Rural Areas – Boroughs Under Pressure and Free Riders. Evidence from Poland

Abstract

The analysis of rural areas in Poland on the LAU2 level reveals significant heterogeneities among these entities. Research based on demographic, wellbeing and infrastructure indicators showed that there was no uniform pattern of change in the rural areas. Two main groups emerged from the analysis – systematically depopulated and financially stressed peripheral boroughs and rural boroughs adjacent to large municipalities, which undertook skilful free rider strategies. The latter limited their own provision of public goods such as healthcare, and education on the one hand and, on the other, attracted residents and businesses from the municipalities. Such a strong differentiation between rural boroughs indicates the need for a reconsideration of the criteria for regional cohesion policies to design context-dependent regional policy instruments instead of the currently prevailing approach of ‘one size fits all’ allocation policies.