Lummina Horlings

Exploring the ‘New Rural Paradigm’ in Europe: Eco-economic strategies as a counterforce to the global competitiveness agenda:

Rural regions in Europe are facing diverging pathways of development. On the one hand, the influence of urbanisation and the intensification and continued up-scaling of agriculture make it more difficult for many regions to remain distinctive and increase sustainability. Places, as well as goods and services, have become increasingly interchangeable. For many regions an obvious choice is to compete with other regions for global mobile capital and labour. On the other hand, and as a counterforce to these global logics, new strategies, which are more place-based, are being developed, such as the construction of identities or images around new agricultural goods and services. These strategies can be seen in the context of the ‘New Rural Paradigm’ for European rural regions. In the search for new trajectories for sustainable development, different models can be identified: the bio-economy paradigm and the eco-economy. Each model has its own sustainability claim and can be analysed in the context of the overarching development theory of ecological modernisation. The central question in this article is what types of strategies and pathways for eco-economic development can be witnessed in rural regions in Europe? The empirical analysis is based on 62 European cases. Three key eco-economic strategies that show a shift from an agricultural-based development to a more integrative rural and regionally based development are identified. The article concludes with some consistent parameters for understanding the dynamic complexity of rural regional development.

Promoting nature conservation by Dutch farmers : a governance perspective

ABSTRACT Reconciling productive agricultural practices with nature conservation is not only an ecological challenge, but also a demanding matter of governance. This paper analyses the potential as well as the limitations of various governance arrangements, and explores ways to enhance the governance of nature conservation in agricultural landscapes. We assume four conditions to contribute to the performance of these arrangements: farmers should be motivated, demanded, enabled, and legitimized to participate in arrangements that promote nature conservation by farmers. We analyse 10 distinct Dutch governance arrangements in the period 2000–2016, including agri-environment schemes but also privately initiated arrangements. The arrangements target a large but unknown share of farmers and farmlands, but nature conservation ambition levels are generally low to moderate. The expected low-to-moderate performance is associated with a low-to-moderate motivation, demand, and ability. Underlying are stronger forces driving towards intensification and problems farmers face in recuperating the cost of nature conservation. New greening requirements in the EU Common Agricultural Policy and in agri-food supply chains are first, cautious steps addressing these fundamental drivers of ecological degradation. More ambitious greening requirements may contribute to a higher motivation and ability of larger groups of farmers to implement nature conservation measures.

Relational knowledge leadership and local economic development

This paper concerns the role of spatial leadership in the development of the knowledge-based economy. It is argued within academic and practitioner circles that leadership of knowledge networks requires a particular non-hierarchical style that is required to establish an ambience conducive to networking and knowledge sharing across boundaries. In this paper, we explore this hypothesis at both theoretical and empirical levels. Theoretically, we propose a conceptualization of relational knowledge leadership, which is ‘nomadic’ in its capacity to travel across multiple scales and cross sectoral, thematic and geographical boundaries. We have operationalized this type of relational knowledge leadership along four key features, derived from literatures on regional learning, organizational leadership and place leadership. Two empirical case studies are then presented, one from Birmingham in the UK and one from Eindhoven in the Netherlands, exploring how these features are expressed on the sub-national level. Also conclusions are drawn regarding the status of relational knowledge leadership. It is argued that the concept of relational knowledge leadership as viewed through our analytical lens does accord with the experience of leadership in the two cases presented. The cases also show that this style of leadership is confronted with three types of tensions that play through knowledge networking. Furthermore, it is argued that the cases exhibit this style of leadership to different degrees, reflecting their different cultural and political contexts.

Strategies for sustainable regional development and conditions for vital coalitions in the Netherlands.

The question that is addressed in this chapter is how processes can be stimulated in rural–urban areas which contribute to sustainable development? How can capacity to act be realized? Our hypothesis is: Specific informal networks in the form of vital coalitions between private and public actors can contribute to innovation and sustainability in rural–urban regions. We focus on the role of bottom-up initiatives like associations, interest groups, business communities, the coalitions they form with public actors and the strategies they follow towards sustainability, based on eight Dutch cases. The theoretical framework is derived from the Urban Regime Theory. The chapter offers insight in the conditions for creating capacity to act and stimulating vital coalitions in regional development processes.

The role of leadership in place-based development and building institutional arrangements

In various case studies across Europe the vital role of rural place leadership in enabling a place-based approach to local and regional development has been highlighted, although not always explicitly addressed as such. This paper aims to do so by reviewing the findings from a selection of earlier research projects within a framework of the role of rural leadership in place-based development. Building on the increasing body of literature on place leadership, the review reveals how place leadership in rural areas is performed by varied public, private and civic actors; is able to bridge vested stakes and make new connections; is supportive to joint learning and innovation and an increasing range of bottom-up grassroots initiatives. Effective rural place leadership initiates joint reflection and enforces a collaborative spirit resulting in an expanding spiral of new alliances and new (institutional) arrangements. This underpins the importance of rural place leadership in building collective agency and its capacity to better attune the institutional setting to the specificities of place and thus enhance place-based development.

Integrated systems research in nutrition-sensitive landscapes: A theoretical methodological framework

South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa are two regions of the world with the highest concentration of nutritionally vulnerable populations that depend to a large extent on agriculture as an important source of livelihood (Gillespie et al., 2015). The vast majority of farmers in these regions have small landholdings due to land fragmentation (Jayne et al., 2014; Valbuena et al., 2015) and are often constrained in their access to resources and agricultural inputs (Herrero et al., 2010), especially women (e.g., Cole et al., 2015). As a consequence, productivity levels are low, and because income sources are also limited, dependence on surrounding landscapes and ecosystem services is high in terms of safeguarding supplies of clean water, human and animal foods, construction materials and fuel wood. People shape their physical landscapes (Ellis, 2015), influenced by cultures, values and livelihood opportunities (Horlings, 2015). People’s utilization of their physical landscapes is shaped by various conditions such as soil properties, topography, climate and flooding patterns. People’s dependence on their physical landscapes is strong and expected to increase due to climate change, resulting in gradual but persistent changes including adjustments in frequency, timing and severity of anomalies such as droughts and floods (Naylor et al., 2007; Gornall et al., 2010).