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This paper contributes to ongoing discussions about the implications of rural change and amenity migration for members of diverse rural communities. We engage with recent amenity migration and political ecology literature that focuses on social constructions of nature and landscapes, and how these constructions affect the attitudes and opinions of community members. We use our case study of a mail-based survey in Down East, North Carolina to suggest that the ways in which people conceptualize the particular 'natures' and landscapes of a place matters in terms of shaping people's attitudes with respect to ongoing processes of change. We find that people's opinions about environment, culture, and land use are often superficially similar but that when conflicts arise or particular actions are considered, substantial differences in people's underlying conceptual frameworks are revealed. In particular we find that despite widespread shared appreciation of the environment and culture Down East, differing interpretations of these key terms lead to potential misunderstandings and land use planning challenges.

Moving beyond direct marketing, food systems work is increasingly connecting sustainably grown food with supermarkets, dining services, and other mainstream outlets. It is here that growers come face-to-face with the rigid conditions of a globalized food system. In this paper we document the emergence of mission-driven intermediaries as bridging institutions in the middle spaces of American agriculture that are using value addition and strategic scaling up to connect alternative food systems to local and regional markets at profitable prices. Through in-depth interviews with Working Landscapes of Warrenton, North Carolina, we describe one path to becoming a Mission-Driven Intermediary, in which intermediaries with roots in the nonprofit sector evolve into organizations of hybrid form that include revenue-generating activities. This institutional heterodoxy allows lateral alliances with diverse entities that help recombine existing resources in new ways, enabling the organization to demonstrate long-term commitment to the local food project while successfully improvising to survive in a highly competitive and corporatized industry. [Working Landscapes, local food systems, mission-driven intermediaries, supply chains]