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Annu. Rev. Sociol. 2001. 27:103-24Copyright @ 2001 by Annual Reviews. All rights reserved

THE GREAT AGRICULTURAL TRANSITION:

Crisis, Change, and Social Consequences

of Twentieth Century US Farming

Linda Lobaol and Katherine Meyer2J Rural Sociology Program, Department of Human and Community Resource

Development, Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio 43210; e-mail: Lobao.1@osu.edu2Department of Sociology, Ohio State University, Ohio State University, Columbus,Ohio 43210; e-mail: Meyel:23@osu.edu

Key Words agriculture, economic development, fann population, family fanning,fann women

.Abstract One of the most profound changes in the United States in the past cen-tury is the national abandonment of fanning as a livelihood strategy. This change isevident both in the exodus of Americans from fanning and in the conditions faced by thefarmers remaining, most of whom are marginal producers in an increasingly concen-trated industry. In this article, we provide a retrospective account of the empirical andsociological fate of family fanners. While sociologists have had longstanding interestin agrarian change, research on contemporary fanners is largely confined to specialitypublications, with a loss to the discipline at large. We examine three distinct researchtraditions that continue to document farm transformation: research on macro-leveltransformation, community impacts, and household response. While these traditionsevolved separately, we describe how they overlap and inform each other. Most notably,research on household and community responses delineates meso- and micro-levelinstitutional factors that extend macro-level theory. Research on the contemporaryfann population offers an alternative context in which to interrogate conventional ac-counts of economic development; such research yields insights about aspects of sociallife being rediscovered as part of the new economy and continues to pull sociologistsinto politically charged public policy debates.

INTRODUCTION

The exodus of Americans from farming is one of the most dramatic changes inthe US economy and society in the past century. In the early 1900s, more thanone of every three Americans lived on farms, a number greater than that at anyother point in our country's history. At the century's end, the farm populationstood at under 2%, and even for those who remained in farming, almost 90% of

0360-0572/01/0811-0103$14.00 103

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household income came from nonfann sources. By and large the magnitude of this

transition and its social consequences have been missed in the general sociological

literature. Subfields, particularly rural sociology, have a rich legacy of addressing

agrarian change. The literature, however, tends to be fragmented, visible mainly

in specialty journals, and its significance for the general sociological discipline

remains underestimated. This article examines the epic transition from farming,

the theoretical explanations for this transition, and the social consequences for

fann communities and households.

By the agricultural transition, we refer to the abandonment of farming as a

household livelihood strategy. This transition is evident both in the mass decline

of the farm population and in the structural transformation of agriculture, whereby

most remaining fanns are marginal units incapable of fully employing and sus-

taining families. While a number of literatures span this topic, we limit our focus

to research concerned foremost with the fate of the independent fann population,

family fanners or those who provide most of the labor, management, and capital

in operating their farms.l Our goal is to provide a retrospective account of the

changes experienced by family fanners by taking stock of this population at the

twentieth century's end.

We examine three research traditions that address changes experienced by the

independent fann population. First is the large literature on the structural transfor-

mation of fanning, which tends to be macro-level theorizing about national trends.

This literature provides conceptual explanations for the empirical contours of the

agricultural transition, such as the decline in the number of fanns and growth of

inequality in the existing system. The consequences of these macro-level trans-

formations are manifest at lower analytical levels across communities and house-

holds. The second research tradition incorporates a longstanding, often politically

charged, literature on the impacts of fann change on communities. As family

fanning declines, analysts generally hypothesize that community class polariza-

tion increases and local well-being deteriorates, even in a postindustrial society.

The third research tradition addresses the effects of fann change on households,

much of this centering on the gender division of labor and on social-psychological

well-being. Considering these three traditions allows us to examine the major paths

by which sociologists have sought to understand fann transformation, capturing

heuristically the changes experienced by fanners at the national, community, and

household levels.

lFamily farmers hold class positions that approach the petite-bourgeois ideal. Empirically,today's family farmers range on a continuum from this ideal. Most are semi-proletarianizedthrough family members' off-farm work; others are closer to the capitalist class in dependingon wage labor. Family farms are often contrasted to non-family units, where labor, capi-tal, and management functions are provided by different entities. Terms often used syno-nymously for the latter are industrialized, corporate, capitalist; scale references are alsomade. We do not focus on non-owner farm workers nor on production networks beyond theI' f~ gate, ~~ch as global co~odity chains and local food systems. These are important, tOpICS, mentmg separate reVIews.

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THE GREAT AGRICULTURAL TRANSITION 105

The next section provides an overview of sociological attention to fann change.We then describe the agricultural transition and turn to each of the three researchtraditions above, describing research themes and conceptual bases. To provide asynopsis of these large literatures, we necessarily present a selective and schematicaccount.

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF RESEARCH ONTHE FARM POPULATION IN SOCIOWGY

Sociologists have long looked to the fann population to understand major issuesof the discipline, but the visibility of this research varies historically. The agrariansector was the starting point for Marx, Weber, and Durkheim, who saw changesin agriculture as reinforcing capitalist expansion. Early US sociology took a so-cial problems orientation with two strands, a focus on urban social organizationepitomized by the Chicago School, and a rural counterpart consisting of rural andregional sociology. Rural sociology developed in large part from federal concernwith the fann population (Summers 1986). Political unrest in the countryside fromwidespread economic hardship as well as concern that fanners would out-migrateen masse to urban areas led to federal creation of the Country-Life Commission in1908 and, in turn, to rural sociology's institutionalization in land-grant universi-ties. Regional sociology gained prominence from the work of southern regionalists,who shared the Chicago School's human ecology paradigm but focused largely onthe rural farm population (Odum & Moore 1938). The significance of the fann po-pulation for most sociologists today comes mainly through its historical role in USsociety. Fanners serve to illuminate key historical issues about state transforma-tion (Gilbert & Howe 1991, Hooks 1990, Moore 1996, Skocpol & Finegold 1982),social movements (Mooney & Majka 1995), and African American's northernexodus (Mandie 1978, Tolnay 1999).

Despite the centrality of the farm population to early and historical sociology,one is hard pressed to find any articles on contemporary fanners published inmajor, general sociological journals. While the Annual Review of Sociology hasfeatured some articles on the rural population, the last one devoted to fanningwas published nearly twenty years ago (Newby 1983). Sociologists tend to take amodernist view of US economy and society, which privileges formal sector, paidwork, manufacturing and services, and urban locations. This prevailing account ofwork renders invisible populations engaged in alternative livelihood strategies andindustries such as fanning, whose organization does not fit neatly into frameworkspurporting to explain contemporary economic structure. Modernist, mass societyassumptions center urban social relationships as topics of sociological investiga-tion and discount diversity based on rurality (Falk 1996, Lobao 1996, Lichter &McLaughlin 1995, Tickamyer 1996). By neglecting fanning, sociologists misssignificant aspects of national social change, an opportunity to interrogate conven-tional conceptualizations of work and economic development, and a key policysector.

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Despite the decline of the farm population, farming remains essential for chart-ing national social change. Farming, direct production of food and fiber, is thecornerstone of agriculture, which includes inputs, processing, and distribution andemploys nearly 20% of Americans (USDA 1999:27). Farming itself is importantboth as an export sector in global commodity chains and as a source of income inrural communities. Some of to day's most serious social issues, such as use of gene-tically modified organisms, environmental conservation, land use preservation, andfood safety, arise from farming. Farmers also retain a significant ideological role,evidenced in global free-trade debates and World Trade Organization protests overpreservation of family-farming, as well as in media attention in films and FarmAid events.

Second, as a business dependent on unpaid household labor, farming alwayspossessed distinct characteristics now being rediscovered as part of an emergingpost-Fordist economy. Farming provides a fertile empirical example for studyingthe informal sector and household livelihood strategies; conceptually, this exampleraises the questions of why family businesses still characterize this industry amidsttheir failure elsewhere. More than 98% of the nation's 2.07 million farms areclassified as family operations. Only 3% are incorporated, and of these, nearly90% are closely held by the operators' families rather than external shareholders(Sommer et aI1998:iv).

Third, farming presents a unique case for interrogating conventional sociologi-cal views about the economy. Farming has not followed a linear development path,and its organization does not fit neatly into industrial sociology's categorizations.Partly due to the biological basis of farming, direct corporate involvement haslagged, and the family, which can adjust labor to match seasonal production cy-cles and consumption to match income flows, remains the typical operating entity(Mann & Dickinson 1978). Farming also reflects vestiges of different capitalisteras. As with early simple commodity production, it is typified by home-base pro-duction. Postwar industrial segmentation theory recognizes farming as a peripheralindustry, composed of small firms producing bulk commodities, sandwiched be-tween oligopoly input and output industries. Some also see evidence ofpost-Fordisttrends. Rising inequality in US society has created a segment of affluent consumersdriving demand for speciality commodities. New technologies and flexible produc-tion methods are tailoring output toward these high value, shifting, niche markets(Kenney et aI1989).

Uneven development also is evident as marginal units are reproduced in themidst of growing concentration. Farming is often described as a dualistic system,composed of a large number of small farms that cannot sustain families and a fewlarge farms with expanding market shares. In 1997, small farms (defined here byannual gross sales under $50,000) made up nearly three-fourths of the nation'sfarms but accounted for only about 7% of sales, while the top 3.6% percent offarms (those with sales over a half million dollars) accounted for more than half ofsales nationally (US Bureau of the Census 1999:676). Moderate-sized farms thatsupport a family through farming alone and require little hired labor are edged out

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THE GREAT AGRICULTURAL TRANsmON 107

of this system. Inequality among fanners is thus high. In 1990, the Gini coefficientfor income inequality for fann households was 0.64, nearly 50% percent higherthan that for all US households (Ahearn et al1993).

Finally, the fann population is significant from a state-policy standpoint. Fann-ers are subject to a legacy of interventions from land grant college research, ex-tension service outreach, fann bill legislation, export promotion programs, andnumerous USDA programs. Unrecognized by most sociologists is that there isprobably no other workforce over which our discipline has such extensive policyinfluence, mainly through rural sociologists' long history of work with federal andstate officials on fann and rural development policy (Jahr et al 1986, Swanson1988b ).

Though the sociological significance of the existing fann population is under-estimated, one would expect greater disciplinary visibility on the basis of its largeliterature alone. For most of twentieth century rural sociology ,"rural" was equatedwith "fann" and hence, there was intrinsic concern with fann families and com-munities. However, the economic development of fanning was neglected, a topicleft to agricultural economics. Emerging in the 1970s, the sociology of agricul-ture centered on agricultural development and drew largely from Marxian theory(Friedland et al1981, Newby 1983). This literature long focused on domestic farmorganization and more recently on global commodity chains (McMichael 1994,1996, Bonoano et al1994), local food systems (Kloppenburg et al1996, Olson &Lyson 1999), and women in fanning (Sachs 1996, Whatmore 1991). The fannpopulation also is of intrinsic interest to rural demographers (Brown et al 1993,Brown & Wardwell 1981, Fuguitt & Beale 1989). For other researchers, fannersserve more as a rich empirical case to inform a specific disciplinary concern. Stud-ies addressing life course and family (Elder & Conger 2000), gender divisions oflabor (Rosenfeld 1985, Lobao & Meyer 1995), spatial inequality (Lobao 1990),and civic society (Tolbert et al 1998) see fanners as providing useful insights forthese literatures.

THE AGRICULTURAL TRANSITION

Structural changes in fanning over the past century (Table 1) show a decline in thenumber of fanns and in fann population, growth of larger fanns in terms of acreage,sales, and real estate capitalization, and gradual replacement of family with hiredlabor.2 The post-World War II period ushered in the most rapid transformation,brought about by New Deal interventions and diffusion of new technologies (Gosset al1980). From 1940 to 1980, the fann population declined tenfold, the number

2The Census definition of a fann has changed ten times since 1850. Prior to 1974, definitionswere based on acreage and sales criteria. From 1974 to 1992, a fann was any establishmentthat generated $1000 or more of agricultural sales in the past year. This fann definition wasexpanded in 1993 to include several new categories of commodities.~~'::i".;~'~;!;I~lF~~'iIi'.

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THE GREAT AGRICULTURAL TRANSITION 109

offanns declined by more than half, average acreage more than doubled, and realaverage sales increased sixfold. In addition to long-term structural changes, farmersexperience periodic crises. The 1980-1990 decade includes the most recent fanncrisis, illustrated in Table 1 in declining real estate values and fann sales relativeto their 1980 peak.

The increase in both size and number of large fanns and decrease in numberof smaller fanns is accompanied by production polarization (Buttel & LaRamee1991). The market share of sales by the largest 5% of producers has steadily in-creased from 38.3% in 1939 to 54.5% by 1987 (Browne et al 1992:22). Agri-business firms have expanded through vertical integration but more typicallyby production contracts through which fanners become the equivalent of factory-homeworkers, raising commodities to be turned over to agribusiness that theygenerally do not own. While only about 3% of fanns operate under productioncontracts, they produce almost all poultry, half of all hogs, and a quarter of cattle(USDA 2000:51,54). At the same time, most fanns have become marginal pro-duction units that cannot fully employ or sustain families. To survive in fanning,families take off-fannjobs. Almost 90% of fanners' household income now comesfrom non-fann sources (Sommer et al1998:48). A USDA commission recentlydetermined that annual gross sales below $250,000 cannot adequately support afamily, and that survival offanns below that size "is most endangered" (Sommeret al1998:69). About 94% of US fanns fall into this category.

Within the agricultural transition, there is much ethnic, regional, and genderdiversity. African Americans were virtually entirely uprooted from fanning. Thenumber of African-American fanners peaked in 1920 when they accounted for14.3% of fann operators compared to 1% today (Sommer et al1998:40). Thisuprooting is attributed to the general decline of small fanns, land erosion andboll weevil infestations of cotton, New Deal fann programs benefitting whitelandowners, postwar cotton mechanization, repressive ethnic relations, and thelure of northern jobs (Fligstein 1981, MandIe 1978, Seavoy 1998, Tolnay 1999).Remaining African-American fanners faced institutional discrimination and areolder and poorer than others (Beauford 1986, Brown et al 1994, Jones 1994).Research on other ethnic groups as fann operators, rather than laborers, is limited.Hispanic and Native American fanners are usually considered in light ofnon-fannchanges contributing to high rural poverty among these groups (Foley 1997, Snipp1989, Snipp et al1993). Whites now comprise 97.5% offann operators, Hispanics1.5%, African Americans, 1 %, and Native Americans, 0.5% (US Bureau of theCensus 1999:675). The agricultural transition also introduced regional change(Molnar 1986). As small fanns have declined, the fann population has shiftedfrom the South to the Midwest (Beale 1993).

Finally, the agricultural transition was experienced differently by gender as alarge literature on fann women indicates. Women's role in fanning, however, tendsto be invisible, in part because it is difficult to document through the Census ofAgriculture that allows for only one self-defined operator per fann. Census datashow women increased from 6.3% of operators in 1987 to 8.6% a decade later.

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110 LOBAO .MEYER

Women's role is significant because farming involves orchestrating family workstrategies, whether on- or off-farm. Surveys of farm women nationally (Rosenfeld1985) and regionally (Barlett et a11999, Lasley et a11995) find a distinct genderdivision of labor in farm tasks. Midwestern women also are more likely to workoff-farm than men, their proletarianization making possible the survival offamily

farming.

CONCEPTUAL EXPLANATIONS FORAGRICULTURAL TRANSFORMATION

What social forces have displaced family farmers and led to the present systemwith its increasing concentration and reproduction of marginal units? Several per-spectives address how farming in advanced nations evolves. It is worthwhile to notethe neoclassical economic perspective because of its ideological dominance in theagricultural establishment and because it serves as a foil of sociological critique.The neoclassical perspective rests on several assumptions: the present farmingsystem is socially desirable; individuals' behavior is guided by rational-choicedecision-making; and human capital factors and life-style choices explain whyfamilies remain on nonviable units. The historical trend of larger and fewer farmsresults from natural market competition in an industry where domestic demand isinelastic. Farmers are on a technological treadmill to expand production (Cochrane1979). Some farmers outperform others by using more advanced technologies andachieving economies of scale. Displacement of farmers from farming, in effect, isan indicator of the system's success.

Though its recent influence is less pervasive, the major sociological paradigmfor analyzing domestic agricultural development remains Marxian political eco-nomy. Like the neoclassical perspective, the political economy paradigm acknow-ledges market competition and the technological treadmill as reasons why farmshave grown larger and fewer. The major difference between the two perspectiveslies in who controls and benefits from agricultural development. The politicaleconomy framework sees market competition as socially produced and regulatedin ways that benefit large capital in and outside farming. The result is a food systemdetrimental to most farmers, consumers, and the environment. At least two volumes(Buttel & Newby 1980, Friedland et a11991) and numerous articles summarizethe political economy view of domestic farm organization.

The political economy paradigm draws from Kautsky's and Lenin's classicalagrarian analyses of the early 1900s, which suggested that the ideal-type "familyfarmers" whose farms sustain the family and depend on its labor might persist foran extended time but would gradually become differentiated into large capitalistfarmers and semi-proletarianized producers. Most focus has been on capitalist en-terprises and persistence of family farming rather than on semi-proletarianization.A large literature explains why family farming persists. Capital still encountersbarriers to profit-making in farming (Mann 1990), avoids low-profit production

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112 LOBAO .MEYER

land to children are incentives to remain in farming (Brown et al1998, Garkovichet al1995, Hinrichs 1998, Mooney 1988, Salamon 1992). Jackson-Smith (1999)concludes that survival in farming depends as much on such micro-level householddynamics as it does on strategic business behavior.

Second, feminists see institutionalized gender relationships as affecting farmchange. Women underwrite farm survival through their household work, on-farmwork, and off-farm work.

Third, the institutional legacy of the state at various levels affects farm change.While large farms reap greater government benefits, small and moderate-size farmsalso draw from various commodity, insurance, environmental, and disaster reliefprograms. In the 1996 Farm Bill, the Republican-controlled Congress attemptedto deregulate farming, overhauling much remaining New Deal legislation. Butdeclining prices and other problems in the interim have resulted in hefty federalfarm aid packages, over $15 billion in year 2000 alone. Clinton's AgricultureSecretary Dan Glickman recently pronounced the 1996 Farm Bill a failure (NewYork nmes 2000:A20). The importance of subnational state institutions is alsorecognized (DuPuis 1993). The decline of African-American farms provides apoignant example. A class action suit won in 1999 found that African-Americanfarmers were denied federal loans and other aid given white farmers, with mostdocumented discrimination due to county administrators (Sack 2000).

Fourth, farm households are embedded in local and regional contexts that affectfarm survival (Pfeffer 1983, Schwarzweller & Davidson 1997). Ecological factorsaffect farm size and structure. Labor market conditions affect the ability to combinefarm with off-farm employment. Urban proximity presents opportunities for nichemarketing and local food system development.

Finally, farm transformation is a function of farmers' political actions. Far-mers' mass-based political action has declined over time. A corporatist model hasemerged in which most major farm organizations represent the interests of largeproducers. Farmers in marginal social positions appear to withdraw politically,excluding cases usually involving far right influences (Meyer & Lobao 1994).Inequality in the farm sector is maintained in part because most farmers are dis-engaged from political action and the organizations that might represent them.

In summary, while not necessarily a stated purpose, much recent sociologicalwork provides an institutional response to the limitations of political economytheory. It remains to be seen if a more coherent approach that combines macro-level theory with meso- and micro-level insights might be worked out under thebroader political economy banner.

Other approaches to farm change have received less attention. Human ecologytraces the evolution of farming systems as individuals and organizations adapt tochanging environmental resources, technologies, and population density (Albrecht1997, Albrecht & Murdock 1990). Friedland (1991) argues that Jeffersonian pop-ulism characterizes some approaches that identify agribusiness corporationsas responsible for the endangerment of family farms (e.g., Goldschmidt 1978,Rodefeld 1974). Populist approaches long have been contrasted with political

;Er'!t~

THE GREAT AGRICULTURAL TRANSITION 113

economy theory that gives primary attention to the structural exigencies of capita-lism over specific corporate behavior. Over the past decade, market concentrationproceeded rapidly in hog and beef processing and expanded in grain processingand inputs, giving rise to a new round of social science concerns with corporateagribusiness. Though political economy theorists share this concern, to some extentthe traditional divide persists; they take a systemic approach, viewing corporate be-havior in light of broader capitalist development. In contrast, populist approachesare intrinsically concerned with creating competitive markets and preserving smallfarm businesses.

AGRICULTURAL TRANSFORMATIONAND ITS EFFECTS ON COMMUNITIES

Sociologists have produced extensive research on the community impacts of theagricultural transition (Berardi 1981). This research is usually concerned with threeinterrelated trends: farm population decline; the relative growth of large, hired-labor-dependent, "industrialized" farms; and the relative decline ofmoderate-sizefarms. The first trend, decline in farm population overall, a demographic change,was of foremost interest in the pre-1970s period of rapid farm decline. Concernwas that small rural communities would decline as families left farming. For mostplaces, however, farm population loss resulted in only short-term or negligibledecline because of urban industrial influences (Swanson 1982). Present concernwith farm population decline centers mainly on parts of the rural Midwest andmetropolitan areas affected by urban-rural-interface land use issues (Pfeffer &Lapping 1994). The bulk of sociological literature is on the second two trends,which are structural in nature-growth of industrialized farms and the decliningmiddle sector. Semantic reference may be to either or both changes, because theyare treated as opposite sides of the same social problem, rising inequality. Fourgenerations of research address this inequality.

The detrimental consequences of inequality in farming were recognized bysociologists in the 1930s (Tetreau 1938, 1940). Catapulting interest in the topicduring the 1 940s was a USDA report by anthropologist Walter Goldschmidt whichpresented a case-study of two California towns: Dinuba, a family farming commu-nity, and Arvin, a community dominated by large farms. Goldschmidt (see 1978reference) found poorer conditions in Arvin: a smaller middle class, lower familyincomes, poorer public services, and less civic participation. He argued that thescale of farming affected £ann and local stratification patterns and, in turn, othercommunity outcomes. Angry over the findings, owners of large farms staged bum-ings of Goldschmidt's report and Steinbeck's Grapes of Wrath, and they launchedattacks that closed Goldschmidt's USDA department.

Controversy surrounding Goldschmidt's study contributed to the neglect ofresearch on industrialized farms for over thirty years. With the advent of thesociology of agriculture, a flurry of studies emerged on the topic in the 1 970s.

114 LOBAO .MEYER

This second generation "Goldschmidt literature" involved updating that focusedon postwar farm concentration and tested relationships quantitatively, typicallyusing territorial units such as counties. Sociologists examined the relationship be-tween indicators offarm scale and structure and indicators of local socioeconomicwell-being, such as income and population change. Lobao's (1990) review of 18studies conducted from 1972 to 1985 shows that half reported support for the hypo-thesis that growth of large farms and/or decline of moderate-sized farms adverselyaffects communities, while 7 noted mixed support and 2, no support. Critiques ofthis second generation research emerged in the 1980s. Methodologically, studieswere cross-sectional, usually regionally specific, and often omitted pertinent, non-farm control variables. Conceptually, analysts were unclear whether farm scale(e.g., sales, acreage) or structure (e.g., use of hired workers, incorporation) wasthe significant causal force, and non-farm intervening factors were given littleattention.

A third generation of Goldschmidt-type studies continues the quantitative tradi-tion. This research attempts to address the issues above (Buttel et a11988, Flora &Flora 1988, Gilles & Dalecki 1988, Lobao & Schulman 1991, MacCannell1988,Skees & Swanson 1988, van Es et a11988) and also to extend the topic to new theo-retical questions. Examples of theoretical extensions include spatial inequality,how the fortunes of regional and local populations vary due to economic structure,the state, and other factors (Crowley 1999, Lobao 1990), and civic society, howvibrant local society is enhanced by small, locally owned business such as familyfarming (Irwin et a11999, Tolbert et aI1998).

Third-generation findings about industrialized farms are more mixed. Of thestudies above, MacCannell, Crowley, Tolbert et aI, and Irwin et al report detri-mental impacts; Buttel et al and van Es et al report no detrimental impacts; andthe remainder are mixed. Some analysts find a curvilinear relationship betweenscale and well-being, with small units also related to poorer conditions (Skees &Swanson 1988). Impacts of moderate-sized farms, when significant, are usuallybeneficial. Regional differences suggest that institutional context, such as stateregulatory efforts, citizen activism, and labor market conditions, may buffer ad-verse effects of industrialized farms. However, these institutional factors are yet tobe fully elaborated. A lack of clarity remains as to whether farm size or structureis the relevant causal concept, though empirically both are related (Wimberley1987). More broadly, the causal mechanisms by which farming affects communi-ties remain under-conceptualized, and their empirical assessment is inherently lim-ited by existing data and methodologies. Sociology has no equivalent of economic'sinput-out modeling, which, however problematic, is concerned with empiricallydisentangling how shifts in enterprises filter down to communities. Finally, it isnoteworthy that most third-generation studies report some significant impacts offarm structure. These persist nationally, across varying levels of rurality and farm-ing dependence, and over time. Even in a post-industrial society, farming affectscommunities, though obviously not to the degree of services and manufacturing.

ConcUITent with third-generation studies is an emerging, new fourth generationfocus on agribusiness expansion, mainly in livestock, where production is more

THE GREAT AGRICULTURAL TRANsmON 115

easily rationalized. The most recent research involves case-studies of communi-ties with hog confinement operations (NCRCRD 1999, Seipel et a11999, Thu &Durrenberger 1998). These studies indicate that large confinement operations fur-ther erode family farmers' share of production. Communities receiving large oper-ations may increase total income and employment but are also likely to experienceincreased social polarization and environmental problems.

To further carve out the rich sociological legacy regarding the community con-sequences of farming, the following issues remain. First, systematic comparisonsacross place and time are limited. Quantitative, longitudinal, and comparative casestudies beyond 1990 are needed. Greater attention should be given both to con-ceptualizing the causal paths by which farm changes filter down to communitiesand to overcoming methodological barriers of assessing these paths. Research isstill rather insular in terms of informing broader sociological theory. Institutionalfactors that mediate farm impacts require more attention. Some analysts suggestthat maintenance of family farming itself is a marker of institutional context, sig-naling a healthy civic society (Tolbert et aI1998). Finally, this research traditioncontinues to pull sociologists into public controversy. An example is a recent law-suit by agribusiness interests seeking to overturn a widely supported South Dakotalaw regulating industrialized farms. The suit pits sociologists whose research sup-ports the public's vote for the law against economists whose position supports

agribusiness.

AGRICULTURAL TRANSFORMATIONAND HOUSEHOLDS

Research on the consequences of agricultural change for households is voluminousbut less systematic than that on communities. Since enterprises and households areinextricably linked, farm transformation is reflected in family work and well-being.Even so, the farm economy and household were treated as separate spheres formuch of the past century. Hence, most research explicitly linking farm economicand household change is of contemporary origin. While the 1970s brought politicaleconomy theory to the farm enterprise, the household continued to be treated asa unit of shared interests, much in the vein of functionalist and neoclassical eco-nomic theory. Though some researchers (Wilkening 1968, 1981) examined genderdivisions of labor earlier, not until the 1980s, largely due to feminist influences,was the farm household widely subject to critical scrutiny. Farm economic andhousehold dynamics of the past are revisited in critical, feminist historical studies(Adams 1994, Fink 1986, 1992). The sociological literature largely centers on theeffects of the contemporary farm economy on households' labor strategies andwell-being. It has the following characteristics.

First, the literature proceeds from two starting points, one from rural sociolo-gy's intrinsic concern with farm household survival, the second from other dis-ciplinary-based concerns such as work, family, life course, and mental health.Second, research is conceptually eclectic, drawing from political economy,

II

116 LOBAO .MEYER

feminist, and general family, labor market, and social-psychological theories. Asnoted previously, these conceptually eclectic elements help to provide an insti-tutionalist extension of political economy theory: farm households' customarylabor and consumption strategies enable family farmers to survive and competewith larger-scale units, although often with social costs. Third, concern is withtwo types of farm transformation-long-term, macro-structural change, usuallytreated as manifest in present enterprise characteristics, and shorter-term financialstress from the I 980s crisis. With the exception of farm crisis case studies, almostall research draws from cross-sectional inferences. In some sense, this problemis irremediable unless small area studies are employed, as national longitudinalsurveys do not adequately capture farmers. Finally, analysts recognize varioussurvival strategies (e.g., Moen & Wethington 1992), including consumption ad-justments (Brooks et al 1986, Bultena et aI1986), and political strategies (Meyer& Lobao 1997) that merit attention. However, for only two types of responses-labor strategies and social-psychological-have sustained research traditions

developed.Sociologists have examined the consequences of farm structural change and

shorter-term financial hardship for both on- and off-farm labor strategies. Thegendered nature of these labor strategies is well documented. Farm women parti-cipate in production tasks, are typically responsible for bookkeeping, and nearlyentirely responsible for household tasks. Men participate more in direct farm pro-duction, and their work, whether on- or off-farm, is more closely tied to enterprisescale and structure than is that of women (Simpson et a11988, Wilson et a11994)--relationships that appear to hold even in the more progressive sustainable agricul-ture commuriity (Meares 1997). Structural changes in farming affect off-farm workof both men and women. As farms become smaller, both men and women expandoff-farm work. Researchers also question whether the gender division of laborin farming is altered by structural change (Haney & Knowles 1988). Some stud-ies find that women's involvement in production tasks increases when farm unitsare smaller and less profitable (Buttel & Gillespie 1984, Coughenour & Swanson1983, Sachs 1983).

The farm crisis period shows how shorter-term financial downturn affected workstrategies. With regard to on-farm work, Gladwin's (1991) research in Floridaand anecdotal evidence suggested that women increased their time and scopein farm work during the crisis. In contrast, research across twelve midwesternstates (Lasley et al 1995) and case studies (Barlett 1993, Salamon 1992) foundthat the division of labor on the farm itself changed little during the crisis. Bothmen and women moved away from farming by taking off-farm work during thecrisis, but the change was greater for women. Nationally, in the 1980s, farmwomen increased their labor force participation relative to earlier years, to farmmen, and to other rural women (McDonald and Peters 1991, Ollenburger et al1989). Over one third of Midwestern farm women and one quarter of men re-ported taking employment due to financial need during the crisis (Lasley et al

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THE GREAT AGRICULTURAL TRANsmON 117

The social-psychological costs offarm change have received considerable atten-tion. While some studies have focused on how farm structural position influencesmental health outcomes (Martinson et aI1976), most contemporary attention ison shorter-term financial hardship from the farm crisis. At first, analysts wereconcerned with negative mental health outcomes of the crisis, often drawing fromresearch on workers displaced by industrial restructuring. Later attention was givento intervening variables that lessen the effects of economic hardship, such as sup-portive networks and coping strategies, typical of mental health research. There isa need to broaden focus to other factors that mitigate stressors in the farm context,such as church membership and belief systems. Political activism also can be auseful crisis response, supplanting or supplementing other social-psychologicalcoping mechanisms (Meyer & Lobao 1997). Finally, there is recent interest inthe resiliency of farm households, reflecting social psychologists' concerns withemotional hardiness and happiness.

Research on stress and depression in the farm crisis replicates both findingsfrom social psychology and extended sociological understanding of the interplaybetween economic hardship and mental health in contexts where economic prob-lems are community-wide, not individualized, such as disaster settings and plantclosings. Findings demonstrated the association between economic hardship, char-acteristics of farming as an occupation, and farmers demographic attributes withnegative mental health outcomes (Armstrong & Schulman 1990, Belyea & Lobao1990, Davis-Brown & Salamon 1987, Heffernan & Heffernan 1986, Lorenz et al2000, Rosenblatt & Anderson 1981, Walker & Walker 1987). Gender comparisonsfound women bore disproportionate stress (Berkowitz & Perkins 1984). Findingsfrom research on non-farm populations were often confirmed with a few excep-tions: more educated and younger farmers had greater mental health problemsbecause this group was more likely to have overcapitalized during the crisis. Con-versely, older farmers had few mental health problems, provided their physicalhealth was good. Other research centered on the impact of the crisis on paths ofsuccessive farm generations. The longitudinal studies of Iowa rural families, par-ticularly their youth (Conger & Elder 1994, Elder & Conger 2000, Lorenz et al2000) examined the ways in which family bonds and community supports counterthe effects of agricultural downturn. In one of the few panel designs, Lorenz et al(2000) provide cross-time evidence that farm economic hardship results in depres-sion, but that families who lost farms were resilient in recovering emotional healthas financial stress abetted.

In summary, we have noted limitations with the literature on farm households,including its reliance on cross-sectional data and the need to more fully exploreother adaptive strategies, particularly political activism. Research on farm house-holds is important because it extends sociological generalizations to contexts over-looked by conventional research, places where work and household intertwine.It also raises new questions for sociology. For example, why are gender boun-daries so inflexible in business labor allocation, even where the household itself,rather than an external entity, controls these decisions? What is special about a

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118 LOBAO. MEYER

childhood embedded in the land and family work that confers resiliency in theface of hardship?

CONCLUSIONS

In this paper, we provided a retrospective and necessarily schematic account of theempirical and sociological fate of the independent farm population. In the course ofthe twentieth century, the farm population effectively disappeared from the nationaland general sociology landscape. Americans at large were expelled from farming,and most participating in this production sector were subject to material deprivationalleviated only by further withdrawal from farm work and reliance on the state. Wecaution against romanticizing the loss of this population, which represents a landedelite when compared to the mass of rural poor and landless Americans. However,farm decline does reflect the incursion of capital into possibly the last domesticeconomic sector dominated, at least numerically, by family businesses. And therehas been a loss to sociology. The discipline as a whole missed one of the greatestsociological stories of the twentieth century as research on farm transformationbecame evermore confined to speciality journals. Examining farming can extendsociological inquiry beyond conventional contexts where household and enterpriseare distinct. Unique industries such as farming allow interrogation of prevailingconceptualizations about domestic economic organization. More broadly, the farmsector provides an alternative social context that helps refine, revise, or challengelongstanding sociological generalizations presumed to hold across mass society.

We outlined three research traditions, those dealing with macro-level farm trans-formations, community impacts of fanning, and household responses. While thethree traditions developed as relatively distinct bodies of work, we noted their over-lap. First, taken together they capture the major changes experienced by the farmpopulation. Farming as a production system continues to undergo rapid trans-formation. The farm enterprise is inextricably connected to the household, sothat production changes become reflected in work roles, hardship, stress, and re-silience. As farms decline in number and grow in size, their effects reverberateacross communities. Second, the three traditions recognize similar transforma-tions, long-term structural and shorter-term changes. However, the causal paths bywhich these macro-level changes filter down to lower analytical units of house-hold and communities tend to be assumed rather than explicitly explored. Althoughwe noted methodological limitations for doing so, this topic merits more seriousattention. Third, research on households and communities provides evidence of in-stitutional mechanisms behind national farm transformation, in addition to privatemarket and central state forces denoted by political economy theory. Attention tohousehold and community institutions can extend current theory. Finally, researchon communities and households needs to develop stronger theoretical underpin-nings and links to sociological theory. While all three traditions speak to centralissues of the discipline, there is a lack of effort in addressing broader audiences,

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THE GREAT AGRICULTURAL TRANSITION 119

compounded by general sociology's reluctance to be informed by peripheral placesand the people who study them.

What lies ahead for the remaining farm population and for sociologists study-ing agriculture? In addition to continued interest in contemporary family farmers,research is becoming segmented along two different topical areas, reflecting globaland local issues, noted earlier. The first is concerned with global production chainsin which family farmers themselves playa relatively small part of the sociologicalstory which centers largely on the actions of agribusiness, the state, and increas-ingly, non-governmental organizations concerned with trade and environment. Thesecond area centers on farming and its embeddedness in local landscape and foodsystems. A growing literature on the urban-rural interface deals with farmlandpreservation in the context of metropolitan growth. Because farms are smallercloser to urban areas, such efforts may enhance family operations as well aslocal eco-systems. A related literature examines local food systems, which pro-vide emerging opportunities for smaller, niche-oriented producers, often engagedin more sustainable agricultural practices. Some argue that the entire agriculturalsystem itself is undergoing bifurcation, whereby remaining producers are movingtowards operating in virtually separate, global or local oriented markets, the latterfar more amenable to family farmers. In sum, as the classical agrarian politicaleconomists argued at the turn of the last century, the fate of the farm population isnot yet sealed.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

We thank Glen Elder, Rachel Rosenfeld, Jeff Sharp, and Louis Swanson for theircomments in developing this manuscript.

Visit the Annual Reviews home page at www.AnnuaIReviews.org

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