Paper short abstract:

By tracing the relationship between territorial inequalities and mobility policies in some of Europe's inner and ultra-peripheries, this paper aims to discuss the multifaceted concept of peripherality, exploring the different ways of living, underdoing and responding to 'left behindness'.

Paper long abstract:

The concept of 'left behindness' is generally associated with inner cities, suburbs and peripheries surrounding major cities and with subaltern life struggling with poverty and social inequalities, but urban peripheries are not the only ones experiencing a sense of abandonment and neglect in the EU context.

Considering 'left-behindness' as a condition and a process, and taking into account the relativity of the notion of peripherality, this paper explores, through a comparative lens and specific ethnographic case studies, the 'other peripheries' of Europe: the Outermost Regions and the Inner Territories.

Sharing some limitations such as remoteness, isolation, environmental fragility, structural backwardness, limited public investment and political weakness, Inner Areas and Outer Peripheries of Europe deal with the feeling of being "left behind" in a variety of ways. Despite all the differences, the hinterland and the outermost regions are linked by profound territorial inequalities that manifest themselves at different levels (local, regional, national and EU) and by particular mobility dynamics with significant implications for demography, the economy and social structure.

We argue that mobility flows and policies in the core and outermost regions deepen rather than alleviate the sense of being left behind at a structural and existential level.

By tracing the relationship between territorial inequalities and mobility policies in some of Europe's inner and ultra-peripheries, this paper aims to discuss the changing and multifaceted concept of peripherality, exploring the different ways of living, underdoing and responding to 'left behindness' in the outermost context and in non-urban peripheries.

Paper short abstract:

I adopt borders as Lense to describe spatial inequality at the interplay of local realities, discursive constructions and policies. Borders are seen as demarcations and as practices of border making that produce the labour market. I discuss feelings of “left in between borders” in Southeast Austria.

Paper long abstract:

The paper discusses spatial inequality in Austria using the example of a municipality in the south-eastern border region of the country. The positionality of the place will be described as an interplay of local realities, discursive constructions and concrete indicators and policies. At this interface, the paper links discourses on territorial inequality at EU level and in Austria with the local implications of policies in the field of regional development. These levels are juxtaposed with empirical material from an ethnographic study in the South-Burgenland region. The focus here is on the question how territorial inequality is locally perceived, experienced, and negotiated at the interplay of these three dimensions.

The paper adopts the border as Lense to describe experienced forms of marginality. On the one hand, the border is understood as a physical and administrative demarcation between countries and federal states. On the other hand, it is discussed in the sense of Mezzadra and Neilson (2013) as the ways in which practices of bordermaking and maintenance are essential to the production of the local labour market. As such, the locality and its inhabitants are portrayed as being crisscrossed by borders or as feeling been “left in between” various borders.

Mezzadra, S., & Neilson, B. (2013). Border as Method, or, the Multiplication of Labor. Duke University Press.

Paper short abstract:

In Turkey, beyond major cities, 'province' oversimplifies diverse regions. Despite industrial progress, narratives of being left behind persist in places like Çorum, revealing evolving class dynamics due to global integration, while polarized discourses conceal this transformation.

Paper long abstract:

In Turkey, beyond a handful of major cities, all other areas are commonly labeled as 'taşra' or 'province.' This term, used in the singular, oversimplifies the vast cultural and religious diversity spanning Anatolia and the Thrace region within Turkey's borders. The prevailing perception characterizes provinces as stagnant, resistant to social change, devoid of social stratification, and generally unappealing. Since the 1950s, internal migration to urban centers has spurred industrialization, development, and societal transformations primarily in metropolises, leaving provinces marginalized in both population and regional policies. However, the left behind perception of the province has slightly shifted since the 1990s, with some Anatolian provinces joining global production chains through industrialization, notably central Anatolia becoming the political stronghold of the ruling party for the past 22 years.

Çorum, where I conducted ethnographic research from 2015-2016, is a taşra city in Anatolia. Despite advancements in the machinery sector and export revenues in the last two decades, these narratives persist about being left behind particularly in relation to worth of Çorum and its people. In this talk, I explore public discussions in Çorum, focusing on the long-planned but unfinished airport project spanning 30 years. I delve into how the absence of an airport is perceived, experienced, and negotiated by locals, revealing nuanced narratives of worth in relation to perceived left-behindness. Ultimately, I argue that narratives depicting worthlessness reflect the evolving class dynamics resulting from the city's integration into the global production chain, while polarized discourses of worth aim to obfuscate these transformations.

Paper short abstract:

This paper aims to locate urban vulnerability within territorial inequality debates through the analysis of the concept “left-behindness”. It draws upon ethnographic research with residents and other stakeholders in Barcelona's urban periphery.

Paper long abstract:

Spain exhibits the most pronounced demographic and spatial imbalances within the EU (De Cos and O Reques, 2019), underscoring prevailing territorial disparities in the country. The concept of "left-behind places" emerges as a valuable tool, directing attention to a field of research that addresses "emerging spatially interdependent social problems and issues" (Lichter and Ziliack, 2017:9). This perspective signifies a novel approach recognising the spatial interdependence of factors contributing to inequalities (Brown and Shucksmith, 2017). While the Anglo-Saxon literature increasingly integrates discussions on being or feeling “left-behind" across rural and urban contexts, a comparable convergence is less common in Spain. In the Spanish context, the debate on territorial inequalities is largely associated with rural areas. In the urban sphere, spatial inequalities are typically addressed through the concepts of urban segregation or urban vulnerability, often independently of broader discussions on territorial inequalities. This paper thus endeavours to locate urban vulnerability within debates on territorial inequalities through the concept of “left-behindness”. The paper discusses the day-to-day experiences and perceptions of living in an area affected by territorial inequalities, drawing upon original ethnographic research conducted with residents and other stakeholders in the urban periphery of the metropolis Barcelona.

Paper short abstract:

This paper describes, through interactions with residents, entrepreneurs, artisans, social workers, activists, policy makers and others, how a territory designated as ‘left behind’ becomes a site of operation where people actively pursue aspirations and ambitions toward ‘leaving being ‘left behind’.

Paper long abstract:

The designation ‘left behind’ has gained traction in UK policy discourse as referent for people who inhabit territories abandoned by industries and economies of old. It is also a category reserved for particular people - white dispossessed - whose subsequent inclination toward populist politics renders them vulnerable to political designs of welfare retrenchment and austerity. This paper draws on recent ethnographic research conducted in Stoke-on-Trent, UK – popularly known as the ‘Brexit Capital of England’ – where the designation ‘left behind’ is overlooked when considering experiences of dispossession that mark the existence of ethnic minorities. And where processes of economic abandonment and socio-political remedy figure little when explaining the background to these lives as ‘left behind’. Concurrently, racialised pathologies persist in narratives of decline and loss to further restrict potentialities.

Rather than counterpose such divergences in representation and experience, this paper describes - through interactions with residents, entrepreneurs, artisans, social workers, activists, policy makers and others - how the territory designated ‘left behind’ becomes a site of operation where people actively pursue aspirations and ambitions toward ‘leaving being ‘left behind’. In what constitute new ‘grammars of the urban ground’ (Amin & Lancione 2022), racially dispossessed groups affect struggle through ‘forgetting’ (Simone 2022) what is going on around them - such as Brexit, welfare retrenchment - while looking out and over to new horizons. This paper will offer an ethnographic account of itineraries pursued by dispossessed minorities that remain off the radar in public and policy discourses on the left behind.

Paper short abstract:

Once perceived as anti-modern, wooden houses are now beginning to be celebrated as sustainable and future-oriented structures in Vilnius, Lithuania. How do residents navigate this shift, and how do research projects and urban policies reframe the houses in contexts of urban and regional inequality?

Paper long abstract:

This paper traces the revaluation of wooden houses that activists, academics, and institutions like the Museum of Urban Wooden Architecture are spearheading in Vilnius, Lithuania. It analyzes the discursive shift that reframes predominantly wooden historical suburbs like the neighborhood of Snipiskes from being interpreted as anachronistic, backward, left-behind to exemplary forebearers of urban sustainability. This reframing comes at a crucial moment when such wooden houses are rapidly disappearing from the cityscape to make way for multi-story newbuild housing. How do the tactics of making-do that have long since been part of the everyday life of disadvantaged residents of wooden houses get repackaged by researchers as exemplars of a sustainable future, and what transformative effect does this have for the resident’s self-perception and subjectivity/personhood/positionality? Once feeling like they got shortchanged during processes of post-Soviet privatization when they gained ownership of housing they had been waiting to be moved out of for decades, thirty years later, residents of these houses are being targeted by municipal and Scandinavian research projects that aim to promote preservation and celebrate these structures as future-oriented sustainable heritage. However, attitudes toward wooden architecture are contextually conditioned and often clash when comparing those in Lithuania and countries like Sweden, Norway, and Finland. How are wooden houses that were once seen as the epitome of provinciality and backwardness, now acting as coordinates of europeanization and ‘nordification’ shaping Lithuania’s future?

Paper short abstract:

This study aims to explore the concept of modernization as it is locally interpreted and practiced in China, focusing on the developmental inequalities faced by rural societies and how these territorial inequalities manifest in the lives of rural inhabitants.

Paper long abstract:

The ideology of rural-urban difference in China originated in the early 20th century, stemming from the cultural elite's attempts to modernize China as a means to resist Western colonial rule. Since then, the concept of modernization has permeated Chinese society, with cities being regarded as the advanced and civilized frontiers of industrial development, and villages as backward, feudal, and conservative static spaces. After the Chinese Communist Party came to power in 1949, the concept of modernization was continuously reinterpreted and implemented through rural collectivization and later socialist market economy. Despite these shifts, the deep-rooted disparities between urban and rural areas persisted. The emphasis on industrial growth and economic indicators continued to dominate the narrative of modernization. Nevertheless, the rural societies formed over a century were not completely obliterated during violent social movements. Instead, village life evolved into a tapestry where tradition and modernity are inextricably woven together.

This research is based on a five-year field study in Naduo Village, a village in Southwest China. While national policies contributed on improving infrastructure, local economics and education here, I want to give more attention to the village members who have not been voiced in the process of modernisation that they were forced to accept. This study brings local voices into discussions on modernization and development, particularly through the local’s narratives and life histories, to understand the greater struggles and dilemmas faced by vulnerable groups amidst the empowerment of modernization and the oppression of traditional society.

Paper short abstract:

Based on my fieldwork in allotment gardens in Nowa Huta, I will reflect on the consequences of treating working class, poor and elderly people as underprivileged, underrepresented, left behind. I will show how their culture could be the avant garde of climate change resilience.

Paper long abstract:

Nowa Huta is a district of Kraków which was originally planned as a model, socialist, working-class town. I have conducted one year of fieldwork with the first, eldest allotment gardeners and retired steelworkers there.

Firstly, I would like to question the assumption that post-socialist, working-class neighbourhoods are degrading. The culture of allotment gardens in Nowa Huta is progressively changing but continuously thriving.

Secondly, I would like to reflect on the consequences of treating working class, poor and elderly people as underprivileged, underrepresented, left behind. It often leads to treating them with pity and paternalism. By seeing them only as victims and they’re culture as an outcome of violence – we devaluate them. At the same time, we reinforce the hegemony of bourgeois culture and society. And, leave the working class, poor and elderly people behind.

Thirdly, I would like to reflect on an ideal of a diverse society which equally includes different groups and their cultures, also the ones presently left behind. To bring it closer, we would have to learn to, on the one hand recognise the hardships and violence which they experience, and on the other affirm their very different culture.

Fourthly, I would like to suppose that maybe it is not the left behind who need the bourgeois culture and society but the other way around. I will describe the radically resourceful, self-sufficient, sustainable and resilient culture and ethics of allotment gardeners from which we could learn as we face climate change.