Why social scientists should engage with natural scientists

It has become part of the mantra of contemporary science policy that the resolution of besetting problems calls for the active engagement of a wide range of sciences. The paper reviews some of the key challenges for those striving for a more impactful social science by engaging strategically with natural scientists. It argues that effective engagement depends upon overcoming basic assumptions that have structured past interactions: particularly, the casting of social science in an end-of-pipe role in relation to scientific and technological developments. These structurings arise from epistemological assumptions about the underlying permanence of the natural world and the role of science in uncovering its fundamental order and properties. While the impermanence of the social world has always put the social sciences on shakier foundations, twenty-first century concerns about the instability of the natural world pose different epistemological assumptions that summon a more equal, immediate and intense interaction between field and intervention oriented social and natural scientists. The paper examines a major research programme that has exemplified these alternative epistemological assumptions. Drawing on a survey of researchers and other sources it seeks to draw out the lessons for social/natural science cross-disciplinary engagement

Shining a spotlight on small rural businesses: How does their performance compare with urban?

Rural enterprises play an important economic role, contributing to national prosperity and wellbeing but are often a blind spot within rural development and wider economic policies and evidence. This paper presents an urban-rural analysis of a large scale survey of Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs). It applies Propensity Score Matching to allow for an assessment of the effects of rurality on business performance. Results show that England's rural firms have similar levels of turnover to their urban counterparts, but are more likely to report a profit. The analysis also reveals rural firms to be significantly stronger exporters of goods and services and to have goods or services suitable for exporting. However, there are some weaknesses and obstacles to business success that concern significantly more rural than urban firms, that vary with the rurality of local districts, and which require the attention of policy makers and support providers seeking to achieve spatially-balanced and more equitable economic development

Performing inter-professional expertise in rural advisory networks

AbstractIn this paper we draw on in-depth research to explore inter-professional working in rural land and livestock management and introduce the novel concept of inter-professional expertise. An increasingly intricate regulatory framework, the diversification of the economic base of rural areas away from primary commodity production and a growing emphasis on environmental protection and ecosystem services mean that the management of land and livestock are becoming more complex in their objectives, more demanding of specialised technical knowledge and skills and more rule-bound in their procedures and processes. To assist them in meeting these challenges, farmers and other land managers turn to a growing array of rural professional advisers. Increasingly the achievement of private and public objectives for rural businesses depends upon the integration of a variety of specialised expert inputs. So, alongside pressures to differentiate the specialised knowledge they have to offer, rural professionals face demands to work together to help clients solve complex problems and deliver multiple objectives. It follows that rural land and livestock management present a rich context in which to explore the dynamic relationship between different types of professional experts. As a departure from the strong tradition of farmer-centred research examining extended knowledge networks in rural settings, we therefore explore the working relations between advisers themselves. Using concepts of relational agency and socio-material approaches we identify the skills and strategies involved in this inter-professional communication and working, with relevance to expert-expert interactions and the negotiation of contemporary professional expertise in fields far beyond the provision of rural services. We find that it is in the ways that experts perform, act and interact in the field that professional expertise and, by extension, inter-professional expertise – is realised and practised. Thus as working practices are increasingly shared, credentialism is pursued less by achieving the monopolies of old and more by striving for new monopolies of inter-professional practice

The COVID-19 Pandemic and Its Implications for Rural Economies

This paper presents a rapid assessment of current and likely future impacts of the COVID-19 outbreak on rural economies given their socio-economic characteristics. Drawing principally on current evidence for the UK, as well as lessons from the 2001 Foot and Mouth Disease outbreak and the 2007/8 financial crises, it outlines the likely key demand and supply effects, paying attention to the situation for agriculture as well as discussing the implications for rural communities. A distinction is made between the effects on businesses offering goods and services for out-of-home as opposed to in-home consumption. Gendered dimensions are also noted as likely business and household strategies for coping and adaptation. The paper concludes with a brief mapping of a research agenda for studying the longer-term effects of COVID-19 on rural economies