Extractive Industry, Historic Disinvestment, and the Future of Rural Communities

George M. Beal Distinguished Lectureship in Rural Sociology

Presenting her book, Pushed Out, this presentation focuses on what happens to rural communities when their traditional economic base collapses and new money comes in. This presentation offers Dover, Idaho, as a case study of transformation from a “thriving timber mill town” to an “economically depressed small town” to a “trendy second-home location” and discusses how Dover embodies the story and challenges of many other rural communities. 

The presentation explores the structural forces driving rural gentrification and examines how social and environmental inequality is written onto these landscapes. Based on in-depth interviews and archival data, the presentation uses an ethnographic lens to put this story in a long view of the region that takes account of geological history, settler colonialism, and histories of power and exploitation within capitalism. With a focus on the processes and mechanisms that make communities vulnerable to gentrification, the conversation that follows the presentation is an opportunity for communities to discuss the future of their homes with an eye toward the economic, social, and environmental sustainability necessary to building thriving rural places.

Ryanne Pilgerim is the Regenerative Economies Manager for The Wilderness Society, working to define, coordinate, and implement strategies and policies to promote a Just Transition away from unsustainable, industrial-scale natural resource extraction through avenues that support thriving and vibrant communities. Ryanne was previously a professor of sociology at the University of Idaho, where she worked for over a decade and ran the USDA-funded “Women Farmers & Ranchers on the Rise in Idaho and the US” project. She is the author of numerous publications, most recently a book, “Pushed Out,” which examines the structural causes of inequity in rural communities. Ryanne has deep connections to the American West, especially Montana and North Idaho, where she grew up in a ranching family and spent many summers as a tour guide in Yellowstone and Glacier National Parks. Both her personal and professional life center efforts to envision rural communities where people can thrive.

Ryanne holds a BA in Sociology from Pacific University and an MS and Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of Oregon. She spends her free time with her husband and their three children, working in the garden, cross-country skiing, picking berries and mushrooms, and caring for their many pets.

This lecture will be recorded and ready to view on the Available Recordings page approximately 24-36 hours after the conclusion of the event.