From post-war era beginning until 1956 - the year which the ministry of Labour celebrated the first half-century it had been in existence -, its division for Labour and Employment was a strikingly stable organisation. Nearly each of its high-ranking managers (the assistant principals, the...

The idea of solidarity may be defined as well a normative reference, i.e. a system of orientations that organizes the relationships between particular segments of society, as as a set of welfare institutions. In France, the organization of welfare for farmers was historically and sociologically...

Theoretical and methodological difficulties explain the low level of knowledge on rural employment, but political and theoretical reasons are impulsing new research. The author examines the three main logics governing present research : development, spatial distribution of employment, historical...

As we get ready to emerge from the current crisis, one wonders whether there will still be room for such concepts as « local » and « rural ». They were very present during the seventies when softer type of growth was aimed at. A quick leap foreward under the ideology of modernization is now...