an innovative integrated modelling and simulation framework consisting of the implementation of Historical Building Information Modeling (HBIM) for the energy retrofit of historical buildings with renewable geothermal HVAC system. To this aim, the field case study is part of a medieval complex in Central Italy (Perugia), as representative ancient rural offshore architecture in the European countryside. The system involves of a ground source heat pump, a water tank for thermal-energy storage connected to a low-temperature radiant system, and an air-handling unit. The building heating energy performance, typically influenced by thermal inertia in historical buildings, when coupled to the novel HVAC system, is comparatively assessed against a traditional scenario implementing a natural-gas boiler, and made inter-operative within the HBIM ad hoc platform. Results show that the innovative renewable energy system provides relevant benefits while preserving minor visual and architectural impact within the historical complex, and also in terms of both energy saving, CO2 emissions offset, and operation costs compared to the traditional existing system. The integrated HBIM approach may effectively drive the path toward regeneration and re-functioning of heritage in Europe.

Populism, Neoliberalism and Agrarian Movements in Europe. Understanding Rural Support for Right‐Wing Politics and Looking for Progressive Solutions

AbstractRight‐wing populism has gained ground in Europe in recent years, with the greatest support among rural communities. Yet the European countryside remains largely overlooked in debates on the current political crisis and the ways out of it. This article aims to provide keys for understanding the connection between right‐wing populism and the rural world in Europe. Our analysis unfolds around three main ideas. First, we argue that the root cause of the spread of right‐wing populism is the fundamental, multidimensional crisis of globalised neoliberal capitalism, particularly pronounced in Europe’s countryside. Second, we examine what role historical legacies, trajectories of agrarian change, and other national, regional and local specificities play in shaping populist movements in different rural areas in Europe. Finally, we discuss the constraints and possibilities for the emergence of agrarian (populist) movements that may offer progressive alternatives to right‐wing populism in the countryside.

Delivering on the Concept of Smart Villages – in Search of an Enabling Theory

Abstract Smart villages have been increasingly heralded as a development strategy for the European countryside but with no clear understanding as to what comprises a smart village. Frequently, commentators associate smartness with quality of IT infrastructure and the ability to use it. An alternative perspective argues that the smartness can be better understood as a phenomenon associated with self-organised, bottom-up community action that either addresses the weaknesses of both state and market to contribute to local people’s wellbeing or exploits emergent opportunities through collective means. Using Scotland as an example, policy architectures can now be seen to be explicitly designed to support bottom-up community action. This paper explores this alternative notion of smartness based on communities’ capacities to self-organise and deliver a range of developments that support wellbeing and resilience and explores some of the challenges arising from this approach.

The Ambiguous Experience of Motherhood in the Western Bohemian Countryside: Exploring Rural Gender Inequalities Through the Framework of Precarity

AbstractPerspectives from Central and Eastern Europe rarely find their way into the debate on rural gender inequality. In this article, I aim to mitigate this imbalance by exploring everyday arrangements of women with dependent children in a peripheralised rural region of the Czech Republic. Using an expanded framework of precarity that integrates different spheres of work, I demonstrate that in the spatial context studied, motherhood increases the social disadvantage women face while simultaneously constituting an important field of female agency. I further show that in order to identify room for manoeuvre within configurations of insecurity the whole life‐situation of women must be taken into consideration. My findings add to a nuanced and context‐sensitive understanding of gender inequality in the European countryside, in particular by highlighting the field‐specific interaction of low‐wage economy, gendered division of work and mobility, and concepts of rural childhood, good (grand)parenting and self‐sufficiency. The study draws upon semi‐structured interviews and ethnographic research.

The Centennial of Mendel University in Brno and its Faculty of Agrisciences (Editorial)

Abstract The paper describes the development of Mendel University in Brno and its Faculty of AgriSciences during last 100 years. It shows the present state of the University and Faculty, including facilities used for educational, scientific and other activities. The journal European Countryside owned by the University has been established 10 years ago. It is a highly cited per review periodical in the field of rural development. This special number gave the opportunity to the members of the Advisory Board to co-celebrate the anniversary by means of their own topic related scientific article.

Lit Lists: The Official Audiobook Guide to the Western European Road Trip

lit lists The Official Audiobook Guide to the Western European Road Trip by Tyler McElroy FEW THINGS CREATE a literary moment as reliably as a road trip, and it is common knowledge that road trips and books pair up like fine wine and aged cheese. But one can only read On the Road so many times before the novelty wears off. This is an audiobook guide to accompany a journey from the snowy streets of Stockholm, Sweden, to the Mediterranean beaches of Barcelona, Spain. Each novel takes place in the country that it is paired with and was translated to English from that country’s principal language. Begin the trip with The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared, by Jonas Jonasson and translated by Rob Bradbury. This novel is set in Malmköping, a small town near Stockholm. It features Allan Karlsson, a sharp-witted centenarian who decides to have one last adventure in a life that has been filled with them. Karlsson escapes his retirement home on the afternoon of his birthday party and gets on the first train he can, embarking on a strange and unexpected journey. The audiobook is narrated by Steven Crossley, an award-winning reader with a dry yet lively voice and a smooth English accent. From Stockholm, travel through Denmark and down into northern Germany to the city of Berlin while playing The End of Loneliness, by Benedict Wells, translated by Charlotte Collins. This novel deals with painful loss and the ways that people try to pick up the pieces afterward. Three young German siblings lose their parents to a car accident, and they are shipped off to a boarding school as they try to make sense of what has happened and how they can continue to live their lives. The narrative follows them for decades as they split apart and come back together again, each with a life overshadowed and defined by that harsh tragedy. Narrator Luke Thompson relays the book in a candid and emotional manner, drawing the listener in with the ease of a natural storyteller. Next, travel southeast through Frankfurt toward Paris while listening to Geoffrey Strachan’s translation of Waiting for Tomorrow , by Nathacha Appanah. This story is set in Paris and the south of France and follows a couple as they meet and begin to grow older together. Although things go well at first, dark undercurrents in their relationship surface and threaten to destroy their marriage when they hire an illegal immigrant to care for their child. Teri Schnaubelt brings the story to life with a voice that alternates effortlessly between the quiet calmness and thick tension that fill the pages of the novel. In the final stretch of the trip, travel from Paris toward Barcelona and dive into Carlos Ruiz Zafón’s The Shadow of the Wind, translated by Lucia Graves. The novel takes place in Barcelona after the tumult of the Spanish Civil War and World War II. Daniel is brought to a secret library by his father and chooses a book from the shelves, not realizing that the book’s author is a central piece of a great secret and that he is about to be pulled into the dangerous center of the intrigue. The story is narrated by Jonathan Davis, whose precise pronunciations effortlessly dance over the novel’s complex words and Spanish names. These audiobooks make a wonderful addition to a once-in-a-lifetime trip. They offer a beautiful opportunity to experience the culture of these world-famous cities through their art while simultaneously traveling through the beautiful European countryside that lies between them. Tyler McElroy is a WLT intern majoring in English writing at the University of Oklahoma. He enjoys reading, writing, and traveling in his spare time. He intends to become an author and see as much of the world as possible after graduating. Barcelona, Spain. Photo: Ondrej Pospisil/Flickr WORLDLIT.ORG 7 ...

The impact of European landscape transitions on the provision of landscape services: an explorative study using six cases of rural land change

ContextThe reasons for recent landscape change in the European countryside are complex and poorly substantiated. Identification of drivers of landscape transition and assessment of the effects on the provision of landscape services are subject of recent debate.ObjectivesAims of the paper are to explore what implications rural landscape transitions (as identified by land use and land cover changes) have for the provision of landscape services, and whether these changes can be related to specific drivers of change.MethodsThe paper records gross landscape change on the basis of land use and land cover changes in six case study areas in five countries, and assesses the impacts on the provision of landscape services in the past 25 years.ResultsIn the past decades the observed land use and land cover changes in the case studies are relatively small, with a dominance of urbanisation and afforestation processes. However, the impacts of these changes are clearly reflected in a change in landscape services.ConclusionsAlthough the landscape transitions do affect the services, spatial data alone is insufficient to assess cause-effect relationships of landscape transitions, landscape structure and pattern. Circumstantial evidence points to substantial effects of EU and national policies on landscape services through landscape transition. These—often unintentional—effects can substantially affect biodiversity, cultural identity and landscape character. More research is needed on the exact cause-effect relationships between policies and landscape service provision.

Quality of Rural Life. Editorial 16 June 2018

Abstract The paper discusses the concept of the quality of life and its measuring. It tries to explain its peculiarities in the rural space considering different levels of education, professional activities, mobility, ways of dwelling, access to the social and technical infrastructure. The subjective perception of both urban and rural people to the rural quality of life can be manifested in moving in and moving out. The main shortages of the rural quality of life can be seen (by rural people) in a poor access to the prestigious and well-paid jobs and to a richer social life. The main advantages of the rural way of life are generally evaluated (by urban people) by better access to the nature. A promotion of the local identity is considered as an important tool for improving the rural quality of life (besides of a solution of infrastructural problems), considering the enormous difference among European rural areas of a big differentiation of the European countryside. The last part of the paper summarizes the contributions of the special number.

Multifunctional Halls and the Place of Cinema in the European Countryside, 1920-1970

Beginning and ending with the question “what is a cinema?” and with a reconsideration of the notion of cinema’s second birth, this article examines the economic and socio-cultural dynamics of film exhibition and film-going in small-town and rural Western Europe, in particular in the Netherlands, Germany and France. Emphasis is placed on the history of itinerant film exhibition in multifunctional venues in the period after the era of the fairground shows—an important aspect of European film culture which has long been overlooked by cinema historians. Insights from these particular experiences of the cinema can help us to reconceptualize the place of cinema in both rural and urban contexts. A crucial aspect of film-going in multifunctional venues is the fact that it was located in spaces that were used for a wide range of commercial and community activities. The author thus advocates a new cinema historiography that breaks away from the fixation on the medium’s singularity to include its relation with the surrounding socio-cultural contexts in which cinema happened.