The principles of Gandhi are applied to the rural crisis in America with special attention to rural Iowa. Approaches to rural reconstruction and development are proposed which emphasize human-scale development, community-owned enterprises, local community development foundations, maximum feasible participation, broad-based land ownership, and…

The decline of agriculture in the 1920s and 1930s was compounded by the subsequent collapse of the rural social community, leaving the rural poor without a community and thus exacerbating and prolonging their poverty. Present restructuring of agriculture in the United States may have a similar impact on rural communities. (JHZ)