Rural Develoment Policies and Rural Governability: the Andalusian case

Abstract

Since the beginning of the 90s, the EU Rural Development Policy (RDP) embodied on different programmes and initiatives -such as Leader- has been changing the institutional way to approach rural communities among State Members. This new policy has been introducing new ideas such as multi-level governance or bottom-up decision making process, which have unfolded a new model of rural governance in Europe. Therefore, the hypothesis of this paper is that EU RPD is a key element in the ongoing process of deep transformation of rural governance in Andalusia. This paper is the outcome of an empirical research based on fieldwork techniques that produced quantitative and qualitative data, which try to combine the micro and macro perspective. Therefore, the current situation and model of rural governance in Andalusia will be explained; ethnographic examples of rural county governance will be used as empiric examples.The Andalusian case represents an incredible chance to study this new model of rural governance, because 90% of the Andalusian territory has been defined as rural. At the same time, this rural territory has been divided in 50 Rural Development Areas (RDA) or counties with 50 Local Action Groups (LAGs).This paper demonstrates that this institutional network has become key element on rural governance in Andalusia, and that LAGs have a powerful position due to their mediation role between civil society and public administration.