3 pages, 11 pages, This paper examines the usefulness of the new social movements (NSMs) paradigm in the changing context of East European post-communist societies and their agricultural systems and rural communities. Starting with statements formulated in Western sociology in the context of Western democratic societies about NSMs as a protest against modernity, the paper analyses the role of such movements in the still modernizing Eastern European reality. The first part of the paper briefly examines some basic elements of the NSMs paradigm in European and American social science. The goal of this section is not only to identify the basic characteristics of NSMs, but also to identify the typical frames used by them. The second part of the paper focuses on the presence of NSMs in the communist era. Drawing on the idea of NSMs as indicators of a "post-materialist shift" as well as of "anti-establishment" and "pro-participatory democracy", the paper examines the frames of democratic opposition in Eastern Europe before 1989. The final part of the paper considers several selected examples from Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic to explore the role of NSMs in the process of shaping new ruralities during the post-communist transformation.
9 pages, via online journal, Rural communities are not restricted to bounded territories but increasingly reproduced by intensified rural connections with the outside. Extant research tends to suggest that the production of rural community unbound relies on the movement and activities of mobile groups while ignoring the trans-local practice of community-making by local villagers who stay in the countryside. This paper draws on ethnographic insights on the formation of inter-regional surname associations in contemporary China, a contemporary form of Chinese lineage communities which is relatively unknown both in and outside China. By adopting a trans-local approach, it explores how rural lineage members and groups initiate the alliance with their same surname fellows in different rural localities to forge trans-local communities. Such rural-to-rural alliance is consolidated through various meanings and practices, producing the idea of a big ‘family’. This trans-local community not only enables rural members to enhance their mobilities and cultural and socio-economic capital but is also grounded in lineage groups' assertion of territorial identity, power, and social status. With a nuanced analysis of the trans-local agency of local villagers, this paper contributes to understanding the production of trans-local communities and trans-local rurality based on rural-to-rural connections. It also offers insights into the reconstruction of rural people's identities in contemporary China.