TYPES OF RURAL AND URBAN TERRITORIES IN POLAND, HUNGARY, ROMANIA AND EUROPEAN RUSSIA

Abstract

Four post-socialist countries of Eastern Europe (Poland, Hungary, Romania and Russia) were comparatively analyzed in terms of the relative position and dynamics of different types of territories over a ten-year period from 2010 to 2020. The author develops methodological ideas about the usage of individual typology to create a socio-economic profile of a territory in order to identify spatial inequality of the countries under study upon socio-demographic, economic and infrastructural indicators. The results of the analysis allowed concluding about dominant trends of socio-economic differentiation between rural, urban and periurban zones. It was found that the intraregional spatial convergence is not an obligatory consequence of the socio-economic development of a country. The transformation processes which accompany the post-socialist transition led to the formation of different models of spatial socio-economic differentiation in each country, i. e. relatively balanced development in Poland, zonal development in Hungary and differentiated development in Romania and European Russia. The author suggests a concept of main stages and directions of the socio-economic differentiation of territories, which helps to systematize statistically-obtained conclusions.