RSS President Lisa Pruitt publishes article in UMKC Law Review
RSS President Lisa Pruitt publishes article in UMKC Law Review
Dr. Lisa Pruitt, RSS President and Brigitte Bodenheimer Research Scholar and Distinguished Professor of Law at the University of California, Davis, recently published an article titled “Canaries in the Coal Mine: Rural Women, Maternal Health, and the Future of Feminist Coalition Building” in the UMKC Law Review. The article discusses how women are largely ignored in most types of research, despite the fact that “rural women are proverbial canaries in the coal mine—at least one category of canaries—when it comes to women’s well-being.” The paper, part of the “Transforming Law, Contesting Exclusion, Shaping Inclusion” collection, argues for the need to bring rural women into feminist coalitions and to help rural women feel empowered about their identities.
Mary Hendrickson, Professor of Sociology and Director of the Interdisciplinary Center for Food Security at the University of Missouri, recently published with coauthors a commentary in The Antitrust Bulletin. Titled “Expectation-Based Fairness in Agricultural Markets: Implications for Antitrust Policy,” the article discusses perceptions of fairness by farmers in the context of two case studies: policy changes to water access rights and the use of dicamba in agricultural areas. Their research demonstrates the feasibility of identifying expectation bases, enabling more objective assessments of unfairness claims, which may have policy implications as it relates to antitrust and competition regulations. The authors note that understanding expectation-based fairness claims can help policy-makers evaluate harms not captured by traditional metrics and design more responsive competition and contract policies.
Kelly Wilson, Assistant Research Professor in the School of Natural Resources at the University of Missouri, and Mary Hendrickson, Professor of Sociology at the University of Missouri, recently published an article in the Agricultural and Applied Economics Association publication Choices titled “Trends and Barriers to Underserved Farmers’ Participation in Federal Conservation Programs and Their Association with Policy Changes.” In the article, they and their coauthors reviews national data on historically underserved farmers and ranchers’ participation in federal conservation programs. They use this data to examine how these patterns relate to administrative processes, structural barriers, and recent policy changes. They describe trends in EQIP and CSP participation across producer groups and assesses whether major institutional milestones have been associated with changes in historically underserved farmers and ranchers contract numbers. The overall goal of the article is to provide a clear view of how accessibility has evolved, identify remaining constraints, and inform policy discussions on equity and efficiency in conservation program design.
A recent article in The Guardian titled “US farmers are rejecting multimillion-dollar datacenter bids for their land: ‘I’m not for sale’” quoted Mary Hendrickson, Professor in Rural Sociology at the University of Missouri and Director of the Interdisciplinary Center for Food Security. The article discussed how many companies that are trying to build AI data centers have attempted to buy large swaths of farmland. However, farmers have by and large resisted these efforts to purchase their land. Hendrickson provided expert knowledge on the importance of farms to rural families and communities, noting that many farmers feel a responsibility to previous generations and citing the tragedies that occurred during the 1980s farm crisis. She also notes that transforming farmland into AI data centers would likely be irreversible.
Ryanne Pilgeram from the Wilderness Society, along with co-author Mark Haggerty, recently published a report titled “Decoupling and Public Lands: Ensuring the future of public lands while supporting communities who bear the burden of shifting fossil fuel markets.” The report outlines how Congress should establish a permanent fund to manage natural resource revenue so communities can diversify fossil fuel-reliant economies and keep public lands in public hands. Their work highlights that public lands are economically entwined with fossil fuel extraction, which creates incentives to continue fossil fuel development. However, boom-and-bust revenue cycles from fossil fuel markets harm local budgets. They recommend creating a predictable, stable revenue source for resource communities irrespective of market fluctuations via establishing a permanent resource revenue fund and note that decoupling budgets from annual extraction revenues can reduce political pressure to sell or develop public lands.
Tim Slack, professor of sociology at Louisiana State University, and Shannon Monnat, professor of sociology and Lerner Chair in Public Health Promotion and Population Health at Syracuse University, wrote a paper for the Aspen Institute’s Health Strategy Group’s recent report “Meeting the Health Needs of Rural America.” In their paper, titled “Population Health in Rural America: Changes, Challenges, and Opportunities,” Slack and Monnat highlight the heterogeneity of rural America. They note the intertwined and fluid nature of rural and urban areas and, while acknowledging significant disparities, also note that many rural areas are “healthy, successful, and thriving.” They call for a response that focuses on upstream policy interventions that will yield better health.
Gregory Fulkerson, professor and chair of the Geography & Environmental Sustainability Department at SUNY Oneonta, recently published a book in Bloomsbury with his colleagues titled “Inequality at the Urban-Rural Nexus.” The book examines examines the systemic and structural nature of social inequalities and how inequalities shape identities and access to opportunities. The authors argue that it will be impossible to build a more just and equitable society without addressing the urban–rural nexus.
John Green, past president of RSS, was recently appointed a community development research fellow with the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis’s Community Development department. Green is the director of the Southern Rural Development Center, housed at Mississippi State University, and a professor in the Agricultural Economics department at the university. Green, a rural sociologist and demographer, focuses his research on rural development, population change and the factors shaping the well-being of rural communities. During his fellowship, Green will collaborate with Community Development staff and partners, author and coauthor research publications, participate in seminars and present findings related to community and economic development.
Dudley Poston, professor of sociology at Texas A&M University, recently published an article in The Conversation titled “China’s new condom tax will prove no effective barrier to country’s declining fertility rate.” In the piece, Poston analyzes the potential impact of this contraceptive policy on declining fertility in China. He notes that while China is the world’s most populous country, it has low fertility rates. In response, the country has adopted pronatalist policies, which Poston predicts will be ineffective at stopping this demographic shift. Poston notes that China’s historical policies surrounding limited childbirth have likely contributed to declining fertility even as more births per family are now permitted.