Christian Vandermotten

The new regional map of Europe

This paper examines patterns of production and population change at the regional level across the whole of Western Europe between 1960 and 1990. It is based largely on the analysis of a regional dataset containing details of GDP, economic structure, employment and population change. The main aims are to monitor the extent and nature of regional differentiation, to examine the trajectories of the different types of regions and to explore the degree of correspondence between the regional economic trends and the changing patterns of population distribution. A 13-fold regional typology is derived from an examination of the production structures of 516 regions. This typology is used alongside country-level analyses to explore the trends towards convergence and divergence in regional economies since 1960 and to examine the degree of linkage between each structural features and the patterns of population redistribution. The relative lack of sensitivity of migration to the continuing economic differentials in the 1980s is linked to several factors, including more general unemployment, changes in labour-market processes and the increasing role of non-employment factors in decisions about where to live. These, together with the emergence of new economic, demographic and political developments, suggest that the forces now operating on the regional map of Europe are now very different from those of 30 years ago. Copyright

Unequal Economic Development at the Origin of the Federalization Process

Unequal economic development in Belgium is often reduced to a mere change in the economic fortunes of Flanders and Wallonia. This image is then used to explain the federalization process. A closer look at the economic development of Flanders and Wallonia, in its relation to the geography of demographic changes, yields a more complex process consisting of three stages. Nevertheless, this very process created different political hegemonies north and south of the linguistic frontier. This explains why unequal economic development was perceived in terms of Flanders and Wallonia and why this perception was politically effective. The present chapter gives a description of this unequal development and points to the geographical basis of the two political hegemonies.

The geography of the European Left from the end of WW II : national homogenization or permanence of the regional political behaviours?

La geografia delle modalita di voto elettorali europee della Sinistra non possono essere comprese senza considerare le storie politiche nazionali. Gli schemi di distribuzione spaziale dei voti non rappresentano solo riflessi meccanicistici delle attuali strutture regionali. Elementi quali le mediazioni sociali, innervate a livello nazionale e regionale, rappresentano delle determinanti molto forti di questi schemi e spiegano, attraverso complessi meccanismi di persistenza (o isteresi), le relative preferenze, anche quando le strutture di classe e le basi economiche delle regioni, cosi come le posizioni politiche dei partiti, siano state oggetto di cambiamenti drammatici. Anche se alcune tendenze sembrano andare nella direzione dell’omogeneizzazione delle mappe elettorali a livello nazionale, permangono tuttavia dei contrasti regionali, spesso esplicabili solo attraverso queste determinanti ereditate dal passato. The geography of the European electoral patterns (here those of the Left) can surely not be understood without taking into consideration the national political histories. The spatial patterns are not at all mechanistic reflections of the present regional class structures. Social mediations, nationally and regionally embedded, are strong determinants of these spatial patterns and explain, through complex hystereses, their relative permanences, even when the class structures and the economic basis of the regions, as well as the political positions of the parties, have known dramatic changes. Even if some trends appear towards more homogenization of the electoral maps at the national levels, regional contrasts remain, often only explainable by these inherited determinants.

Electoral Geography of Europe

On a national scale, electoral geography allows us to refine and spatialize the behaviors studied by electoral sociology, whose samples generally prove insufficiently representative at regional and local levels. It allows us to bring in additional hypotheses to explain the relationships between voting behaviors and the social, cultural, ideological, and economic features of the regions, even if it constantly requires being careful about improper interpretations of the correlations in terms of explanatory relationships. In the field of electoral geography, a relevant analysis always requires a good knowledge of the overall historical and social background.