L. Lobao et K. Meyer, The great agricultural transition: Crisis, change, and social consequencesof twentieth century US farming, ANN R SOC, 27, 2001, pp. 103-124
One of the most profound changes in the United States in the past century i
s the national abandonment of farming as a livelihood strategy. This change
is evident both in the exodus of Americans from farming and in the conditi
ons faced by the farmers remaining, most of whom are marginal producers in
an increasingly concentrated industry. In this article, we provide a retros
pective account of the empirical and sociological fate of family farmers. W
hile sociologists have had longstanding interest in agrarian change, resear
ch on contemporary farmers is largely confined to speciality publications,
with a loss to the discipline at large. We examine three distinct research
traditions that continue to document farm transformation: research on macro
-level transformation, community impacts, and household response. While the
se traditions evolved separately, we describe how they overlap and inform e
ach other. Most notably, research on household and community responses deli
neates meso- and micro-level institutional factors that extend macro-level
theory. Research on the contemporary farm population offers an alternative
context in which to interrogate conventional accounts of economic developme
nt; such research yields insights about aspects of social life being redisc
overed as part of the new economy and continues to pull sociologists into p
olitically charged public policy debates.