ABSTRACT
This chapter reviews the genesis of the challenges and raises questions about the capability of leaders to respond. It deals with a discussion of the implications for community leadership and leadership policies in rural America. Despite the economic and social gains realized during the period of the 1960s and 1970s, many communities across the rural US landscape are undergoing major upheavals in the 1980s. The publication in 1953 of Floyd Hunter's Community Power Structure served as the seminal work on community leadership and power in the United States. An important precursor to the study of community leadership is an understanding of the meaning of "community" and "leadership." While social interaction is commonplace in many localities, a critical distinction exists between local activities that represent community phenomena and local actions that have marginal relevance to the community. The emergence of public disputes and conflict in many communities provides clear evidence that local affairs were not dominated by a few powerful leaders.
