Author(s): Melinda Molnár, Zsuzsanna Kassai
Title: Social activity of rural communities in Hungary-Experiences of research camps
Source: International Scientific Days 2016. The Agri-Food Value Chain: Challenges for Natural Resources Management and Society
Document Type: Scientific paper
ISBN: 978-80-552-1503-7
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.15414/isd2016.s7.10
Publisher: Slovak University of Agriculture in Nitra
PY, pages: 2016, 509-515
Published on-line: 2016-06-24
Language: eng
Abstract: The social activity is the basic point of the successful settlement. To have a settlement operated appropriately and achieve sustainable development, it is vital to have a cooperative, active local community. Civil organizations have an important role in each phase of sustainable rural development and so can increase the quality of life. These organizations can significantly contribute to the recognition of local demands, to their forming, making them strategies and control of their realization. According to the authors a settlement can be successful in the long term only if its own (internal) image, thus the opinion of the people about their own settlement is positive. To achieve this, the settlement management needs to know how can work the local communities, how the locals perceive their own settlement, what do they regard as their strengths, weaknesses, dangers, opportunities. Therefore, this study gives a comprehensive overview about the social activity of the Hungarian rural communities. Among others, the main activities, the difficulties and some other important characteristics of rural social organizations will be presented. In addition, the opinion of the inhabitants of rural villages regarding the necessity and the reputation of these organizations has been mapped as well. To obtain the necessary data for this study, first an overall document analysis was done based on a wide range of scientific books, journal articles, research reports and territorial statistical databases. Besides, in the last nine years several research camps were organized in rural areas by the staff of Szent István University. The findings of this study are based on interviews made with the leaders of social organizations and other key actors of rural communities during the field researches. Moreover, questionnaire surveys among inhabitants of rural villages were conducted, too.
Keywords: social activity, civil social organizations, sustainable development, rural community, internal image
JEL Classification: Q01
Rights: Open Access :: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Licence
Toto dielo je publikované pod/This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Plný text/Fulltext (PDF/375 kB)