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Comparing rural development with agricultural modernisation, there are fundamental differences. Industrial development of agriculture more and more segregates agriculture from other functions and is based on an ‘individualised transaction model’ in which the world consists of loose particles that are linked by markets (atomistic world view). Conversely rural development can be perceived as a form of re-socialisation of agriculture and is based on a ‘relational cooperation model’ in which new relations characterise business development.

This chapter is a second level type of analysis of many research findings of these common traits or features and gives a picture of the distinctiveness of rural development practices. Nine different features that characterize rural development practices are described and discussed: (1) novelty production, (2) relative autonomy, (3) synergy, (4) clashes and competing claims, (5) coalitions and new relations; the construction of rural webs, (6) common pool resources, (7) new division of labour, (8) the distinctive different impact and (9) resilience. The more these features are present and intertwined, the better the specific practice can face and withstand adverse conditions. These features and the associated practices have to be understood as part of a wider transitional process that might co-evolve with or run counter to competing transitional processes.

Rural development is, above all, constructed by actors operating at grass-root level. These actors are increasingly facilitated by specific policy programmes, but these programmes often follow the initiatives and practices already developed by the grass-root actors themselves. Policies follow, they do not trigger nor drive. This chapter is a second-level analysis of available European and national research material and focuses on the role of agricultural actors as crucial co-constitutors of RD processes. Some distinctive elements and characteristics of RD-practitioners are identified, described and discussed. Taken together these characteristics underscore that RD-actors may reflect distinctive features. It is finally argued that RD-actors will develop especially distinctive personal attributes through iterative learning by doing processes and unfolding agency. Both are thought to be key components of the resilience of RD-actors to withstand adverse conditions and to grasp new opportunities for alternative, more promising agricultural pathways.

The results of a survey of Dutch educational managers are described, which used an adaptation of the Cooper Executive Stress Questionnaire and the Spielberger Job Stress Survey. Directors of large secondary schools, managers and directors at universities and top‐ranking employees at the Dutch governmental department of education and science were studied. Results for these Dutch educational managers are compared with those of Dutch corporate executives.

This chapter addresses the question how entrepreneurial synergies can be stimulated in places by leadership and network governance in the context of the knowledge economy. The chapter not only analyses the role of leadership in a regional case in the Netherlands, but also assesses to what extend place-based characteristics play a role.

The chapter is based on a case-study-analysis of the region Brainport Eindhoven. Data were collected via 27 interviews in 2 rounds (in 2008 and in 2012), and retrieved from academic literature, case documents and governmental plans.

This chapter shows the importance of knowledge leadership in creating entrepreneurial synergies in the region Brainport Eindhoven. Entrepreneurial synergies is defined here as the creation of governance conditions and a context for effective entrepreneurial activities and regional co-operation between entrepreneurs, to enhance innovation. The socio-spatial quality of this place, path-dependency and the establishment of a regional regime explain the clustering of high-tech firms in a context of pro-active policy support, embedded in a cultural tradition of public–private co-operation. Key-persons of the private sector, science, and government enabled the development by taking initiative, co-operating, framing issues and aligning people around the agenda of Brainport.

The chapter gives insights on how leaders can enhance entrepreneurial synergies rooted in place-based assets and characteristics, by using network power, resources, ‘windows of opportunity’ and by linking ideas, inspiration and individuals from different strands of the triple-helix.

Revealing normative leadership lessons – how leadership is enacted in ‘everyday’ practice – may also allow us to explain, at least to some limited extent, why some localities are able to adapt to the ever changing social and economic conditions of the modern world, and are successful in creating entrepreneurial synergies. Beyond this, deeper critical appreciations provide us with insights into the interplay between leadership, power and resources – and shed light on the questions of why and for whom economy and society are ‘organised’, in different places and at different times.

The chapter offers new insights in the importance of place and the leadership dimension in the context of the continuing debate around the effectiveness of sub-national economic development policy for the so-called ‘knowledge era’.

Detailed results of numerical calculations of transient, 2D incompressible flow around and in the wake of a square prism at Re = 100, 200 and 500 are presented. An implicit finite‐difference operator‐splitting method, a version of the known SIMPLEC‐like method on a staggered grid, is described. Appropriate theoretical results are presented. The method has second‐order accuracy in space, conserving mass, momentum and kinetic energy. A new modification of the multigrid method is employed to solve the elliptic pressure problem. Calculations are performed on a sequence of spatial grids with up to 401 × 321 grid points, at sequentially halved time steps to ensure grid‐independent results. Three types of flow are shown to exist at Re = 500: a steady‐state unstable flow and two which are transient, fully periodic and asymmetric about the centre line but mirror symmetric to each other. Discrete frequency spectra of drag and lift coefficients are presented.