Unveiling intra-rural divides: investigating decline and prosperity in rural areas. The case study of southern Italy

Alfonso Annunziata, Francesco Scorza, Simone Corrado and Beniamino Murgante

European Planning Studies, 2024, vol. 32, issue 7, 1478-1505

Abstract: Strategies to address the decline and marginalization of rural areas are emerging as a central issue of European and national policies. Yet, the conceptualization of decline and the recognition of forms of decline specific to distinct rural areas, resulting in conditions of intra-rural divide, are fundamental aspects for developing place-based and targeted strategies. The article thus focuses on the concept of intra-rural divide. It introduces the categories of declining, adapting, stabilizing, and developing regions as spatial clusters that present specific population trends and require specific place-based policies. These policies are defined as adaptation, mitigation, and development strategies. The aim of the study is to develop a procedure, based on a set of indicators of population trends and population structure, to investigate the impact of active decline resulting from out-migration and legacy decline resulting from demographic imbalances produced by past migration. The objective is to understand the intra-rural divide and identify clusters of declining transition and prosperous rural areas. Six Italian regions were selected as study areas, including Abruzzo, Basilicata, Calabria, Campania, Molise, and Puglia. The Municipalities are selected as the unit of analysis. The study’s findings provide relevant information for defining targeted policies and balancing adaptation, mitigation, and development strategies.

Date: 2024
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/09654313.2024.2335312 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:eurpls:v:32:y:2024:i:7:p:1478-1505

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/CEPS20

DOI: 10.1080/09654313.2024.2335312

Access Statistics for this article

European Planning Studies is currently edited by Philip Cooke and Louis Albrechts

More articles in European Planning Studies from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().