Links

DEFINED

Understanding Rural America - This government site provides detailed statistics about the sizes and types of small communities in the United States. Also available as an Acrobat PDF here.

TRENDS
Bowling Alone - This is the Web site for the book by Robert Putnam, which measures the decline of community spirit in the last third of the 20th century.

ACTION

Migrating from a City - This Danish site proposes a scheme to decentralize cities. It is a slide presentation of a model of de-urbanization.

RESEARCH

Small is Beautiful - E. F.  Schumacher - The E. F. Schumacher Society, named after the author of Small is Beautiful is an educational non-profit organization founded in 1980. Their programs demonstrate that both social and environmental sustainability can be achieved by applying the values of human-scale communities and respect for the natural environment to economic issues.

School of Living - The School of Living is an educational organization dedicated to learning and teaching the philosophy, practices and principles of living that are self-empowering for individuals. Its general aim is to establish decentralized, ecologically-sound, self-governed and humane communities.

ATTRA - Appropriate Technology Transfer for Rural Areas-is the national sustainable farming information center operated by the private nonprofit National Center for Appropriate Technology (NCAT). It provides technical assistance agriculture professionals.

Community Development Society - The international Community Development Society (CDS), founded in 1969, is a professional association for community development practitioners and citizen leaders around the world.

Center for Agriculture and Rural Development (CARD) - CARD was early innovator of complex statistical and mathematical policy modeling systems. CARD programs embody academic excellence and communication with policymakers, opinion leaders, farmers, business people, and agricultural commodity organization leaders.

Center for Community Change - CCC helps people build organizations and create better communities and policies focusing on community development, community organizing, leadership training, coalition building, housing, welfare reform, jobs, economic development, banking and reinvestment, as wells as Native American issues.

ERIC Clearinghouse on Rural Education and Small Schools - AEL is a nonprofit, regionally oriented education research, development, and service institution. Its mission is to link the knowledge from research with the wisdom from practice to improve teaching and learning.

Center for Rural Revitalization - This groups helps create a rural community and agricultural structure that is economically viable, environmentally sound, socially acceptable and sustainable into the future, with a focus on leadership, sustainable agriculture, economic, and community development.

Heartland Center for Leadership Development - The Heartland Center for Leadership Development is an independent, nonprofit organization developing local leadership that responds to the challenges of the future, with a focus on rural community survival.

The Kellogg Collection - The Kellogg Collection of Rural Community Development Resources is a reference library containing hundreds of high quality print and video materials developed by universities, nonprofit organizations and agencies throughout the U.S. and Canada. This site provides annotations and information on obtaining copies.

MDC Rural Community College Initiative/University of Namibia - The RCCI is a national program that helps community colleges in economically distressed regions move their people and communities toward prosperity. The RCCI aims to strengthen rural community colleges, enhancing their capacity to provide economic leadership for their regions and serve as agents for community development. It is also working to increase state and national support for rural community colleges.

National Association of Towns and Townships - The purpose of the National Association of Towns and Townships (NATaT) is to strengthen the effectiveness of town and township government by educating lawmakers and public policy officials about how small town governments operate and by advocating policies on their behalf in Washington, D.C.

National Center for Small Communities - The mission of the National Center for Small Communities is to provide the elected leaders of America's small communities with tools to govern effectively.

National Civic League - Headquartered in Denver, Colorado, the National Civic League (NCL) is a 107-year-old non-profit, non-partisan organization dedicated to strengthening citizen democracy by transforming democratic institutions.

National Rural Development Partnership - The National Rural Development Partnership (NRDP) works to strengthen rural America through collaborative partnerships. The NRDP brings together partners from local, state, tribal, and federal governments, as well as from the for-profit and nonprofit private sector.

National Rural Health Association - The National Rural Health Association is a national membership organization, consisting of approximately 2000 members, whose mission is to improve the health and healthcare of rural Americans and to provide leadership on rural issues through advocacy, communications, education and research..

North Central Regional Center for Rural Development - The North Central Regional Center for Rural Development, located at Iowa State University, is one of four regional centers coordinating rural development research and education throughout the United States.

Northeast Regional Center for Rural Development - The NERCRD is one of four regional rural development centers in the nation. It focuses specifically on rural issues affecting the 13 states of the Northeast region.

Rural LISC - The mission of Rural LISC is to build the capacity of resident led rural Community Development Corporations (CDCs), increase their production and impact, and demonstrate the value of investing in and through rural CDCs.

Rural Policy and Research Institute (RUPRI) - The Rural Policy Research Institute (RUPRI) conducts policy-relevant research and facilitates public dialogue to assist policymakers in understanding the rural impacts of public policies and programs.

Social Capital for Development - This website is the World Bank's link with external partners, researchers, institutions, governments and others interested in understanding and applying social capital for sustainable social and economic development.

Southern Rural Development Center - The SRDC supports research and extension efforts to improve the lives of people living in non-metropolitan areas of the United States.

VISION 2010 - VISION 2010 is a partnership initiative with the purpose of building healthy, sustainable communities in Arkansas in the 21st century - the knowledge based economy.

Western Rural Development Center - The WRDC, located at Utah State University, facilitates collaborative socio-economic research through higher education institutions in the 13 states and four territories of the Western region.

Heart Land Field Guide - A guide to a variety of community building resources.