Socio-economic changes in the village of Przybyszew in 1918–2018

The article presents the socio-economic changes that took place in the years 1918-2018 in the village of Przybyszew, located on the Pilica River in the Promna commune. The analysis covers both the rural community and the rural economy (agricultural and non-agricultural). An important element of the analysis is the description of the role of the rural institutional infrastructure, both that from before World War II and the current one. The changes in the village of Przybyszew show in a nutshell many different processes taking place in rural areas throughout the country. These include, for example, the aging and decreasing number of village inhabitants, the concentration of land in a few well-developing farms, the growing scale of informal leases, changes in the structure of rural society in favor of the numerical predominance of the population not working in agriculture, the growing entitlement attitudes of residents, etc. The article also shows the changing nature of the multifunctional development of the village from multifunctionality forced by the need for self-sufficiency dictated by the economic conditions of the time to the current rational multifunctionality. The accelerated development of both the entire Promna commune and the village of Przybyszew itself has taken place in the last twenty years thanks to EU and pre-accession funds. It should be noted, however, that the current level of development of the village of Przybyszew and the increasing prosperity of its inhabitants is not given forever. There will be fewer and fewer EU funds. Therefore, the further level of local development will depend on the rural community, its activity, willingness to cooperate, and the level of mutual trust.