Rural-Urban Divide Research Articles

Introduction to Bridging the “Urban–Rural Divide”

Introduction to Bridging the “Urban–Rural Divide”

University-anchored Partnerships That Reimagine the Urban–Rural Divide

University-anchored Partnerships That Reimagine the Urban–Rural Divide

Strengthening Intra-regional Connectivity: Implications for Bridging the Urban–Rural Divide

Strengthening Intra-regional Connectivity: Implications for Bridging the Urban–Rural Divide

Examining Spatial Disparities of Obesity: Residential Segregation and the Urban–Rural Divide

This study investigates spatial disparities in obesity among different racial and ethnic groups from the urban–rural perspective through a case study of the southeastern United States, a region marked by its prevalence of chronic diseases and degree of residential segregation. Two proposed measures—local/global entropy indexes and a set of the obesity–segregation combined index (OBESEG)—are prescribed to exploit the degree of spatial disparity between counties’ obesity rate and residential segregation in the urban–rural perspective. A strong interrelationship is confirmed between obesity rates and residential segregation, particularly for high levels of obesity and residential segregation, as well as for low levels of obesity and residential segregation at the county level. The findings identify several clusters of obesity–segregation correlation across the region. This urban–rural perspective helps reveal that clusters of rural areas have a high degree of segregation, whereas urban areas tend to create clusters of counties having less segregation and less obesity. Key Words: entropy index, obesity–residential segregation, obesity–segregation combined index, spatial disparity.

Disparities in Subjective Wellbeing: Political Status, Urban-Rural Divide, and Cohort Dynamics in China

This paper investigates disparities in subjective wellbeing in China by analyzing the Chinese General Social Survey (2003–2015). Our hierarchical age-period-cohort models reveal how Chinese Communist Party membership, the urban-rural divide, and cohort differences have jointly shaped levels of happiness. Interestingly, the significance of political status in shaping happiness varies profoundly across birth cohorts and locations of residence. In earlier cohorts (1910–1948), Communist Party members in rural areas have a considerable advantage over nonmembers, but this advantage gradually diminishes later, except the 1977–1985 cohort. The advantage of urban party membership keeps increasing up to the cohort born during 1957–1965 but declines rapidly after that. Findings suggest that in the planned economy, political status plays a central role in promoting subjective wellbeing especially in urban China; the transition to a market economy in post-Mao China has reduced political disparities among younger cohorts, mainly for urban residents.

Rural-Urban Divide and the Social Stratification in Leisure Participation in China: Application of Multiple Hierarchy Stratification Perspective

This study explores how the additive combined consequences of rural-urban status, gender, age and socioeconomic status influence leisure participation in the Chinese context. Drawing on multiple hierarchy stratification perspective, this study assumes that combinations of these unique variables will form a continuum of statuses from the lower end of the most disadvantaged leisure group to the higher end of the most advantaged leisure group. Using combined data from the trends seen in the 2012, 2013, and 2015 Chinese General Social Survey (N = 34,171), the findings show that rural-urban status, age, education, gender, and family income are the consistent five significant predictors across two leisure types. Rural women who have lower socio-economic statuses occupy the lowest participation in general leisure activities, whereas urban men who have higher socio-economic statuses occupy the highest participation.

Urban-biased land development policy and the urban-rural income gap: Evidence from Hubei Province, China

Developing countries generally face the challenge of significant urban-rural divides during their process of industrialization and urbanization. Following the paradigm of the theory of urban bias (TUB), this article focuses on the urban-biased land development policy (UBLDP) in contemporary China, which refers that local governments expropriate rural land with the inadequate compensation and use a considerable share of net land revenue to develop urban areas instead of rural areas. On the basis of pointing out three practical facts about and proposing the technique to measure the UBLDP, its influence on the urban-rural income gap (URIG) is investigated by employing the GMM dynamic model along with panel data from Hubei Province over the period of 2010-2016. The results show that a 1% increase in the extent to which compensation deviates from the market value of expropriated rural land (ERL) leads to a 0.46% increase in the URIG, while this effect is attributed to an unbalanced urban-rural income growth associated with the land development. These findings not only generate a broad of direct implications for Chinese policymakers but also provide lessons for other developing countries.

Bridging the Urban-Rural Divide Between Ecosystem Service Suppliers and Beneficiaries: Using a Distributed Community Nursery to Support Rural Revegetation.

The provision of ecosystem services from vegetation on private land is constrained by a lack of effective markets to overcome the costs of supply. Urban beneficiaries of ecosystem services from vegetation on private, rural land have limited options for enhancing the supply. This study examines a not-for-profit revegetation programme, the Tree Scheme, in which participants are volunteers who grow seedlings for revegetation on rural land, and rural landholders who use the seedlings in revegetation. We used records of participation and seedlings, along with participant questionnaires to investigate the flow of resources between volunteer growers and rural landholders. The programme produced approximately 22.5 million seedlings between 1994 and 2012; 79% of seedlings were grown in urban locations and 79% of seedlings were ordered for rural plantings. Landholders identified a mixture of objectives for revegetation, with improvement of habitat and biodiversity being most common, followed by objectives with higher private benefits, including planting for windbreaks, erosion control and screening. Volunteer growers reported liking the programme because of the programme's intended environmental benefits, the satisfaction they gained from raising seedlings and other social benefits of participation. The programme demonstrates that a substantial flow of resources between urban ecosystem services beneficiaries and rural producers can be achieved by facilitating voluntary actions. The type and scale of this programme is rare and potentially transferable.

Cultural Attachment and Wellbeing Among Canada’s Indigenous People: A Rural Urban Divide

The relationship between cultural attachment and mental wellbeing among Canada’s Indigenous population is explored with data from the 2012 Aboriginal Peoples Survey. Cultural attachment is assessed by involvement in traditional activities and Indigenous language. Ordered probit models are used to determine the factors associated with wellbeing. The results suggest an urban–rural divide with cultural attachment associated with higher levels of wellbeing for Indigenous Canadians living in rural areas. The results are expected to be of interest to policy makers in countries with significant Indigenous populations whom tend to have higher frequencies of psychological wellbeing issues, such as Canada, Australia and the United States.

Urban-rural divides in preferences for wetland conservation in Malaysia

We examined the preferences for wetland conservation among urban and rural dwellers in Malaysia. A choice experiment using face-to-face interviews with urban and rural households was employed. Wetland conservation alternatives were described in terms of environmental protection zones, biodiversity protection, recreational services and flood. Each alternative was connected to a cost for the household, which was a reduction in subsidies for daily goods. Using a latent class model, we identified three groups with distinctly different preferences. The first group comprised mainly rural people with negative willingness to pay for conservation, while the second group included mostly urban people who favored wetland conservation and exhibited positive preference for wetland attributes. The third group was also consisted of mainly urban people who exhibited both negative and positive preferences toward different aspects of conservation. All three groups, however, asserted a strong preference for significant flood risk reduction. The results indicated potential conflicts over wetland conservation impacts and targets. Accordingly, the divide in preferences should be taken into account in policy-making, and the insights provided here may inform efforts to avoid conflict across the population.

Demographic dynamics, urban-rural divides and the (changing) mother's age at birth in Greece: a regional analysis, 1980–2016

Being more sensitive to economic fluctuations, childbearing postponement increased during the second demographic transition and was accompanied by a moderate decline in the number of children per woman and the progressive rise of mother’s age at first birth. Under the hypothesis that recessions have a marked influence on population dynamics, the present study investigates spatial changes in mother’s age at birth in Greece with the aim to assess the differential impact of economic crisis along the urban-rural gradient. The percent composition of births by mother's age class – considered a gross indicator of fertility under a changing socioeconomic context – was studied at 4 spatial scales (the whole country, administrative regions, prefectures and metropolitan areas or specific economic districts) over an economic cycle from expansion to recession (1980–2016). While stimulating childbearing postponement observed since the early 1980s, empirical results of this study indicate that the 2007 recession was quite neutral on fertility trends in Greece, consolidating the traditional divide between urban and rural areas.

European disintegration? Euroscepticism and Europe’s rural/urban divide

ABSTRACTEuroscepticism has been a persistent part of the European integration process over the last several decades (Usherwood and Startin [2013]. Euroscepticism as a persistent phenomenon. JCMS: Journal of Common Market Studies, 51, 1–16). Scholars have proposed various theories to explain resistance to integration by drawing upon economic, political and cultural theories. In this paper, I ask whether Euroscepticism is a by-product of rural–urban divisions, which influences one’s perception of the economy, one’s trust of transnational politics and one’s cultural identity. However, geographical variables have never been tested in the presence of these more well-established Euroscepticism predictors. Here, I use the European Social Survey to compare the predictive power of economic, political, cultural and geographical variables on two forms of Euroscepticism: trust in European Parliament and the belief that integration has gone too far. Multilevel mixed-effects regression models demonstrate that trust in the European Parliament is indeed higher in big cities, but overall, place of residence is not a strong predictor of Euroscepticism. Among other theories, I find that cultural variables are more meaningful than economics or politics. I finally conclude with a discussion of the EU’s future.

Facebook, Contestation and Poor People’s Politics: Spanning the Urban–Rural Divide in Cambodia?

ABSTRACTRural internet use, although still limited, is growing, raising the question of how rural people are using social media politically. As a vehicle of communication that permits the rapid transmission of information, images and text across space and connections between dispersed networks of individuals, does technological advance in rural areas presage significant political transformations? This article investigates this question in the light of a poor result for the Cambodian People’s Party in the 2013 elections, and the subsequent banning of the main opposition party, before the 2018 elections. Expanding internet use in rural areas has linked relatively quiescent rural Cambodians for the first time to networks of information about militant urban movements of the poor. Rural Cambodians are responding to this opportunity through strategies of quiet encroachment in cyberspace. This has had real effects on the nature of the relationship between the dominant party and the rural population and suggests the declining utility of the election-winning strategy used by the party since 1993. However, the extent of this virtual information revolution is limited, since neither the urban nor rural poor are mapping out new online political strategies, agendas or identities that can push Cambodia’s sclerotic politics in new directions.

Social capital and social trust in urban China

Owing to the dynamics of internal migration and the hukou system, urban areas in China always consist of a four-tiered structure of urban locals, urban migrants, new urbanites and rural migrants. This paper aims to examine the differences among these four groups in terms of social capital and to explore how the association between social capital and social trust may vary across the four groups. Data are based on the 2014 China Labour-force Dynamics Survey. Our analysis of 7662 responses first indicates that patterns of social capital in the four urban groups appear to be largely distinct. Second, we find a clear rural–urban division in social trust in the Chinese city: rural migrants and new urbanites tend to be less trusting than urban locals and urban migrants. Among the aspects of social capital under consideration, social network support and neighbourhood attachment are associated with higher levels of social trust, whereas the effects of bonding and bridging civic organizations on social trust are relatively weak. However, these patterns indeed tend to vary across the four groups of urban residents in the cases of civic engagement and social network support. Consequently, these findings suggest that the interplay of individuals’ hukou identities and migration experiences in urban China has an important impact on their social connectedness, which also presents distinctive implications for social trust.

Deconstruction of Rural-Urban Divide in New Tools Prospective

Abstract In this essay importance will be given to the traditional and contemporary conception of the rural-urban divide. The traditional approach influenced by a hegemonic perspective has seen rural as urban residual by believing in the idea of a clear division between urban and rural, driven by demographic, cultural and economic factors. But today's empirical research in different fields, reflecting strong local and global dynamics, proves that the split between rural and urban is impossible. The change of these realities at the local and global scale has influenced the development of a thesis that reformulates the urban/rural relation under the perspective of a continuum, hybrid or liminal state. Today's urban research backs the idea that it is impossible to define once and for all what is rural and urban. Concrete cases taken in Europe and in Albania prove that the existence of realities with particular typology not only makes the existence of a general and universally accepted definition problematic, but also creates the need for a continuous, dynamic, and temporary re-definition of urban and rural.

Health risk behaviours of Palestinian youth: findings from a representative survey

There is little systematic information about health risk behaviours among youth in Middle Eastern countries, leaving public health authorities unprepared to deal with emerging public health threats at a time of major social change. The Palestinian Youth Health Risk study investigates patterns of risk behaviours among Palestinian youth, their perceptions of the risks and benefits of such behaviours, and the relationship of exposure to violence with mental health and engagement in risk behaviours. We conducted a representative survey among 2500 individuals aged 15-24 years in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, permitting reliable comparison across sex and rural-urban divisions. A stratified 2-stage random sample was drawn from the 2007 population census, with strata formed by crossing the 12 governorates with urban, rural and refugee camp locations. Within strata, 208 survey clusters were sampled with probability proportional to size. Within each cluster, 14 households with youth of the appropriate age were sampled. Among youth aged 20-24 years, 22.4% of males and 11.6% of females reported trying alcohol; 10.5% of males and 4.3% of females reported trying drugs. Almost one quarter of unmarried youth aged 20-24 years reported any sexual experience. Tobacco use is high, even among younger youth (45.4% of males and 21.2% of females aged 15-19 smoke). Risk behaviours are higher among males, older youth and in urban areas and refugee camps. While smoking is of particular concern, prevention outreach for all behaviours should be directed at subgroups and areas identified as highest risk.

Can healthcare policy and technology heal rural-urban divides?

Can healthcare policy and technology heal rural-urban divides?

Assumptions and Assemblages: Variation in Material Consumption across the Rural–Urban Divide

ABSTRACTThis article analyzes the home site of Louisa McWorter, an African-American widow and landowner who resided in the town of New Philadelphia, Illinois in the mid-nineteenth century. Archaeological and historical evidence demonstrates that McWorter achieved economic success in agriculture, which enabled her to support a large family, grow her landholdings, and fully participate in the local market economy. Excavations at the McWorter home site yielded an assemblage that closely resembles the assemblages of European-American households at New Philadelphia while contrasting with patterns of consumption observed at African-American sites in more urban areas. These comparisons suggest that the consumption choices of McWorter and her European-American neighbors were shaped by similar economic and social stresses that differed from those faced by African Americans in larger cities. This study demonstrates that the life experiences and consumption constraints of demographically similar but geographically disparate groups should not be assumed to be equivalent.

Globalised Growth in Largely Agrarian Contexts: The Urban–rural Divide

The gulf in living standards is widening between cities and rural areas of developing countries that have large rural populations. Legacy as well as emergent factors contribute to this trend. An old urban bias from colonial and post-independence times was supplanted by a newer metropolitan bias as global investments began to arrive on these shores. More poorly served by social and physical investments, individuals in rural areas are less well prepared to compete for the better positions. Trends in the technology of manufacturing processes are worsening the prospects for rural youth. Citizenship bonds between the urban rich and the poor in rural areas are fraying as widening differences in lifestyles and aspirations, overlaid on existing inequalities, are cleaving societies into disparate segments of space-age rich and stone-age poor residents. Managing their vastly unequal situations within a common framework of policies and laws is making the tasks of a development state more difficult. This paper examines the forces giving rise to urban-rural inequality and presents the need for institutional and policy reforms.

The Economy or an Urban–Rural Divide? Explaining Spatial Patterns of Voting Behaviour in Poland

This article contributes to the debate on spatial variance of voting behaviour in Poland. Using empirical data from the 2015 Polish parliamentary election, two alternative explanations of observed patterns are tested. The first focuses on the role of economy while the second emphasises the importance of the urban–rural divide. The empirical analysis demonstrates higher relevance of the differences between urban and rural areas. Even after controlling for historical legacies, urbanization offers the best explanation of the differences in electoral results between spatial units. Furthermore, the effects related to the urban–rural divide are similar within the two broadly defined clusters of parties. Economic variables, on the contrary, matter only in certain socio-cultural contexts.