The Rural Reconciliation Project was honored to host Dr. Nicholas Jacobs—professor, researcher, and resident of rural Maine—to discuss his new book on the political attitudes of rural communities. The Rural Voter: The Politics of Place and the Disuniting of America, co-authored with Dr. Daniel Shea, examines both historical and modern factors that have influenced and shaped the ‘rural voter’ and is the end result of the largest-ever survey targeted at understanding rural political beliefs.

The electricity industry in the United States is undergoing a period of massive and turbulent transition. One recurring question is whether public regulation or public ownership can best serve public interest goals. Nearly every state has an agency with intensive regulatory powers to direct or influence the activities of electric utilities. However, even with state regulatory oversight, private utilities have faced persistent criticism, and public ownership of utilities is often touted as a potentially desirable alternative. In this debate about public ownership versus public control, Nebraska offers an interesting and underexamined case-study.

In Do Rural Places Matter?, Stephen Clowney (University of Arkansas Law School) explores various arguments in support of continued investment in rural places. Clowney questions the strength of these arguments but ultimately endorses renewed investment in rural spaces by proposing a new approach to addressing the challenges facing rural communities.

In Economic sanctions and agricultural trade, authors Mario Larch (Department of Law, Business Administration, and Economics, University of Bayreuth, Germany), Jeff Luckstead (School of Economic Sciences, Washington State University), and Yoto V. Yotov (School of Economics, Drexel University) discuss the impact of economic sanctions, particularly for farmers and agricultural trade.

In The Spatial and Scalar Politics of a Just Energy Transition in Illinois, Shannon Anderson and McKenzie Johnson (both Natural Resources and Environmental Sciences, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign) evaluate the political climate and decision-making processes surrounding Illinois’s 2021 Climate and Equitable Jobs Act (CEJA), which established clean energy mandates with an emphasis on social equity.

In Eviction and the Rental Housing Crisis in Rural America, Carl Gershenson and Matthew Desmond (both Sociology, Princeton University) detail the demographic and economic factors relating to eviction filings in rural America using data compiled in a national database. The authors note the lack of comprehensive research on the eviction crisis facing rural Americans, as most research focuses instead on the urban eviction crisis. By offering the first comprehensive analysis of evictions in rural communities, Gershenson and Desmond identify the significant impact of racial biases and lack of affordable quality housing on rural communities.

In Toward a New Compact With Rural America, the foreword to the University of Richmond Law Review's Symposium, Overlooked America: Addressing Legal Issues in Rural United States, Anthony F. Pipa (Center for Sustainable Development, Brookings Institution) introduces the Symposium by outlining the challenges rural America faces and how public policy is the potential solution.

In Growing Superdiverse, Growing Apart – Modes of Incorporation of International Migrants in Rural Areas, authors Jakub Stachowski and Bente Rasmussen (both of the Department of Sociology and Political Science, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim, Norway) analyze rural resident perceptions of international migration.