Congratulations to Josh Barrett for successfully defending his PhD dissertation titled “A New Localism for Newfoundland and Labrador? An Exploratory Study of Rural Local Government Entrepreneurialism”. Josh's dissertation focuses on understanding how rural local governments can facilitate economic development in their communities in light of limited capacity and resources to do so. He presents a conceptual model, generated through the implementation a systematic literature review from two databases, to consider when conducting economic development research with local governments. 

Members of the PhD dissertation examining committee were Dr. Rob Greenwood (Government of Newfoundland and Labrador), Dr. Audrey Jamal (Lang School of Business and Economies, University of Guelph), Dr. Kelly Vodden (Grenfell Campus, Memorial University), and Ryan Gibson (University of Guelph).

Photo:  Sara Epp (advisory committee member), Josh Barrett, Kelly Vodden (advisory committee member), and Ryan Gibson (advisor).

The final version of Josh’s dissertation will be available shortly – stay tuned!