IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ags/erdnra/272190.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The LEADER Programme as a vehicle in promoting social capital in rural regions: a critical assessment and examples from the case of Greece

Author

Listed:
  • Caraveli, Helen

Abstract

The ‘new rural paradigm’ in Europe, applied through the Rural Development Programmes (RDPs), places at the centre of academic analysis and policy formation the concept of ‘territorial dynamics’ as an important vehicle for growth in rural regions. The term denotes “specific regional and local factors, structures and tendencies” which would facilitate the creation of ‘smart places’ among EU regions – according to the 2020 EU strategy terminology – competitive on a regional and global scale. As ‘social capital’ lies at the centre of the above intangible elements this paper critically examines the contribution of the LEADER axis in promoting it, through its bottom-up and place-based approach. After a brief presentation of the programme’s philosophy and methods of application, its relationship with social capital elements is established. A discussion follows on the lack of sufficient attention to social capital in conventional evaluation methods of LEADER. LEADER’s efficiency in stimulating aspects of social capital in rural regions is assessed with reference to case studies on Greece, which appears to be a good case for highlighting the difficulties in applying the bottom-up approach in rural regions but also the challenges that this process involves in inducing territorial/regional development. This is due to the country’s low overall level of social capital resulting from a number of structural/social characteristics. The paper concludes with pointing out the need for more in-depth research on this topic so that lessons for local strategies can be drawn.

Suggested Citation

  • Caraveli, Helen, 2017. "The LEADER Programme as a vehicle in promoting social capital in rural regions: a critical assessment and examples from the case of Greece," Rural Areas and Development, European Rural Development Network (ERDN), vol. 14, pages 1-16.
    • Handle: RePEc:ags:erdnra:272190
    DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.272190
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/272190/files/Caraveli.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/272190/files/Caraveli.pdf?subformat=pdfa
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.22004/ag.econ.272190?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Asimina Christoforou, 2011. "Social Capital Across European Countries: Individual and Aggregate Determinants of Group Membership," American Journal of Economics and Sociology, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 70(3), pages 699-728, July.
    2. Roberto Camagni & Roberta Capello, 2013. "Regional Competitiveness and Territorial Capital: A Conceptual Approach and Empirical Evidence from the European Union," Regional Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 47(9), pages 1383-1402, October.
    3. Christos J. Paraskevopoulos, 2007. "Social Capital and Public Policy in Greece," GreeSE – Hellenic Observatory Papers on Greece and Southeast Europe 09, Hellenic Observatory, LSE.
    4. Pollermann, Kim & Raue, Petra & Schnaut, Gitta, 2013. "Rural Development experiences in Germany: opportunities and obstacles in fostering smart places through LEADER," Studies in Agricultural Economics, Research Institute for Agricultural Economics, vol. 115(2), pages 1-7, June.
    5. Michael Bamberger & Vijayendra Rao & Michael Woolcock, 2009. "Using Mixed Methods in Monitoring and Evaluation: Experiences from International Development’," Global Development Institute Working Paper Series 10709, GDI, The University of Manchester.
    6. Go, Frank M. & Trunfio, Mariapina & Lucia, Maria Della, 2013. "Social capital and governance for sustainable rural development," Studies in Agricultural Economics, Research Institute for Agricultural Economics, vol. 115(2), pages 1-7, June.
    7. Asimina Christoforou, 2005. "On the Determinants of Social Capital in Greece Compared to Countries of the European Union," Working Papers 2005.68, Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Nikolaos Apostolopoulos & Panagiotis Liargovas & Stavros Stavroyiannis & Ilias Makris & Sotiris Apostolopoulos & Dimitrios Petropoulos & Eleni Anastasopoulou, 2020. "Sustaining Rural Areas, Rural Tourism Enterprises and EU Development Policies: A Multi-Layer Conceptualisation of the Obstacles in Greece," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(18), pages 1-19, September.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Nectarios Oudeniotis & George O. Tsobanoglou, 2022. "Interorganizational Cooperation and Social Capital Formation among Social Enterprises and Social Economy Organizations: A Case Study from the Region of Attica, Greece," Social Sciences, MDPI, vol. 11(3), pages 1-15, March.
    2. Liagouras, George, 2018. "On the Edge of the South European Model: Familism, Business and State in Greece," OSF Preprints 8eqmb, Center for Open Science.
    3. Marius Constantin PROFIROIU & Carmen Valentina RADULESCU, 2019. "Local Development Opportunities In The Context Of Sustainable Development By Applying The Concept Of Smart Village In Romania," Proceedings of the INTERNATIONAL MANAGEMENT CONFERENCE, Faculty of Management, Academy of Economic Studies, Bucharest, Romania, vol. 13(1), pages 1059-1067, November.
    4. Roberto Antonietti & Ron Boschma, 2021. "Social capital, resilience, and regional diversification in Italy [Social capital, innovation and growth: evidence from Europe]," Industrial and Corporate Change, Oxford University Press and the Associazione ICC, vol. 30(3), pages 762-777.
    5. Tamilina, Larysa, 2012. "Characteristics of social policies and social trust," MPRA Paper 96517, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    6. Rafael Morais Pereira & Ana Cláudia Azevedo & Fabio Emanuel Farago & Felipe Mendes Borini, 2024. "Technological intensity and local socio‐economic development," Journal of International Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 36(2), pages 1043-1057, March.
    7. Karima Kourtit, 2017. "Effective Clusters as Territorial Performance Engines in a Regional Development Strategy - A Triple-Layer DEA Assessment of the Aviation Valley in Poland," REGION, European Regional Science Association, vol. 4, pages 39-63.
    8. Ivan Blečić & Arnaldo Cecchini & Emanuel Muroni & Valeria Saiu & Serafino Scanu & Giuseppe Andrea Trunfio, 2023. "Addressing Peripherality in Italy: A Critical Comparison between Inner Areas and Territorial Capital-Based Evaluations," Land, MDPI, vol. 12(2), pages 1-14, January.
    9. Anneli Kaasa & Eve Parts, 2007. "Individual-Level Determinants Of Social Capital In Europe: Differences Between Country Groups," University of Tartu - Faculty of Economics and Business Administration Working Paper Series 56, Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, University of Tartu (Estonia).
    10. Paolo Rizzi & Paola Graziano & Antonio Dallara, 2018. "A capacity approach to territorial resilience: the case of European regions," The Annals of Regional Science, Springer;Western Regional Science Association, vol. 60(2), pages 285-328, March.
    11. Pollermann, Kim, 2018. "Participants in participative processes – who they are and what they think about participation," EconStor Conference Papers 190762, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    12. Karagiannis, Stelios & Panagopoulos, Yannis & Vlamis, Prodromos, 2010. "Symmetric or asymmetric interest rate adjustments? Evidence from Greece, Bulgaria and Slovenia," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 29168, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    13. Federico Benassi & Marica D'Elia & Francesca Petrei, 2021. "The “meso” dimension of territorial capital: Evidence from Italy," Regional Science Policy & Practice, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 13(1), pages 159-175, February.
    14. Gil, Alejandro & Brennan, Mark & Chaudhary, Anil Kumar & Maximova, Siela N., 2023. "Evaluation of cacao projects in Colombia: The case of the rural Productive Partnerships Project (PAAP)," Evaluation and Program Planning, Elsevier, vol. 97(C).
    15. Pollermann, Kim, 2019. "Participation in rural development – the view of non-participants," EconStor Conference Papers 209647, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    16. George Pagoulatos & Nikolaos Zahariadis, 2011. "Politics, Labor, Regulation, and Performance: lessons from the privatization of OTE," GreeSE – Hellenic Observatory Papers on Greece and Southeast Europe 46, Hellenic Observatory, LSE.
    17. Daskalopoulou & I., 2017. "Democracy and social capital in Greece," Business & Entrepreneurship Journal, SCIENPRESS Ltd, vol. 6(1), pages 1-2.
    18. Ezio Micelli & Elena Ostanel & Luca Lazzarini, 2023. "“Wanna Be Provoked”: Inner Peripheries Generators of Social Innovation in the Italian Apennine," Land, MDPI, vol. 12(4), pages 1-23, April.
    19. Nicola Camatti & Luca Salmasi & Jan van der Borg, "undated". "Tourism and economic growth: an application to coastal regions in the Mediterranean area," Working Papers 2021:16, Department of Economics, University of Venice "Ca' Foscari".
    20. Elena Batunova & Giovanni Perucca, 2020. "Population shrinkage and economic growth in Russian regions 1998–2012," Regional Science Policy & Practice, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 12(4), pages 595-609, August.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ags:erdnra:272190. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: AgEcon Search (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/erdnnea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.