The Third Sector: The “Other” Actors of Rural Development, Andalusia 2000–2015

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

In general terms, this is a good article which in a descriptive way analyses the performance of the third sector in Andalusia and its contribution to rural development through the LEADER programme.

The article should be published, but the following should be corrected first:

In the introduction there is no paragraph informing the reader about the structure of the article.

It would be interesting to have a literature review to situate the reader in the state of the art. That is to say, to inform whether similar studies have been carried out in other geographical areas where the LEADER programme or other European Union funds are active.

In the conclusions, possible limitations to the scope and future lines of research should be highlighted.

With these modifications the article could be published.

 

Author Response

A file with the answers was attached.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

The Authors of the Article „The Third Sector: the "Other" actors of rural development. Andalusia 2000-2015” analyze the role played by non-profit organizations in developed societies at a global level and within LEADER in particular. The study is for the period 2000-2015 and is made for the Andalusia area.

The article is structured correctly and contains all the parts a scientific article should contain.

However, the proposed study is basically just a quantitative analysis of LEADER projects implemented with the participation of the so-called "third sector" organizations. It is difficult to determine what new scientific findings the analysis brings. The reader learns how many projects have been carried out, for what amounts, what they concerned and how they are spatially distributed. And what is the result of it? The analysis concerns the years 2000-2015, so it has almost a historical aspect. One should analyze how the implemented projects influenced the development of rural areas. What about how many projects there were and what they concerned? It would be much more important to answer the question: what resulted from them? We are at the end of 2021, so the effects should already be visible.

The present analysis is strictly quantitative, in addition to being of more historical value. I do not see what new contribution it makes to science and knowledge concerning the subject matter. Without supplementing it with the assessment of the impact of analyzed projects on rural areas (e.g. making some kind of delimitation, assessment of these areas, showing the changes before 2000 and today, correlating it with the implemented projects), the article does not have a high scientific value and should be supplemented with the proposed research.

I also have comments about the drawings provided. Their quality is unsatisfactory. If the authors used ARCGIS 10.6. here, please export the maps in .png format instead of .jpg, it would significantly improve their quality. Please also increase their resolution. I would also suggest tweaking the markings a bit, such as introducing different types of hatching. In Fig. 1, there are "white" areas without any markings in the legend - please add them.

The article as it stands is more of a summary report of projects carried out in Andalusia than a scientific article on the subject. It needs to be supplemented and restructured.

Author Response

A file with the answers was attached.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

The authors have gathered and analised the bunch of facts about rural projects co-financed under the LEADER umbrella.  The strength of the work is that not only successful but also failed projects are considered. Yet one need a little more information about why the projects were not successful. I can also advise adding 'more political economy' to the question  why the participation of the third sector is so important for the development of local communities.

Author Response

A file with the answers was attached.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

The authors' replies to my comments and the corrections they made to the text of the article still raise my doubts.

In the article, the authors point out three key questions: i) How important is this group in terms of the number of projects and the amounts invested? ii) What kinds of project does each type of association carry out? iii) How is investment distributed geographically across the different types of rural area? (lines 172-175)

I agree that the article answers ii) and iii). Just what is the scientific aspect of such research? I still don't see the rationale for answering i).

In my opinion, the research presented in the article is more concerned with evaluating the efficiency of acquiring EU funds by "The Third Sector" organizations. And here again the question arises about the scientific significance of such analyses.

Methodologically, the article is basically a report on the acquisition of EU funds between 2000 and 2015 by "The Third Sector" organizations.

The methodical aspect I see in using “Categorization of Andalusian municipalities on the basis of time distance from service centres”.

I leave the article to the judgment of the Editor. If he feels that such research is scientifically sufficient for the journal, then I rate the article favorably. My technical comments regarding the quality of the figures have been taken into account.

Author Response

The answers are included in the attached file

Author Response File: Author Response.docx