Amazon.com description: Product Description: A thorough examination of tremendous changes apparent in traditional rural society in recent years and their affects on modern, national societies. Studies the broad trends that have altered the parameters employed by policymakers at different scales in western societies including Sweden, Australia, Britain and the United States. Explores the inadequacies of the rural sociology approach used over the past two decades to examine changing rural social relations and stresses the need for a new, holistic approach.