ABSTRACT The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‐19) pandemic exposed and intensified the long‐standing geographic divide in access to digital infrastructure and flexible work arrangements. Using 25 months of data from the Current Population Survey (May 2020–May 2022), this study examines how working from home (WFH) due to the pandemic differed between rural and urban workers and whether these differences varied by employment characteristics and industry. We find a large and persistent rural–urban WFH gap due to the COVID‐19 pandemic that remains even after accounting for worker, job, household, and contextual factors. Full‐time workers, wage workers, and those employed in high‐WFH industries were more likely to work remotely overall. However, rural workers in these categories were less likely to WFH. Interaction models and predicted probabilities show that rural full‐time workers experienced less pandemic‐related WFH than their urban counterparts, and the rural–urban gap in Finance was slightly more pronounced than expected based on rurality or industry alone. Patterns among the self‐employed showed a consistent rural disadvantage. These findings suggest that broadband access is necessary but not sufficient for enabling remote work in rural areas; the structure of rural labor markets also limits the feasibility of WFH. Documenting both the persistence and variation in this pandemic‐specific rural WFH gap shows how digital infrastructure and job composition jointly shaped remote work opportunities during the pandemic.
ABSTRACT Gendered systems of power in agriculture underpin a heteropatriarchy that disempowers women's participation. To interrogate how imagery may function as both a reflective and perpetuating force in maintaining heteropatriarchy across the agricultural sector we analyzed 357 images on 36 Australian agriculture organization websites, coding them for key attributes. We found most images coded ‘farming’ as inherently masculine and drew on stereotypical notions of the ‘rural man’ and ‘masculinised farmer’. Importantly, the images actively constructed contemporary dimensions of gender inequality by positioning women farmers as peripheral, passive, and lacking in agricultural expertise and knowledge. The images conveyed the overall message that agriculture is a men's domain, and reinforced the heteropatriarchy that contributes to excluding women. Inclusion of diverse knowledges is important in transitioning towards sustainable agriculture. Based on our findings, we present recommendations for inclusive visual representation of women in agriculture.
ABSTRACT The Fifth Sustainable Development Goal on gender equality remains distant in rural areas of low‐and middle‐income countries, where restrictive gender norms persist. While empowerment is promoted as a means of transforming these norms, little is known about how such transformations unfold or about the unintended negative consequences they may generate. We propose an analytical approach to understand how the resources provided by development programs translate into women gaining agency and contesting gender norms, which could lead to norm transformation, and how these processes can trigger negative consequences. We implemented the approach in a case study in Colombia, drawing on a large qualitative sample of 65 interviews with rural women and men. By integrating two distinct areas of scholarship, Gender and Development and Feminist Political Ecology, we identify four pathways through which resources from development programs foster agency while simultaneously producing adverse effects, including verbal intimate partner violence. This study presents an analytical approach useful for scholars and practitioners in development. It also offers empirical evidence of the pathways through which gender norms are contested and highlights the need for strategies to address the unintended negative consequences that may arise when promoting women's empowerment.
Relatively little attention has been given to rural local governments' social safety net and public service provisions. We develop a framework to explain how the character of communities influence social and other public services provided by local governments and why rural-urban differences may exist. Theoretically, our framework links conceptualizations of place character with welfare state theory. We illustrate our framework using original primary data collected for 1086 counties spanning the USA. The character of communities varies along economic, sociopolitical, and governmental lines. These same factors influence the services that county governments provide, with results for sociopolitical factors and local government capacity tending to follow welfare state theory. But contrary to views of a binary metro-nonmetro divide: big-city metro counties diverge most from others, especially remote rural counties, and possess characteristics that make them much better equipped to protect the local social safety net even as they engage in competitive economic development; suburban metros are closer to their nonmetro counterparts in service provision and governance; and counties overall face operating pressures. Our findings indicate that future work should consider spatial inequality in the social safety net across graduations of rural-urban communities and whether gaps with big-city metros are intensifying.
Rural and peripheral settings are diverse and context-dependent, yet many are shaped by varying combinations of geographic distance, population size, access to resources and opportunities, and forms of social and community connectedness. These characteristics vary across contexts and may be associated with different configurations of disadvantage, marginalization, and place-based strengths. The current study focused on the Israeli Northern periphery, aiming to trace the journeys of those born in the periphery as they move away and then return. It explores their perspectives on living outside the periphery, their reasons for returning, and their experiences upon returning. This study employs phenomenological methods and was conducted through semi-structured interviews with 17 local returnees. A thematic analysis identified three main categories that characterize the locals' journey outside the periphery and back: outside the periphery is perceived as both fulfilling and allowing for a recognition of the strengths of the periphery; motivations for returning, which include economic and familial considerations on a practical level, and a sense of responsibility and recognition of local needs on a symbolic level; and life in the periphery after returning, which encompasses judgments from others about their return, the ambivalence of profit versus compromise, and local agency through action, entrepreneurship, and personal development. This complex journey is analyzed through the theoretical framework of Social Identity in relation to social action and collective action, highlighting the interviewees' sense of belonging and love for their community and its residents.
