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This chapter evaluates the effects of second-home phenomena in several cities which, due to their unique spatial characteristics, are the target destination for the people who wish to escape routine life. The study setting, the Caspian Sea coastal zone, is endowed with natural comparative advantages due to its lush and green landscape, as well as sun, sea, and sand tourism, and has been experiencing high growth of second homes and village tourism during recent decades. Social exchange and stakeholder theories within the context of sustainable development compose the frame on which this study is based. The findings are discussed and followed with implications and hints for future research.

This chapter contributes to addressing the gap in the literature on entrepreneurs and enterprise in island and remote rural environments.

The research, policy and practice literature on island enterprises and entrepreneurs is reviewed, taking Scotland as a focus within wider international contexts. Islands – as spaces and cultural places – are recognised in terms of ‘otherness’ and difference, not least in respect of tourism and culture. The importance of distance, isolation and peripherality is discussed as social constructions – myths and narratives – as well as in their mainstream measured equivalences. Agencies and policies are introduced at different levels and given significance reflecting their particular relevance in remote and isolated communities. The significance of the dominant paradigm founded on agglomeration, clusters, connectivity, proximity and competitiveness in the peripheralisation of those establishing and running businesses on islands is explored critically. This is contrasted with experiences from comparative northern European locations of smart specialisation, innovation and resilience, and the underpinning key roles of social capital, relationships and cultural values and norms are identified. Sectoral case studies and enterprise are offered to examine these issues in context.

As this is an exploratory study, results are neither comprehensive nor definitive. However, they are indicative of how forces and obstacles apply in island and remote rural environments.

The study confirms the need to recognise social relations locally, and for policies and strategies to be proofed for locational differences.

The seachange phenomenon has recently returned to the policy and planning agenda in Australia owing to some recent data showing new movement patterns out of capital cities. This chapter presents a discussion around this via review of the literature in the areas of amenity migration, counter-urbanisation and lifestyle migration. It further proposes, through demographic research into the region of Gippsland in Victoria, that we need to begin to better understand the motivations for shifting away from the capital cities and the flow on impacts in local communities. Among these impacts are coastal populations in various stages of flux, transforming communities based on local, familiar ties and an enduring relationship to place with new residents from far and wide. As these communities and places are ‘opened up’ through permanent, semi-permanent and visitor populations, more work is required to understand the local place as one that is increasingly inclusive of converging mobile lives, driving communities in transition and renegotiations of identity, belonging and security.

The impact of globalization on individual well-being through the interplay of self and standard forms of lifestyle aspirations, has generally received less attention than the merits of globalization at the macro-level. This chapter addresses this question by testing the hypothesis that poor rural-dwelling Botswana men suffer diminished well-being compared to their relatively well-off urban-dwelling counterparts as a result of unfulfilled lifestyle aspirations. The study combines ethnographic, psychological, and psychosomatic data to compare well-being among rural and urban adult Botswana men. Results indicate that failed urban migration associates with low cortisol and high depressive affect, and rural residence is also independently associated with high depressive affect. This psychosomatic syndrome may be similar to that observed in posttraumatic stress disorder, suggesting that the experience of failed urban migration is considerably more stressful than the demands of employed urban life in contemporary Botswana.

The materialization and continuation of the pandemic have a big toll on everyone's life. Female workers specifically from the unorganized sector faced diversified financial crises during the pandemic. These households went through multiple changes in terms of expenditure, loan burden, job uncertainty, etc. A selected sample of 149 has been considered to understand the changes that had taken place in terms of health, expenditure, and other associated evolved behavior in lockdown and post-lockdown phase in a selected rural-based area of West Bengal. By applying different statistical tools like regression, f-test, and t-test, various influencing factors for household expenditure along with the changes in savings behavior have been observed in the chapter. A sudden crisis like COVID-19 has made the selected respondents responsive toward vivid positive lifestyle and attitude changes like financial literacy, savings, crisis management, and so on.

Purpose – Ecological cohousing communities, or ecovillages, are emerging as contemporary housing models that attempt to recreate a sense of community and encourage an environmentally sustainable lifestyle. This chapter analyzes a rural ecovillage (Ecovillage at Ithaca – EVI) to find out how the community conceptualizes and practices sustainability. The chapter also examines whether and how the community incorporates issues of equity and social justice into its activities.

Design/methodology/approach – The chapter uses a multi-method approach. It is a case study; however, participant observation was conducted at the site. In addition, interviews with residents were conducted and archival materials from the community's newsletters as well city government documents were also used.

Findings – As practiced at EVI, the green lifestyle emphasizes comfortable living that is both esthetically appealing and good for the environment. In making the decision to focus on building a community for the middle class, residents have limited their engagement with social justice issues and have struggled with incorporating minorities and the poor into their community.

Originality/value – This is one of the first papers to analyze the ecovillages from an environmental justice perspective. It shows where there are overlaps between the ecovillage and environmental justice movements. The chapter also fits into a growing body of scholarship that examines the concept of sustainability from a social justice perspective also.

From a post-colonial feminist perspective, this chapter explores how themes of gender and ethnicity combine to produce an embodied narrative of the everyday lived experience of one immigrant woman in a small country town. Her story was told to me as part of an interpretive study via a face to face interview. Her personal history of trauma and dislocation influenced by the wider cultural frameworks and expectations that inform her way of doing gender and ethnicity shape the way she experiences the pleasures and pains of a rural life. In this rural place, she finds that her embodied narrative does not conform to the set of socially constructed meanings that lead to inclusion so her body is reconstructed as “other” and as such is subjected to covert and overt practices that exclude and marginalize her. The discussion is situated within the field of rural studies as the settlement of immigrant women in rural places is seen as a process of social restructuring contextualized and influenced by the social and cultural meanings attached to those places.

This chapter is a qualitative exploration of consumer experiences into rural tourism initiatives in Japan. Rural tourism initiatives have been on the rise in Japan in recent times due to the need to rejuvenate the local economies, arts and cultural heritage. These initiatives aim to mobilise tourist attention to the countryside and create a bridge between urban tourists and rural tourism. Using theories of cultural encounters and cultural consumption, the research investigates rural tourism initiatives in two regions – Tateyama and Hirakawa. The narrative data provide insights into the motivations of the respondents to be part of the initiative and their experiences. It indicates how the process of cultural consumption leads to cultural appreciation. The study also serves as an example of how rural tourism can be implemented by other countries where rural economic mobilisation and empowerment is critical.

The market-based approach to catering for the poor mainly focusses on companies making profits while helping the poor enhance their lives. This concept presented the possibility of there being a ‘fortune’ to make at the Bottom of the Pyramid (BoP) market that was an opportunity for both businesses and consumers. The notion of the BoP market has been widely studied using urban and rural contexts as distinct classifications; yet many argue that the opportunity does not in fact exist in the rural BoP markets. In this chapter the authors examine the prospects in the rural BoP in Sri Lanka through a qualitative study using insights provided by industry practitioners who operate at the BoP level. Findings show that a large percentage of the income of multinational companies is derived from rural BoP markets. Compared to the urban sector, the rural BoP market indicates relatively higher disposable income and is viewed as an attractive market segment by industry practitioners. The findings also show that rural BoP people have more resources and skills than their urban counterparts, although the former commonly have lower levels of education. Moreover, the youth segment in both the urban and rural BoP markets was found to heavily consume social media. The authors conclude their discussion by providing several key proposals for organisations looking to seize opportunities in this market.