Rural Development Research and Policy: Perspectives from Federal and State Experiences with an Application to Broadband

Throughout time and space, rural economies have changed, but they have seemingly remained disadvantaged. In this article, I discuss rural development research and policy from federal and state perspectives and provide lessons learned from my rural broadband work in both contexts. I promulgate better integration of federal and state government, academia, and the private sector to solve rural economic development challenges. Fostering relationships among federal and state rural development researchers and outreach practitioners would allow researchers to better anticipate future research needs as contacts in the field, or inside the beltway, could share an early look into where they need on-the-ground problem-solving support. I close with suggestions for fostering these relationships and I encourage my SRSA colleagues to embrace the wonderful interdisciplinary nature of regional science in addressing rural development and policy challenges.