"The argument advanced here is that actor-network theory is useful in analyzing conservation agriculture as a radically different agriculture: a new paradigm with new beliefs about soils, plants, and environment, and farmers themselves as well as new crop production systems."
Goreham, Gary A. (author), Leistritz, F. Larry (author), Rathge, Richard W. (author), and Departments of Sociology and Agricultural Economics, North Dakota State University, Fargo, ND; Departments of Sociology and Agricultural Economics, North Dakota State University, Fargo, ND; Departments of Sociology and Agricultural Economics, North Dakota State University, Fargo, ND
Format:
Journal article
Publication Date:
1988
Published:
USA
Location:
Agricultural Communications Documentation Center, Funk Library, University of Illinois Box: 83 Document Number: C05135
AGRICOLA IND 89001627, We compared the socioeconomic characteristics of a generalizable sample of displaced farm households in North Dakota with a random sample of producers who were currently operating their farming enterprises. We hypothesized that the displaced farmers would differ significantly from their currently operating counterparts in (1) the structural conditions of their operations and (2) their personal characteristics. Our hypotheses were guided by the changing structure of the agriculture literature and the adoption-diffusion literature. We obtained our data from lists of farmers who were displaced between 1981 and 1985 for financial reasons (N = 169) and from a panel of active farmers (N = 759) initially surveyed in 1985. We found that farmers displaced between 1981 and 1985 did not operate enterprises significantly different from those currently in business. Our analysis of the personal characteristics of operators revealed statistically significant differences, but these differences had limited explanatory power. We concluded that researchers should shift their attention to macrolevel variables to characterize displaced farmers.
AGRICOLA IND 89035615, We explore the relationship between adoption of farm technology and labor availability in Africa. We use a case study of the introduction of a high-yielding variety of maize in an area of Zambia to examine the different aspects of the relationship between adoption and labor availability/mobilization. The research is based on an intensive 15-month study of 23 maize farmers, survey data from 240 of their farm workers, and data collected from an ongoing integrated rural development project. The data illustrate that the shift to hybrid maize requires additional labor. farmers' inability to mobilize additional labor results in partial adoption and various compromises in the performance of recommended practices. The labor survey reveals that despite farmers' preferences for hiring older workers and female labor, children are extensively employed because of their availability. We conclude by illustrating the need for adoption research that takes the broader farming environment into account.
Gartrell, C. David (author), Gartrell, J.W. (author), Lewis, Scott C. (author), and Lewis: Department of Sociology, University of Victoria, Victoria, British Columbia, Canada; Gartrell, C.: Department of Sociology, University of Victoria, Victoria, British Columbia, Canada; Gartrell, J.: Department of Sociology, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
Format:
Journal article
Publication Date:
1989
Published:
USA
Location:
Agricultural Communications Documentation Center, Funk Library, University of Illinois Box: 83 Document Number: C05148
AGRICOLA IND 89062953, We test two hypotheses based on Cancian's theory of the status-innovation relationship which predicts upper-middle-class conservatism in agricultural communities (1967, 1972, 1979, 1981). Quantitative meta-analysis of 34 rural development surveys yields a cumulated difference-of-proportions that (1) actually runs counter to the direction predicted by Cancian's "upper-middle- class conservatism" hypothesis, and (2) supports Morrison et al.'s (1976) conjecture that upper-middle-class conservatism effects should be weaker in pyramidal representations of rural stratification systems. Future research should focus on community-level contextual factors that may influence the nature of the status-innovation relationship:
Boersma, Larry (author), Faulkenberry, G. David (author), Mason, Robert (author), and Mason: Survey Research Center, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR; Boersma: Department of Soil Science, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR; Faulkenberry: Department of Statistics, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR
Format:
Journal article
Publication Date:
1988
Published:
USA
Location:
Agricultural Communications Documentation Center, Funk Library, University of Illinois Box: 84 Document Number: C05169
Kloppenburg, Jack, Jr. (author / Department of Rural Sociology, University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI) and Department of Rural Sociology, University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI
Format:
Journal article
Publication Date:
1991
Published:
USA
Location:
Agricultural Communications Documentation Center, Funk Library, University of Illinois Box: 90 Document Number: C06474
James F. Evans Collection, As a result of environmental and agrarian activism and of academic critique, a substantial amount of space is available now for moving agricultural technoscience onto new trajectories. A critical rural sociology has played a key role in pushing forward the deconstructive project that has been instrumental in creating this space. And rural sociologists can be active agents in the reconstruction of the alternative science that must emerge from "actually existing" science and that must be developed if there is to be a truly alternative agriculture. But to be effective in this effort we need to enlarge not only the canon of our colleagues in the natural sciences, but our own canon as well. This article suggests that the theoretical resources for such reconstruction are available in contemporary sociological and feminist interpretations of science. Material resources for the reconstruction of a "successor science" are to be found in the "local knowledge" that is continually produced and reproduced by farmers and agricultural workers. Articulations and complementarities between theoretical resources are suggested and potentially productive research areas are outlined. (original)
Bailey, Wilfrid C. (author), Robinson, I.E. (author), and Dept. of Sociology and Anthropology, University of Georgia; Dept. of Sociology and Anthropology, University of Georgia
Format:
Journal / Research summary
Publication Date:
1965
Published:
USA
Location:
Agricultural Communications Documentation Center, Funk Library, University of Illinois Box: 4 Document Number: B00414
Gartrell, C. David (author), Gartrell, John W. (author), and Department of Sociology, University of Alberta, Edmonton; Department of Sociology, University of Georgia, Athens
Format:
Journal article
Publication Date:
1979
Published:
USA
Location:
Agricultural Communications Documentation Center, Funk Library, University of Illinois Box: 37 Document Number: B04061
INTERPAKS, Examines the conditions under which cultivators in 84 agrarian villages within the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh adopted green revolution technology. Social status or resources and awareness are viewed as necessary but not sufficient conditions for the trial of innovation. A multiplicative model was specified to examine their effects. At higher levels of education, awareness was translated into trial at a high rate. In villages where awareness and resources were relatively highly concentrated, the rate of translation of awareness into trial was higher.