ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the interaction between local and state level institutions in two federally funded shellfish aquaculture projects in Florida, the Baywater County Aquaculture Project and Project Aquaculture. It deals with the political economy and project design literature, both of which have addressed the problem of elite appropriation of development projects. The chapter discusses the literatures in an unusual way by exploring the strategies a rural elite used to protect itself from a project designed in such a manner as to make it difficult for the elite to appropriate. It describes John W. Bennett's work on local political autonomy in the face of the bureaucratization of rural life. The local elite's ability to circumvent the Baywater County Aquaculture Project was related to project design, but development projects exist in nested institutional and social contexts outside of designers' control. The Marine Institute transfered oyster aquaculture technology to project participants but was unable to convert the Baywater project into sustained development.
