Social Trends in Rural Areas: Administrative Problems: (a) General Survey
| Date | 01 July 1938 |
| Author | L. K. Elmhirst |
| Published date | 01 July 1938 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9299.1938.tb02084.x |
Social Trends
in
Rural
Areas
:
Administrative
Problems
(a)
General
Survey
By
L.
K.
ELMHIRST,
M.A.,
C.C.
Dartington Hall, Totnes,
Devon.
[Pnfier to
be
discussed
at
the
Summer
Goizfeiwzce
of
the I.lzsi!itute
of
Public
Administration,
B&ol,
July,
19381
THE
decision
of
your Institute to devote
a
whole session to the
subject
of
administration in rural areas may be taken as some-
thing more than one of practical wisdom and foresight.
It
is
a
very
proper act
of
piety. For although the very colour and pattern
of
administration in this country seem to be
of
the great industrial
town and the densely populated city, the origins
of
many
of
our most
distinctive political institutions lie away back
a
thousand years, when
towns were almost unknown and the Saxon village and
its
political,
economic, social and religious organisation gave
rise
to the manor
court, the hundred moot and the shire court. The parish
with
its
nine men,” or vestry, was somewhat later the symbol
of
a
com-
munal consciousness and of civic administration under Plantagenet,
Tudor
and Stuart. For more than ten centuries there has been in
rural areas
no
abrupt break but a continuous evolution and modifica-
tion
of
this ancient administrative pattern. Our national parlia-
mentary system sprang out of it, for the borough was once a fortified
village and the shire was
a
group of village communities.
In
dealing with the
rural
administration of to-day we need to
rub up our historical sense, and to pay due respect to our forefathers,
who
in
some
of
their planning were perhaps wiser than we.
Our immediate practical purpose must be, however, to sift out
from a host
of
allied trends those social movements which are of chief
significance in any general picture. This survey must in
its
fxrn
supply a background to the remarks
of
Mr. Morris
on
education and
Mr.
Stead on transport, since these are perhaps the two most signifi-
cant and permeating influences in modern rural evolution.
I
dare
not therefore use my limited time for
a
special discussion
of
housing,
health, school and leisure services or digress over specific economic
25
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