INTERPRETING A RELATIONAL OF FARM BUSINESS IN SOUTHERN ENGLAND.

The article interprets a relational typology of farm business in Southern England. In a paper published in the previous issue of Sociologia Ruralis the author addressed the theoretical and methodological aspects of constructing a relational typology of farm businesses. In this paper the author builds on these arguments in an attempt to develop a typology that is both theoretically informed, within a political economy framework and responsive enough to empirical variation to be capable of interpreting field survey material. In the earlier paper the author argued for a methodology, which focused upon the causal relations and mechanisms explaining the dynamics of agricultural production, rather than on the contingent forms describing farm businesses. The author emphasized two particular points in the analysis of agricultural production relations. The examination of empirical material represents the second stage. It provides a means of refining and developing the typology through an examination of the contingent conditions within which structural processes operate and are modified over time and space.