A multiplicity of communities which held different purpose and meaning for members were found within the rural communities. These many communities appeared to be complete within
themselves yet elements of the larger rural community. They were positioned variably with each other through a range of boundary processes as they co-existed. They also exhibited the same processes and dynamic boundaries as described for rural communities. These communities within community will be referred to as constituent communities, being part of a whole, yet separate entities.
Most participants described those living in a geographically defined area as the “whole community” or “broader community”.
“You can’t sort of just concentrate on one area. You’ve got to look at the whole community.” (2b)
“.. get the message out to a broader community” (2c)
However they then went on to describe what they recognised as existing within the ‘whole’. These identifiable communities held some common identity, feature, experience, purpose or interest.
“Oh yeah it’s a normal local community .. a predominant aged community here, there’s no doubt about that. Obviously a bit of a retirement place as well. But certainly there’s some very rich people here too. And it’s also like an itinerate place, I mean you’ve got a lot of people that only have a holiday ..” (2g)
As these communities were described by the manner or feature by which they were recognisable, generic descriptors were used rarely. When they did arise, they included terms such as “groups”, “sections”, “sectors”, “sort of people”, “crowd of people”, and “types”. While at times this included clubs and formal structured groups it was also used to describe linkages between people within the community:
“I think everyone’s had their own, yeah probably their own crowd of people that have been interested and it’s all come into one ..” (2e)
The following boundaries were apparent within the data, revealing a range of constituent communities. They have been grouped into three types based on the aetiology: feature-based, interest-based and cause-based. It is amongst these dynamics that the RCD projects emerged as a new cause based constituent community.
5: 1.2.1 Feature-based communities
Feature-based constituent community boundaries were identifiable in differences relating to a common feature of members’ lives, rather than engagement in relationships and activities with one another. The following examples are by no means the only feature-based communities within the rural communities at the time of the interviews, but those that were most prominent when discussing community in light of the RCD activity.
5: 1.2.1a Length of connection with the rural community
A very apparent yet fluid boundary was found differentiating between constituent communities based on the length of connection a person has with the rural community. The sea change or tree change phenomenon has altered rural community from a place where people felt they knew everybody to a sense of change that brought unknown dynamics.
“See back then you could go down the street and knew everyone. Now you don’t. It’s changed. So, yeah, it’s a hard one. .. You used to know everyone.” (2a)
Participants sometimes struggled to find descriptive terms to explain the difference, creating terms like “new-comers”, “recent comers” or “new settlers”. The challenge seemed to be around not devaluing the new-comers’ contribution and belonging to the rural community, while acknowledging their recency, and the sense that they bring something new:
“That’s right, new settlers I call them. And good people. In the majority of retirees, so they’ve got a fair bit to offer. .. You can’t call them ‘blow-ins’ or ‘those mainlanders’ because that’s rude.” (1b)
New-comers were seen as different to long term residents. Only those who had been born in the community or who had resided there more than twenty years, classified as being local. This was consciously discussed between the two constituent communities.
“That’s what they told me, if I want to be local I need to live here for twenty years. I said I will never be.” (3d)
Those who had lived in the rural community twenty years, while being a long-timer to more recent members, could still be a new-comer in the eyes of families with heritage within the community, those who were “born and bred” in the area. This was an example of the fluidity of boundaries shifting according to meaning and purpose. In the following quotes, the first acknowledges that even 32 years in a community was not the same quality as those families with generations, and in the second, the member considers himself and some others as ‘new’ compared to those that have had a permanent connection with the area, but as having more ‘history’ than more recent arrivals.
“Yeah, I’ve been here 32 or three years. My wife was, she’s born and bred here, and her father was born and bred here.” (2a)
“.. There was, oh [Long-timer 1] had been here all of her life, now [Long-timer 1]’s in her seventies. .. And I’ve been here fifteen years. And outside of that most of the people are newer than me. And a lot of them – like [New-comer 1]’s only been here a couple of years ..” (2h)
A sense of agency also distinguished these communities. New-comers had experienced a world where their actions brought significant change to their environments, even if just through the recent moving from one lifestyle to another. Such a fresh consciousness of their agency and capacity for choice was identified as underpinning a different approach to life.
“I think the nature, or, the nice thing about the [Rural town] community which is interesting, I think there is a fair percentage of people who live in [Rural town] by choice, and it’s been not long .. Whereas in a lot of country rural communities they live there because that’s where the family have always lived. It’s the circumstance .. next thing they’ve found they’ve married the person, you know and they’ve inherited a property or a business, and whilst they’re probably
really, really happy there, it’s not been a conscious choice. Whereas with [Rural town] it’s full of people who have made a conscious choice to live in [Rural town].” (2i)
This sense of agency affected the approach to engaging in the rural community, such that
newcomers were more likely to seek change where they felt improvements could be made. This was seen to be in contrast to the long-timers who saw themselves as more likely to maintain the status quo, even if they were unhappy about it.
“But I think that the thing that they did bring with them is the fact that they wanted to do it rather than expecting it to have already happened, or it should have happened, or someone else was at fault for not having it here, or whatever it was. Yeah, so that – I suppose, and coming in from outside of the community, if you’ve lived here like we have for fifteen years you’ve got used to [it]. .. So you just accepted the fact, that’s the way it was. You know you grumble about it ..” (2h)
New-comers from their city and professional experience, brought with them expectations for services and facilities ranging from health services to restaurants, also visible in the recent opening of businesses such as a wine bar. These were not expectations of long-timers who were instead viewed as insular.
“I think it’s fair to say that it was a fairly insular country town, and before the [RCD project]. And because of the influx of retirees, it’s become, I hate to use the word sophisticated, but it’s become, it demands more luxury services than it had originally.” (2c)
In contrast to professionals, were other new-comers described as the “wrong sort of people” (2a) who brought values that threatened the rural community values. They were seen as being a
potential problem, bringing drugs and behaviours not stereotypically associated with a clean healthy lifestyle of a rural community.
“And that’s where I reckon you’ve got to be careful. .. I mean at the moment, drugs is the biggest problem in [Rural town], and it’s ‘cos of the .. fairly cheap rent.” (2a)
In both cases there was a clear sense that the new-comer constituent community looked for an experience in community which varied from long-timers.
Long-timers were aware of this different perspective. While some were comfortable with these influences, others were very concerned about how it affected their familiar processes.
“And there’s been four or five people that are not born and bred here, they’re, you know, people that moved into the district. They’re retired people, and they’ve been worth their weight in gold. Don’t think that the locals always agree with some of the philosophies they’ve got.” (1b)
Some long-timers expressed concerns that their community was not overly active or vocal and thus change could be driven by new-comers whose views may not represent long-timers.
“.. that community inactivity by the (what do you call it?) the older, not older residents but the established residents in a town. They let decision making default to, in some cases, the wrong people.” (1c)
Both long-timers and new-comers were mindful of their differences. Not only were new-comers (even of ten years) very aware of their recency status, but they were also conscious that long-timers saw them as novel.
“There was a fair bit of, not jealousy, but consciousness on the part of people who consider themselves a Johnny-come-lately, that locals consider them so” (2d)
It was particularly felt by new-comers that long-timers did not see them as necessarily having the right to make changes to the way the rural community worked. There was a sense of some antagonism:
“And don’t forget we are outsiders. I’m from mainland. ‘How dare you come from mainland and try to tell us how to live.’” (3d)
The distinct boundary between long-timers and new-comers highlights the importance of the rural community identity being founded in an historical memory. Without this knowledge it was felt that new-comers did not necessarily understand the locals/long-timers’ needs and experiences.
“It is, as I say, probably what we don’t like is people moving in and not knowing what the place has ever been like before. .. probably one of the hardest things I find is like they’ll go down and they’ll drench down the front, you know get the seaweed off, and people will meet you down
the street and they’ll say, ‘Oh look at this. Look what they’re doing for [Rural town]. [Rural town]’s never had a beach.’ Well I mean we, we swam seven days a week. You know [Rural town]’s had all that and the people who’ve come in have got no idea what we did have many years ago. No, they’ve got no idea really. No idea.” (2e)
A need by long-timers to educate others about community history was apparent throughout the interviews, reinforcing the difference in historical knowledge. Participants went to considerable lengths to explain to the researcher historical facts about the town, its physical evolution and significant moments for its members.
However a lack of historical knowledge, while acknowledged by both communities as important, is not always necessarily an antagonistic boundary. For some it was just a reality to be respected; there are those with local history and those without.
“.. it was fairly obvious that about half the community are new-comers like me, and the other half are the old timers and they’ve been here for generations and they have that core. ..” (2c)
So although at times new-comers referred to locals as “very insular and not very accommodating towards visitors”, some described a different experience. This was particularly in rural communities where the sea/tree change phenomenon had changed the balance of new-comers such that they were not considered a minority:
“But what’s happened here is that because the numbers or new people are now pretty much equal the locals, there seems to have been an acceptance and it’s a very warm and friendly environment.” (2c)
In all the participating projects, constituent community boundary processes relating to the length of connection with the rural community were apparent. The boundary between new-comers and long- timers was highlighted by two key facets: the different values, philosophies and career experiences found in life beyond country towns, and a sense of rural community identity which encompassed historical knowledge of the community. New-comers brought different expectations of services and facilities along with a strong sense of agency about making change. At times there were suspicion
and tensions between the two communities, while at other times there was respect and a desire to share knowledge and ensure representation.
5: 1.2.1b Time currently spent within the rural community
In one rural community there was a constituent community which lived in the township for weekends and holidays or who travelled to “town” for extended periods of work. Members were described as “fifty percenters” or “part-timers” and the community boundary was identified in contrast with the “full-timers” who resided only in the rural community.
Most part-timers were also new-comers having taken up part-time residence as part of a lifestyle change. When interviewed, part-timers clarified their status in response to being asked to describe the community.
“Well I better explain my position. I’ve been in [Rural town], or [wife] and I, for three years only, and we’re part timers. We spend fifty percent or roughly fifty percent in Melbourne and fifty percent here.” (2j)
As demonstrated in the previous quote part-timers sensed that their experience of the dynamics and processes were likely to be different to a full-timer and thus effect their community description.
Full-timers however, were not a homogeneous community, existing only in the daily and weekly experience of being continuously in the rural community compared to part-timers. Indeed full-timer membership included both new-comers and long-timers, although there was a predominance of long-timers.
The full-timer/part-timer constituent community boundary was peculiar to one rural community of the three involved in the research. Where it presented, the part-timer contribution to the broader community and membership within other constituent communities was important.
5: 1.2.1c Visitors
Participants in the research made a distinction between local and non-local constituent
locals lived beyond the rural community boundary and usually engaged with the rural community for the purposes of their vocation.
As with new-comers, this boundary process was founded in the belief by locals that the different lifestyles may hold different values and bring a different culture to the rural community.
“And see that’s another thing that worries me a bit is that, without being terrible, people from cities don’t know how a country [community] works.” (2e)
Non-locals also described the rural community as having its own culture which they could not assume to know, and needed to take time to understand:
“I think it’s just about listening to what they’re saying to us; understanding the culture of the [Geographic area] is really critical. .. they’re like a lot of small isolated communities, yeah they very much have their own structure and they very much have their own culture.” (3e)
The boundary processes also involved non-locals being aware of their status, acknowledged in their acceptance of terms such as ‘outsiders’ or ‘fly-ins’ to describe their relationship with the local community.
“.. Because I am a fly-in and fly-out.” (3a) “And don’t forget we are outsiders.” (3d)
A point of tension for these constituent communities was the possibility of non-locals taking employment which might have been filled by locals:
“.. ‘cos she is, well she’s probably as local as any of the girls [employed] there get. .. I didn’t like it. I think it should have been more local, but that’s only my view. ..” (2a)
The concern seemed to relate to a sense of displacing the local community. Ensuring locals did not feel displaced or disadvantaged in any way by the increased presence and activity of non-locals was considered a significant factor in creating smooth boundary processes between these communities.
“So in spite of the fact that you’ve got a lot of new people coming into the town and
continuing, they’re mainly retirees. .. But they also haven’t intruded on the local community in a job sense, and I think that’s pretty important.” (2c)
The local and non-local constituent communities were identified in each of the participating rural communities. Members from each considered the boundary important to be managed, ensuring the local community felt heard and not displaced by members of the non-local community.
5: 1.2.1d Age demographics
All participants were very aware of age related community boundary processes and frequently referred to a younger community and an older community. There was acknowledgement of the different contributions made and the different needs held by these constituent communities.
Participants were attuned to rural communities having a higher population of older people
compared to younger people. Here the fluidity of boundaries continues to be apparent, sometimes including or differentiating those of retirement age.
“.. a predominant aged community here .. a bit of a retirement place as well. ..” (2g) At times the boundary for young people focused on the under 25 year olds as in the below quote which also highlights the different needs of youth.
“With young people there are things; we just started connecting with the young people in the area, but the problem is we had very limited resources here to do it ..” (3d)
At other times the boundary encompassed adults with families of school age children:
“.. It was also still relatively cheap for young people to build their first house and grow their family. And that’s still a major part of it .. youngies .. Young tradies.” (2d)
It was recognised that the younger community was significantly smaller and many youth left rural communities due to the lack of local further education opportunities.
“.. oh Uni changed it here .. as soon as they turn their 18 or whatever, they’re off .. the kids