Enhancing Rural Social Sciences: Macro Forces[1]
Gary D. Lynne[2]
Perhaps we need more concerted effort at addressing questions raised by the sparse population (e.g., tax issues, health services); the interdependence driven by important economic decisions, e.g., in industrializing agribusiness, made in distant places; and a region environmentally and perhaps culturally quite different from other rural places in the U.S. We live at the confluence of four agroecological zones, providing an unique environmental situation. This uniqueness in our natural capital, along with perhaps a unique kind of social capital . . . represented in the culture . . . gives opportunity for substantive scientific contributions from a Social Science focus on Rural Studies while helping clientele and citizenry.
Castle (1998, pp. 622-623) adds both natural and
social capital to the list with the more generally recognized human and
manufactured capital, to give a conceptual framework to address the Rural
Capital problem, 1) social capital, the
cement that holds the economy together as represented in the norms, laws,
rules, regulations, customs, culture which in turn are all represented in the
other-interest(s) motivating each individual, 2) human capital, represented in
the knowledge, abilities and pursuit of self-interest, which is sought jointly with the others-interest, and thus
motivating each individual in this most rural place, 3) manufactured, human-created capital like machines, chemicals
and bioengineered seeds and used in complex mixes by these individuals, and 4)
natural capital, which produces work and service from the natural environment
in consort with the other forms.
The deterioration in Rural Capital perhaps explains
why we are not enjoying the current
economic boom along with other sectors.
The capital base may have deteriorated such that income cannot be
generated at the same pace as in other sectors. Reduced income, in turn, contributes to less reinvestment in
Rural Capital, so that we could be started on a downward spiral. After noting the deterioration, Castle (1998, p. 622) suggests this to be
the reason for a renewed effort in the Study of Rural Places, and notes that
any such effort is normative in nature:
“… it is appropriate (that) rural people have, and exercise, a degree of
autonomy in addressing their common concerns and in seeking fulfillment of
their aspirations.” A social science effort focused on rural studies in
Nebraska also perhaps needs to recognize this normative dimension of any
programming we might develop and enhance.
Arguably, it is for this reason we exist as a Land
Grant University. Seemingly we also
need to address the concerns and help individuals seek fulfillment beyond the
bottom line, i.e., to achieve the multiplicity of aspirations they seek. The Mission arises at the confluence of
these aspirations and the fact of deterioration in Rural Capital. Seemingly we need to define our Mission as
one of finding creative ways to build, develop and conserve Rural Capital. Perhaps we could organize ourselves around
this Mission with due connectivity to the underlying Social Science, including
a sensitivity to the forces constantly remolding this Science into new
forms.
Boehlje (1999) seemingly has it right. Science and technology are advancing to the
point where we will eventually build and manufacture food and fiber products
from component elements. We perhaps
will produce protein and sugar, not wheat and corn; meat of a particular color,
consistency and tenderness, not pigs, calves and fed stock. The food system on both sides (input and
output side) of the farmer/rancher is already doing it. It is perhaps only in
the farm and ranch community where this world view has yet to take hold. It
appears that only a very few innovators (who also tend to be the integrators)
see this future.
Such concerns were revealed in the statewide IANR
Listening Sessions. The fact of
industrialization, i.e., the need to re-integrate the components in food and
fiber, starting at the micro level below the field, feed lot, and farm/ranch
levels, in addition to driving tractors and riding horses as a way of life,
seemingly needs to be faced. Business
development needs to recognize the separable components and address the
re-integration problem, all fed by a massive information revolution.
Macro Forces in the Value
System
This same scientific and technological revolution is
driving dramatic changes in the realm of policy. This is to say: Values are shifting. American Values are quite different from
what they were even 10-years ago (see Nelson, 1997). This is to say: The
“common sense” is shifting. As a result, we perhaps cannot continue to assume
“institutions invariant” which is the tradition in some parts of social science
(e.g., in economics), a remnant from an earlier era when this was a good
approximation. The information technology revolution, especially, has added a
dynamic to the change in values and thus is speeding the change in
institutions. Another way to highlight this phenomenon is to argue that
the “invisible hand” needs to become “visible.”[3] The nature of the institution in place is
the question, rather than the assumption.
Perhaps our ears need to peak to the conversation when we hear someone
say “it is only common sense,” for
example, it is only common sense that we move to an industrialized agriculture.
Maslow (1954) predicted value shifts of the nature
we are experiencing. Once fundamental
needs are met, people seek fulfillment.
Consumers are searching for attributes of food and fiber that only
become of concern once the stomach is full, e.g., how the component parts were
produced. Castle (1998) highlights the
need to focus on the fulfillment of people in rural places, that perhaps
farming and ranching as a way of life is an important goal, rather than
something to be denigrated. As one
individual noted in recent farm task force meeting, he did not want to become a
grower, someone growing components for a high tech food industry.
Such a shift in values suggests the need of more
concern for true community. While
independence and autonomy produces individual wealth (e.g., stomachs are full),
engaging as individuals in a viable human and environmental community,
including now the entire food marketing channel from producer to final
consumer, holds the potential to produce peace of mind, a higher state of
mind. The highest level of need is
perhaps met only with some form of
(food/fiber) community: “The Me needs a We to Be.” Yet, in order to fill the stomach, i.e.,
satisfy material needs and produce individual wealth, the Me seemingly must
drive the system: “Without a Me there
is no We.” Rugged individualism.
Freedom of choice. Autonomy. Free
markets. Education. Ability. All are fundamental, but now in the new
value system, we see a value swing that recognizes “the Me needs a We.” Rural people as individual “Me” entities
perhaps also need a “We” in a common food producing community that extends well
beyond the farm/ranch gate.
We seek an enlightened self-interest. The farmer, rancher, rural resident,
consumer, agribusiness business manager, politician. . . perhaps all need to
rise above, and go beyond both altruism and the self-interest (Khalil, 1990),
acting as a distinct entity on this higher plane. Perhaps we need to find ways for said individuals to evolve and
then express their values. We seemingly need to have the value dialogues and
the “megalogues” (Etzioni, 1996, p. 106) to determine what it is we actually do
value in Rural Places. Such a dialogue
may especially be needed within the food marketing channel itself. We need to
engage in moral inquiry (Wolf, 1999), and help in evolving the new cement that
will bind the various communities of interest together.
Another value shift has occurred with respect
to the environment. Perhaps more than
any other group, the youth are becoming environmentalists. The young understand we are on a spaceship
earth traveling within the much larger universe, which reflects an intuitive
understanding of fundamental physical and natural laws explained by
thermodynamics, 1) we cannot destroy
mass and energy, so we have no choice but to live with the wastes of production
and transformation, 2) we cannot return a burned log, coal or crude oil into
a useful form, so we lose useful work every time we transform something into
something else. We are on a one-way
road. “Earth is destined to dry up, burn up or freeze…” (Journal Star, February 21, 2000, front
page). Entropy shows actions to be
irreversible: Entropy always increases.
This means marginal (additional) cost inherently increases. Looking to the very long term, we are
beginning to understand the contemporary need to start charting an economic and
social course that puts Rural Places on paths that make sense in light of this
long term scientific reality.
To accomplish same, we may need to see a
synthesis and integration not only within social science, but also across the
natural/physical sciences and the social sciences, a Consilience
(Wilson, 1998). Such a
possibility calls for a different kind of economic and social scientist; new
training for those of us who have been in the business for sometime; and a
university environment that encourages synthesis and integration. It is time to
recognize the role of the integrator in science, and the scholarship of
integration. As Boyer (1990, p. 18 - 19) notes:
We underscore the need for scholars who give meaning
to isolated facts, putting them in perspective. … we mean making connections across the disciplines, placing the
specialties in larger context, illuminating data in a revealing way, often
educating nonspecialists, too. …
scholarship of integration involves . . . doing research at the boundaries
where fields converge, and it reveals itself in what philosopher-physicist
Michael Polyani calls “overlapping (academic) neighborhoods.” Such work is, in fact, increasingly
important as traditional disciplinary categories prove confining, forcing new
topologies of knowledge.
Such
social (and other kinds) scientists would need to shift world views to
encompass both ecological/physical and sociality thinking.. Such steps would help reinforce the view and
help our understanding about how individual farm/ranch families, agribusiness,
and rural people are intertwined/ integral parts of both the social and natural
system. We may need to see the same
entities as part of several different kinds of elemental socialities (Fiske,
1992), i.e., rural people working within a complex planetary system, economy,
and society with cause and effect, in constant feedback. Seemingly we need to re-conceptualize the
economy as embedded in society, and
society embedded in the environmental system, each on par with the other, a
flat rather than a hierarchical system.
This suggests shifting away from thinking about individual humans in
control, and shifting to a
coevolutionary way of thinking, and thus re-forming the metaphors by
which we live (See: http://agecon.unl.edu/lynne/metaphor.pdf ) and may survive (Norgaard, 1995) in rural
places.
Macro Forces in Social
Science: Time to Wage Peace, Not War
Social sciences waged war around the turn
of the century. The resolution of the war involved dividing the social science
territory. This division first occurred in Europe, and was eventually exported
to the Americas, wherein the war was
especially brutal. We live with this
legacy in our social science programs.
The battle lines formed between the German historical-social school
and the English abstract-deductive school (Granovetter and Swedberg, 1992, p.
3). The former used rich description of real world situations and conditions in
its methods and methodologies, and was quite empirical and inferential in
nature. The latter used abstract models
of economy and society, logico-deductive approach, and evolved over time the
hypothesis testing idea. The latter
historically was shared with many of the physical and natural sciences,
especially physics. Tracing back to
Pareto, very sharp lines were drawn between sociology and economics (and, as it
turns out, between economics and most other social science disciplines), with
the basic premise that economics engages in the study of rational action, while
sociology and other social sciences study nonrational action (Swedberg, 1990,
p. 11). The hard line between “logical”
and “nonlogical” human action was drawn.
In the U.S.,
the war resulted in the
sociologists, and to a lesser extent their brethren in anthropology,
psychology, political science, the
other social sciences all agreeing to stay out of the economists
territory. It was understood that their
chances of being hired into the universities would be slim without the support of the economists (Swedberg,
1990, p. 10). The result has been
almost 100 years of separation of the territories between the social sciences.
Fortunately, we have since learned such
separation is scientific nonsense, as has been borne out in psychological and
neuroscience research (e.g., see Cory, 1999),
i.e., real humans are simultaneously both rational and nonrational, logical
and nonlogical, egoistic and empathic, which requires all social sciences to
rethink the behavioral assumptions built into their disciplines and to seek
common ground. Additionally, we have
learned in modern day philosophy of
science and methodology that no one of the methodologies is superior. Seemingly we need, instead, a plurality of
methodologies, applying both the rich description and the abstract modeling,
simultaneously, jointly, not separably.
This helps justify both private and public scholarship, i.e., scholarly
work by the academy and in the lay public, and in working with same. We can learn from each other. We are experiencing the need for a research
enlightened look at actual human
behavior, and the need for a common behavioral model that perhaps all social
scientists can use, in addition to blending the methodologies. Social science
is behavioral science. We seek to
understand human actions and behaviors.
Perhaps we need a plurality of methodologies to do so.
Fortunately for the progress and consilience
of these sciences, we see encouraging
signs that the divisions can be healed, with much of this healing made possible
by the new scientific research showing the higher plane arising between the
egoistic and empathic, the logical and the non-logical tendencies in human nature (Cory,
1999). This may be occurring in large
part due to each territory now being sufficiently secure that some benefits
from trade have become possible.[4]
Starting about 10-years ago, we start to see the emergence of new social
science disciplines at the interstice of the old ones. This is especially encouraging, in that
nearly all scientific breakthroughs occur at the interstices of more
established disciplines. Science is
something like an amoeba, breaking out here and there, at which time we may
sometimes see rather dramatic paradigm shifts. Two prime examples are economic
psychology and economic sociology, and the evolution of new societies and
professional associations like the Society for the Advancement of Behavioral
Economics, the International Association for Research in Economic
Psychology, and the Society for the
Advancement of Socio-Economics.
One of our IANR-UNL social scientists was heard
to exclaim, after attending one of the recent Townhall meetings, “… we (social scientists) are our own worst
enemy!” Perhaps it is, indeed, time
to wage peace and not war.
Macro Forces in Costs
While Mission, Technology, Human Values and
Science are more fundamental forces,
Cost sometimes overrides and drives it all. Scientists, perhaps moreso than ever before in the history of
science are being asked to be moving toward the low point on the long run
average cost curve for what we produce. As a result, departments sometimes are
cut apart into component parts and reconfigured to produce the lowest cost
services.
Unfortunately, sometimes cost economies are
sought and achieved without enough attention devoted to “making a difference,” i.e., producing net
benefits. Perhaps not enough focus is
being put on net benefits (benefits – costs). Nevertheless, cost savings
represented in economies of scale, e.g., the use of Business Centers to handle
personnel matters and to relieve pressures put on single accountants and
department heads, need to be seriously considered as we look to the future of
rural studies and the rural social sciences.
Hopefully, however, any such cost driven
changes will perhaps give more weight to the reality of the more substantive
macro forces at work. Also, in doing a
thorough benefit-cost analysis seemingly the first step is to study ourselves,
in order to ascertain our assets and how we fit together in complex and
interdependent ways (Allen, 1997;
Lynne, 1997). We may also need
to ascertain the needs much as accomplished through the recent set of IANR
Listening Sessions. It seems that only
then could we be positioned to know how
to construct the ideal type of rural social science program.
Conclusions and Recommendations
It seems it is time to act. We as Rural
Social Scientists perhaps need to see a
common future with joint
attention to mission and science, with Mission driving Science, and
Science driving Mission, in synergistic ways. We need to perhaps recognize the
macro forces in technology and values, which also often drive each other in
constant feedback. We seemingly need to focus on increasing net benefits =
(benefits – costs), , and reduce the
emphasis on only the cost side. In
fact, we may need to increase the cost side (i.e., provide substantively
increased funding to social science) in order to realize the net benefits. We perhaps need to do an asset analysis,
and an analysis of our interdependence, as well as to find better ways to
discover what our next mission needs to be, and then to orchestrate team
actions to work on same. We perhaps
need to continue the Town Hall meetings beyond the current plans of three, to
move to some kind of regular, maybe even weekly Seminar or ongoing Workshop
series. We perhaps need to find new
ways to build social capital among the social scientists: Wage peace, and not War. Offshoots could be joint grant writing
efforts and expanded support from actively participating in a variety of joint ventures.
It is hoped this thought piece will stir
others to also write about the issues in Rural Social Science. Such writing,
and the open dialogue emerging from same, can serve to help us find creative
ways in which the self-interest and others-interest can be jointly served, reaching a higher plane
for ourselves and for the people in this most Rural Place we call Nebraska.
References
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[1]Impetus for this paper is the current dialogue
(Spring, 2000) about enhancing the rural social sciences at the University of
Nebraska- Lincoln. Metaeconomics
provides the framework being applied in
this analysis (See: http://agecon.unl.edu/lynne/metaeconomics.htm ).
[2] Professor, Natural Resource and Environmental Economist, University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
[3] See Heiner (1983) who notes how it is only in the simplest of tribal societies wherein institutions are usually close to being invariant, and it is thus for these societies that models with the institutions invariant assumption predict accurately. This suggests we need to build new social science theories and models to facilitate examining the changing nature of institutions and the norms… the moral dimension… said institutions embed and represent. This also seems to suggest it is time to help people in rural places proactively design organizations, institutions and laws due to rural peoples now facing complexities never before experienced in the evolution of agriculture.
[4] That is, waging war can lead to clearly defined territorial boundaries. Each territory must be strong after the war, lest others will continue to move in and take new ground. Once the boundaries are in place and secured, mutual benefits can occur from trade (See Simmons, 1998). Perhaps we are in the trading stage among the social sciences.