In favor of a different kind of research in rural development

Abstract

Research in rural development should open up to new theoreticmethodological
trends. Complex thought proposes the fusion – in
this case – of social and natural sciences, and thus studies in rural
development lead to Eco-development (ED). Until now, many
investigations in rural research are applied to the agricultural and
cattle sector (ACS), and they ignore the complex relations between
human beings and the physical environment of which they are part,
where the subjects of rural development live and produce, and with
which they maintain, historically and traditionally, objective and
subjective relationships that are relevant and transcendent.
Once ED is accepted as complex thought, it becomes operative through
methodological approaches in trans-disciplinarity –the fusion of
diverse disciplines, such as Ecology and Sociology– and multidimensionality.
With the last one, it is recognized that univocal
approaches to reality are only partial, and its intention is to overcome
this inconvenience. From this approach, comprehension and
interpretation are suggested of – among other dualities –, the ones
made up of objective and subjective, macro and micro, individual
and collective, modern and traditional, the gender perspective,
structure and action, and the (inseparable) link between society and
nature.