ABSTRACT
Since the early 1980s, ideas about the importance of locality and community have been proposed in opposition to the emphasis on growth and urbanization. This ‘localism discourse’ has largely been ignored by mainstream economists and social scientists. If it is addressed at all, it is seen in the context of Luddism, allotment movements, Amish communities, Ranters and Shakers – futile attempts to obstruct history’s march to modernism in the name of backward-looking rural utopianism.
