FROM THE COUNTRYSIDE CRISIS TO THE COUNTRYSIDE IDEAL – AN URBAN REINVENTION

 Ana Matos Fernandes, University of Barcelona, Spain

After the generalization of the speech and the notion of functional, demographic and territorial crisis of the rural, it seems more and more clear that the countryside valuation speech is gaining strength. The apparent contradiction is clarified when we realize that the underlining of the crisis often works as an argument for a renewed visibility of the subject. The idyllic dimension of the rural is reinforced as an answer to the functional crisis. It is used as an opening of new business possibilities. The old signs of the, so discussed, development delay are now confused with the competitive advantages of the countryside. This occurs mainly because they have been converted in elements of an idyllic past and heritage, by speeches and representations. The rurality and its products open new markets of consumption to the urban areas, constituting a necessary alterity to the urban unsustainability and representing the memory, nature and all the values that are supposedly jeopardised in the globalized world. This presentation pretends to discuss this reversion of the rural crisis trough the valuation of its idyllic and patrimonial power, which is spread and feed mainly in the urban areas.