THE FIELD OF RURAL SOCIOLOGY 617 



are seen to influence activities generally. Their social phases 

 as such may find a place here at discretion. Relative to the 

 institutions of long standing, the church and the school, we must 

 inquire relative to each : Is it an efficient institution, when judged 

 in the light of the community function it should perform? 

 This supposes that we know what each of these agencies should 

 accomplish. We apprehend this to the degree that we have 

 arrived at a competent judgment as to the demands society at 

 large and the local community make upon them. Upon the basis 

 of this judgment, the investigator may proceed to formulate a 

 program for school and church, which, if executed, will trans- 

 form them into more serviceable agencies of community life. 



Certain notable agencies and organizations have appeared in 

 the rural affairs of our nation during relatively recent years. 

 In the list may be mentioned granges, unions, societies of equity, 

 cooperative buying and marketing organizations, institutes, 

 farmers' clubs, non-partisan leagues, and recreation associations. 

 The function of the rural sociologist is to evaluate their useful- 

 ness for social progress, to denote their limitations, to suggest 

 needed modifications and how greater efficiency may be secured. 

 It is also his function to make an inventory of the social resources 

 of country communities and to reveal how the social capital may 

 be increased. 



A seventh significant line of study is the pathological social 

 conditions of country life. The phrase is objectionable, but it 

 covers important facts, such as poverty, pauperism, insanity, 

 feeble-mindedness, and criminality. "While in some particulars 

 the country appears to better advantage than urban groups, in no 

 case is it within the limit of complete safety. Rural populations 

 are exceedingly behindhand in giving serious attention to the 

 scientific and preventive methods of handling these menacing 

 phenomena. As in many other fields of investigation and study 

 of rural conditions, there is a dearth of reliable information rel- 

 ative to the frequency of occurrence and the provocative factors 

 of these features. Real statesmanlike insight into devising appro- 

 priate and effective laws and instruments for exercising a safe 

 control and the gradual reduction or complete elimination of these 

 backward classes is sorely demanded. Extreme pauperism may 

 be infrequent, the social evil as a local institution may scarcely 



