In an effort to clarify and synthesize recent explanations of underdevelopment and poverty in Central Appalachia, the following three models were explored: (1) the subculture of poverty model (identifies the internal deficiencies of the Southern Appalachian traditional subculture as the source of poverty problems); (2) the regional development model (providing for economic and social overhead capital, training people in skills for new industrial and service jobs, facilitating migration, and promoting private industry via a growth center strategy); (3) the internal colonialism model (identifies the process by which dominant outside industrial interests establish control and continue to prevent autonomous development of the subordinate internal colony). It was concluded that: the three models should be understood as representations of the different dimensions of social existence; the human interest dimensions of mutual understanding, technical control, and emancipation should provide a framework for perceiving cultural adaptation, technical development, and redistribution of power as potentially complimentary aspects of social development; institutions should be analyzed in the context of the competitive, monopolistic, and state sectors of the national economy; class structure should be viewed in its full complexity. (AUTHOR/JC)