Rurality and discourse: From the Spanish case to the Cantabrian case

• Main Author: Eloy Gómez-Pellón
• Format: Article
• Language: Spanish
• Published: Antropólogos Iberoamericanos en Red 2012-09-01
• Series: Antropólogos Iberoamericanos en Red
• Subjects: Common Agrarian Politics; multi-functionality; new rurality; rural spaces; sustainability; peasantry
• Online Access: http://www.aibr.org/antropologia/netesp/numeros/0703/070302e.pdf

The European Union reform of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) in 1992, in accordance to what has been called multifunctionality of rural environments, has considered as its most ambitious goals the preservation of the rural landscape and natural environments, as well as the maintenance of the social fabric and the welfare of local populations. As an attribute of the territory, and in harmony with the principle of sustainability, the multifunctionality of rural environments should provide the society with essential public goods. After some time, the rural rhetoric reinforced by the Agenda 2000 and the CAP reforms of 2003 and 2004, has created a growing illusion of an immense rural world that supposedly covers nearly the whole territory of the European Union. Contradictorily, the European Union spreads over one of the most urbanized areas of the world, and its citizens have adopted urban living styles long time ago. This research shows, through the analysis of the Spanish case, the insurmountable difficulties for assuming this dichotomous conception of the territory and, on the other hand, how the multifunctionality of rural spaces hides a great diversity of social landscapes of the rural .