Building a continental area: identities, differences and urban developments in Europe

Abstract

Despite its common cultural heritage, Europe is the continent in which there is greatest diversity. This diversity, as well as the distribution of people and wealth, goes back a long way in history. The geography of the industrial revolution and the process of formation of nation states can only be understood when looked at in terms of a continuation of mediaeval Europe and of the formation of the economic mercantilist system, concentrated in Western Europe. Pre-industrial urban population density was a major factor in the subsequent differentiation. The Communist interlude in Central and Eastern Europe is ending up with the reintegration on a peripheral and semi-peripheral basis of this part of the continent into the world economy and the revival of acute nationalism. The extent of the disparity in economic terms between this area and Western Europe is a particularly daunting challenge, given the fact that the populations in Centre-Eastern and Eastern Europe share the same identity and references points as those in Western Europe. Europe, regional diversity, spatial production, population pattern, towns

Keywords

• Europe
• diversités régionales
• production spatiale
• répartition de la population
• villes