Explorations of comparative ruralism in the UK and Japan
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Leicester
Department Name: Sch of Geog, Geol & the Environment
Abstract
The network will seek to develop collaboration that fosters dialogical learning that flows equally between Japan and the UK. The 18 month project will involve 18 researchers, drawn equally from Japan and the UK and involving both experienced and early career researchers, who will meet at two workshops, one on each country, where they will engage in idea, knowledge and experience sharing activities, including short field visits to rural locations. Members of the network will work together to co-design and undertake scoping visits for at least 9 comparative rural research projects. The outputs of the workshops and scoping visits will be disseminated via a project website, exhibitions held in Japan and the UK, and through the submission of research articles. These outputs will address not only rural change in Japan and the UK, but will the theory and practice of comparative rural research more generally.
Planned Impact
Who will benefit from this research?
This project will produce direct benefits for academic researchers as it is designed to develop a network of academic researchers who can undertake collaborative comparative research in rural areas in Japan and the UK. The network will initially consist of 18 academics, 9 from each country. The proposal includes one co-investigator from each country who is an early career researcher and involvement of further early career researchers from each country will be prioritised as final membership of the network is expanded from the investigators to involve additional researchers interested in the project.
Academic beneficiaries of the project will not only include participants in the network but further academic researchers, as the network will disseminate its discussions and the findings of scoping reports, as well as develop research projects proposals that it is expected will involve academics from beyond the network.
Whilst academic researchers will for the initial beneficiaries of the research, it is expected that there will be a series of people and organisations who will indirectly benefit from the project. This will include governmental rural policy makers and planners; rural development practitioners, and rural interest and resident groups.
How will they benefit from this research?
The academic beneficiaries of the network will benefit through dialogue with and learning from each other and through the conduct of scoping projects and associated research activities such as the construction of a bibliography of key rural research in Japan and the UK. They will generate greater understanding both of the four key themes that form the focus of the network workshops but also of the theories, practices, challenges, ethics and politics of conducting comparative research. They will also have the opportunity to develop collaborative research with each other, and potentially benefit from any future research programme initiated by the AHRC, ESRC and Japan Society for the Promotion of Science.
Academic beneficiaries beyond the network will benefit from the outputs of the network, which will include: i) a bibliography of key references on rural Japan and the UK, ii) summaries of the 2 workshop discussions and 9 research scoping reports, iii) at least 3 articles in internationally recognized journals; and iv) two exhibitions of material from the workshops and scoping projects (one in Tokyo, one in Leicester). Items i)-iii) will all be made available via a project website, which will also contain material from item iv). Information about the exhibitions will also be circulated via academic email distribution lists and social media and access to the exhibition will be available free of charge.
The non-academic beneficiaries will be able to draw on the materials listed above and rural policy makers, planners and development practitioners will all be invited to attend the exhibition and make contact with the network participants.
This project will produce direct benefits for academic researchers as it is designed to develop a network of academic researchers who can undertake collaborative comparative research in rural areas in Japan and the UK. The network will initially consist of 18 academics, 9 from each country. The proposal includes one co-investigator from each country who is an early career researcher and involvement of further early career researchers from each country will be prioritised as final membership of the network is expanded from the investigators to involve additional researchers interested in the project.
Academic beneficiaries of the project will not only include participants in the network but further academic researchers, as the network will disseminate its discussions and the findings of scoping reports, as well as develop research projects proposals that it is expected will involve academics from beyond the network.
Whilst academic researchers will for the initial beneficiaries of the research, it is expected that there will be a series of people and organisations who will indirectly benefit from the project. This will include governmental rural policy makers and planners; rural development practitioners, and rural interest and resident groups.
How will they benefit from this research?
The academic beneficiaries of the network will benefit through dialogue with and learning from each other and through the conduct of scoping projects and associated research activities such as the construction of a bibliography of key rural research in Japan and the UK. They will generate greater understanding both of the four key themes that form the focus of the network workshops but also of the theories, practices, challenges, ethics and politics of conducting comparative research. They will also have the opportunity to develop collaborative research with each other, and potentially benefit from any future research programme initiated by the AHRC, ESRC and Japan Society for the Promotion of Science.
Academic beneficiaries beyond the network will benefit from the outputs of the network, which will include: i) a bibliography of key references on rural Japan and the UK, ii) summaries of the 2 workshop discussions and 9 research scoping reports, iii) at least 3 articles in internationally recognized journals; and iv) two exhibitions of material from the workshops and scoping projects (one in Tokyo, one in Leicester). Items i)-iii) will all be made available via a project website, which will also contain material from item iv). Information about the exhibitions will also be circulated via academic email distribution lists and social media and access to the exhibition will be available free of charge.
The non-academic beneficiaries will be able to draw on the materials listed above and rural policy makers, planners and development practitioners will all be invited to attend the exhibition and make contact with the network participants.
Organisations
Publications
Halfacree K
(2019)
Rural imaginaries
Martin Phillips
(2022)
What place for the rural in an era of planetary urbanisation?
Maye D
(2019)
Agriculture in uncertain times
McGreevy, S.R.
(2021)
Comparing agri-food policy regimes in the UK and Japan
Phillips M
(2019)
Rural Revitalisation and Gentrification?
| Description | The overall purpose of this grant was to examine the potential for comparative rural research that could identify and address key processes of rural transformation within Japan and the UK through dialogue and learning that enabled the flow of ideas and practices between the two countries. The principal achievement of the grant included the development of outline proposals for 10 research projects involving comparative research focused on rural aspects of Japan and the UK. These proposals spanned the following four broad thematic areas: 1) Differences in the meanings, representational forms, and understandings of the countryside and rural spaces, places and landscapes within the UK and Japan, and how these have emerged, differed, and connect to each other. The need for research to examine how these are being actively drawn into and/or displaced by a series of processes of rural economic, social and environmental change, including rural revitalisation/regeneration, touristification, rural gentrification and rewilding was also highlighted. 2) Changing forms of dwelling and living with human and more-than-human co-occupants of rural spaces and places in the UK and Japan. In both countries there are significance changes occurring in both the character of rural dwellings and practices of live within rural areas which have hitherto been rather neglected, because research has often focused largely on the events of house construction/abandonment and moving into/away from the countryside. Whilst these events are highly significant drivers of very divergent changes in rural areas in Japan and the UK, in both countries there are also many other dimensions of change that warrant comparative study. 3) Change in agricultural production, policy and food supply chains in Japan and the UK, which have both seen strong growth in market liberalisation and corporate agriculture, whilst having agricultural production systems that are structurally quite distinct and undergoing divergent changes in their international trading positions. Such changes are likely to significantly impact producers, and communities where there is a high economic dependency on them, although they may create opportunities for innovation as well as considerable intra-national variability in levels of resilience and adaptability. There are also changes occurring in both countries related to the adoption of new technologies, including those related to digital agriculture, although again questions of spatial and social variability are relevant in both countries. 4) The conduct of comparative research, particularly in the context of rural Japan and the UK. Use was made in the outline proposals of four different strategies of comparison: namely, 'individualising' comparisons that seek to emphasis differences between individual cases or locations, 'genetic' or 'universalising' comparisons that stress common features between cases/locations, 'relational' or 'encompassing' or 'relational comparisons' that focus on the interconnections between cases/places, and variation-finding comparisons that looks the causes for differences in situations where there is seen to be significant commonalities. The significance of UK-Japan rural comparisons in relation to other inter-national comparisons was also explored in one proposal, with connections forged between examinations of this issue and the four identified strategies of comparison. |
| Exploitation Route | The principal way that the finding from this funding can be taken forward is through the development of the outline proposals into grant proposal, research projects and academic research outputs, which can be used by academics and other relevant policy-makers and stakeholders |
| Sectors | Agriculture, Food and Drink,Communities and Social Services/Policy,Creative Economy |