No abstract

It is argued that the changes in the crime situation in rural areas are associated with the formation of a stratum of post-socialist rural poor. Three sub-divisions of the marginalized rural poor are discernible: (1) pauperized post-socialist peasantry, (2) poor, impoverished, and culturally estranged urban immigrants to rural areas, and (3) marginalized second-generation rural youth. Political, socio-economic, and legal factors contributing to the formation of each of the three sub-divisions within the rural underclass are analyzed, as well as determinants of their group behavior. It is argued that in order to increase its effectiveness, rural policing needs to be more differentiated to be able to respond effectively to the group behavior typical of each of the three groups of rural poor.

No abstract

Sustainable development has become the main priority of contemporary global society, and it is increasingly perceived not only in the context of environmental protection, but also as an entirety of processes in ecosystems, the society and different countries. Ecosystem stability and human well-being in an ecosystem, in the community, the society, and the country are greatly influenced by political, economic, social and cultural processes in the countryside, because rural territories make up a bigger part of the territories of contemporary countries. The article analyses Lithuanian rural development reviewing the damage done by Russian (Soviet) occupation to the Lithuanian countryside and assessing its development in the context of rural development and contemporary sustainable development in Western European countries and the world. It is concluded that the agricultural model in Lithuania as well as in all other countries that have freed themselves from the Soviet Union is based on Socialist (communist) doctrine and is an extreme contrast to the European Model of Agriculture.