ABSTRACT
This chapter defines the term built capital and discusses how it is provided and how rural communities can organize to maintain it. Built capital provides a supporting foundation that facilitates human activity. Built capital can facilitate production in and of itself Buildings enable a factory to make products that can then be sold. Goods and services are considered to be exclusive-access built capital when particular groups or individuals can be denied access to them. Two dimensions, access and consumption, are involved in people's use of the community's built capital. Public schools and roads, for example, are provided for totally through public investment and control. Private schools and private roads, in contrast, have at least some private financial capital invested. Private and toll goods or services can be supplied by either the private or the public sector. In contrast to collective goods and services, common-pool goods and services can be made exclusive.
