MATILDE

Background

Against the background of global trends such as urbanization and agglomeration, economic and forced migration flows are also moving outside urban areas. So far, this has largely been perceived as yet another burden for already marginalized territories. 

The specific needs of rural and mountain regions have been scarcely considered at the time of formulating the governance of migration. If unaddressed, the sentiments of people in ‘places that don’t matter’ risk fuelling an authoritarian dynamic, rejecting diversity altogether.

Notwithstanding the prominence of urbanization as a global trend, migrations to rural and mountain areas can play an important role for European rural regions, among the other things, by contributing to revitalise social and economic local milieu, reducing territorial inequalities and reconfiguring urban-rural interconnections. Migration has a potential to trigger development in the medium and long run especially in remote areas, where it can operate as a counter-process to depopulation and economic decline. Migration can be a crucial element to attain balanced territorial development, as defined in the UN Sustainable Development Goals. To avoid the existing risk that migration flows exert a negative impact on socio-economically and geographically fragile areas, place-based policies and adequate governance measure are needed.

Main objectives