It is widely held view that left-behind rural areas' resentment against urban political elites underlies the recent success of populist parties. But the sharp distinction drawn between rural and urban areas obfuscates competing cleavages and hides significant differences existing among rural areas. By focussing on Italy and relying on an integrative multi-method design, we unpack the origins of political dissatisfaction in more or less isolated rural areas. First, we analyze electoral data to show that turnout decreases as rural areas are more isolated from urban centers and support anti-establishment parties increases with isolation. Second, we analyze administrative data to show that more isolated rural areas differ significantly from less isolated ones based on several dimensions, including access to public services, shops, and cultural activities; integration in the labor market; exposure to environmental risks; and age and ethnic composition. Third, we exploit a 2010 Italian reform that forced small municipalities into inter-municipal unions to examine the causal effect of reducing access to public services on political dissatisfaction. Fourth, we conduct interview-based case studies to uncover why some municipalities complied with the obligation to enter an inter-municipal union while others decided to oppose it. Fifth, we conduct a survey experiment to address the individual level mechanisms linking forced inter-municipal union and political dissatisfaction. Our results suggest that in order to the spatial gradient of political dissatisfaction, researchers should go beyond the classic dichotomic analysis of urban-rural divides and look at more fine-grained measures of isolation.