People in the CountrysideAuthor(s): C. WatkinsSource: Area, Vol. 21, No. 2 (Jun., 1989), pp. 202-203Published by: The Royal Geographical Society (with the Institute of British Geographers)Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20002732 .

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202 IBG Annual Conference

1980' (with special reference to the city of Kiel). It was clear from the presentation that both carrot (financial incentives, repayment of pension contributions) and stick (discrimination in public housing allocation; no rights for the German born children of immigrants) were being used to repatriate Turkish immigrants in particular, and that these policies were being effective. Any labour shortages that such policies might cause would be met by the admission of more acceptable national groups. Currently these are immigrants from Eastern Europe and the USSR with German ethnic connections. No' liberal conscience ' was evident in West German-Turkish relations. Deborah Sporton (Sheffield) began her presentation on 'The differential fertility of ethnic minorities in the Paris region' with a quotation from a French tabloid ' Serons-nous encore Francais dans 30 ans? ' Her analysis showed that the sensational picture painted of a French population being replaced by a Maghrebian one through the fertility process was unlikely because of the evidence that the fertility of the second generation was as low, if not lower than that of the native French. Fertility in the Paris region was lower than in the rest of the country for all groups reflecting both career orientation of women in Paris and the small size of housing units. Formal analysis showed that pattern of immigrant child spacing was highly influenced by migration patterns and husband-wife separations, while interviews revealed the crucial role of the mother-in-law in determining her son's family formation!

It was a thoroughly interesting and thought-provoking session to which PGSG members are indebted to Bob Woods and Paul White, even if the star attraction, John Rex, could not be there on the day.

R Woods University of Liverpool

P White University of Sheffield

People in the countryside The Rural and Population Geography Study Groups held a joint session. The convenors, Dr A Champion (University of Newcastle) and Dr C Watkins (Royal Agricultural College, Cirencester) brought together nine papers and Dr Moseley's (UEA) introductory address, each paper falling into one of two categories. Some were, first and last, descriptive and exploratory case studies: others started from an explicit theoretical position which had guided the specific work. All but two of the papers were focussed on Great Britain-the exceptions were King's work (Trinity

College, Dublin) on Italy and Kockel (Liverpool) on Galway. One problem for the organisers of any session is how to fill the Conference's ninety-minute

modules. Two speakers, each having three-quarters of an hour, allows for the full exposition of an argument or research findings, and still leaves time for discussion: but just one poor paper weakens the whole session. An alternative (which was used before the coffee break) is to give the speakers twenty minues each and then have a panel discussion. This needs strict timekeeping (which was largely achieved) and a recognition by the speakers that a twenty-minute talk is not a longer one given quickly. Speakers do need to be reminded that to do themselves and their topic justice (and some did not) they need to prune their subject matter, perhaps by discussing only one feature of the project. A one- or two-page summary is also helpful for the audience.

Overall, however, the session was successful simply because some clear themes recurred through the diverse settings of the nine papers. First, there was a strong desire to consider the disadvantaged in rural society: how they came to be disadvantaged, how their position is main tained and reproduced, and how their plight could be ameliorated. Such groups include the elderly and disabled (Gant and Smith, Kingston Polytechnic), women (Little, Bristol Polytech nic), the poor and, by extension, these studies have to consider the actions of the middle class who may replace or displace the disadvantaged (Harper (RHBNC) and Cloke, Lampeter).

A second theme which was most explicit in the paper by Cloke and Rankin (University of Auckland) was the need to study power relations at a variety of scales; central-local, county district, formal and informal. Power as exercised through planning systems was the backdrop to at least six of the papers.

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IBG Annual Conference 203

The third theme was the necessity of studying various issues (e.g. housing and economic development) at a variety of scales but particularly in small areas or 'localities'. Yet Walford (ESRC Data Archive, Essex) and Hockey showed clearly how difficult it is to get official data for small areas, while Harper's research since 1981 reminded us of the fieldwork effort needed to collect one's own longitudinal data on the processes of change. This insistence on locality studies stemmed in part from a distrust of over-arching generalisations about economic and social development such as the counterurbanisation or restructuring hypotheses. The wide diversity of rural experiences (clearly shown in McCleery's (Napier College, Edinburgh) paper on the

Highlands, for instance) is felt to demand a fine mesh of fieldwork. Yet the nagging doubt, which was unanswered at this session, was how to handle a plethora of locality studies, even supposing they are methodologically compatible. Is it philosophically acceptable to generalise from them inductively? It may be that theoretically-informed empirical work will keep the broader issues in focus but it is not clear that the sine qua non of a single agreed theoretical position has been achieved among rural geographers. This is a worrying issue when rural geographers want to pull their findings together.

Finally Moseley urged rural geographers to communicate their research findings with brevity and clarity to wider non-academic audiences. Only that way, he argued, will we influence policy in the way Bowler and Lewis (Leicester) were aiming to do with their study of the Rural

Development Commission. Overall this was a stimulating meeting, the organisers and participants are to be thanked

warmly, but major issues remain unresolved and need our attention. C Watkins

Royal Agricultural College Cirencester

Talking walking

In a city celebrated in the past for its cycle industry and in the present for its pedestrian precinct the TGSG used its symposium to bring together transport planners, consultants, pressure groups and others with an interest in walking and cycling. The academic disciplines on display were diverse, but there was considerable unanimity of purpose in seeking ways to place the 'green modes' more centrally in transport policy for the next century.

The Keynote Address provided by Mayer Hillman (Policy Studies Institute) stressed the value of green modes to a sensible transport system. Issue was taken with policy makers not only for ignoring walking and cycling but also for failing to provide the statistical base which would allow pro-green mode policies to be enacted. Frank West-Oram (Pedestrians' Association) provided support by highlighting the way in which D.Tp. statements about the' improvement ' in overall road accident figures conceal a dramatic worsening of the safety of walking and cycling, both of which are now twice as dangerous as in the 1950s.

Turning to practical experience, David Maunder and Phil Fouracre (TRRL) reviewed non motorised travel in Third World Cities: slides of hourly flows across the Jumna bridge in Delhi of 7,500 cycles-not all of them with just one aboard either!-provided food for thought. Jan

Hartman (Dutch Ministry of Traffic and Transport) outlined the keenly awaited results of the research on the city-wide cycle network in Delft which show that the apparently inexorable growth of the car at the expense of the cycle may not only be arrested but can in fact be reversed. The contrast with English cycle planning experience in the past decade was demonstrated by Hugh McLintock (Nottingham) whilst Julia Meaton and Richard Gray (Plymouth) showed how the large scale traffic reorganisation involved in pedestrianising a city centre must be carefully

managed to avoid temporarily undermining public support for car-exclusion policies. Anthony Ramsay (Strathclyde) argued that notwithstanding the recent upsurge in traffic free spaces in city cores, planning for pedestrians in the UK has been partial, reactionary and residual during the period of growth in motor vehicle ownership. He outlined principles for a radical, systematic and strategic approach to walking networks. The 'traffic calming' policies that need to be imple

mented in order to allow green modes to flourish were reviewed by John Whitelegg (Lancaster)

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