ELDEMOR studies local development and rural mobility and migration. In particular, it examines how new residents support local economies, bringing new ideas on business innovation and sustainability, and revitalise the social fabric of municipalities with fewer than 2000 inhabitants in four regions of Spain and Portugal (two on the Spanish-Portuguese border, and two islands in the Canary and Azores archipelagos, respectively). In order to draw useful lessons for endogenous local development across Europe, the project aims to study rural municipalities in four regions with low levels of human development. In line with the Horizon 2020 Framework Programme, the project helps to identify “main economic opportunities for innovative companies and thus contribute to the competitiveness and employment of the European Union” in rural settings. The project also aims to inform public policy makers about migration and mobility patterns and their impacts on economic development in rural areas.
ELDEMOR main objective is to examine the impact of spatial mobilities on rural areas and, particularly, explore how newcomers might improve local alternative development strategies, enhance cooperative building of human capital, as well as developing new avenues on wellbeing and sustainability in rural settings.
Specifically, ELDEMOR intends to:
Conduct a critical theoretical exercise on mobility/migration pathways in rural settings.
Study labour incorporation of new residents in selected municipalities with fewer than 2000 inhabitants in four peripherical Portuguese and Spanish regions, in order to identify sustainable economic projects managed/supported by internal and international immigrants, and present successful experiences in terms of rural development.
Analyse settlement processes of new residents in selected Portuguese and Spanish municipalities, exploring challenges for social incorporation in rural communities, and issues on wellbeing and inter-cultural aspects.
To qualitatively examine the perceptions and practices of new residents throughout the life cycle to understand the microstrategies of these individuals to deal with aspects related to daily life in lagging areas.
Create place-based policies to enhance mobility benefits and alternative local development.
Challenging existing narratives about rural communities to strengthen a sense of community belonging.
The project methodology consists of multi-sited research based mainly on qualitative methods applied to carefully pre-selected case studies. This selection is made through an exhaustive statistical analysis of municipal data obtained from the National Institute of Statistics (INE) of Spain and Portugal.
The study regions are of a different nature. Following the NUT3 criteria, two peripheral regions of the Portuguese-Spanish border have been chosen (Trás-os-Montes, in the north of Portugal, and Zamora, in Castilla y León, Spain). Taking into account the interests of the research group, ELDEMOR also studies two Atlantic islands (El Hierro in the Canary Islands and Pico in the Azores). In all four case studies, the project focuses on Spanish and Portuguese rural municipalities with fewer than 2,000 inhabitants.
In the study locations, qualitative data are collected through in-depth interviews with a non-representative sample of internal and international migrants, and if possible, return migrants, residing in the four study areas. Interviews are primarily addressed to the economically active population (including entrepreneurs, self-employed and employees in similar numbers) to cover different mobility/migration profiles. Interviews inquire into household practices and strategies in the economic (career trajectory, income, household economic strategies), social (well-being, care chains, representations/narratives of place, territorial attachment and identity), political (participation and attitudes), cultural (diversification, transnationalism), as well as expectations of future mobility. These data will be complemented by participant and non-participant observation in the areas to produce ethnographic profiles of places.
Qualitative data on the challenges and potential of mobility are also collected through interviews with key informants from the private (representatives of economic sectors, businessmen, entrepreneurs, real estate agencies), public (local, provincial and regional policy makers) and civic (social partners, trade unions, NGOs) sectors.
A thorough analysis of official statistics for the study areas is carried out and detailed maps of these areas are produced. This analysis also guides the selection of specific locations for fieldwork.
Principal Investigator ELDEMOR
Associate Professor (ULPGC)
ORCID: 0000-0001-8694-6830
ELDEMOR project technician
Researcher (ULPGC)
ORCID: 0009-0006-5500-0966
Full Professor (ULPGC)
ORCID: 0000-0001-7460-5553
Full Professor (ULPGC)
ORCID: 0000-0001-7064-7465
Although some studies have seen the potential of migration for preventing (or at least slowing down) de-population (Bayona-i-Carrasco & Gil-Alonso, 2013; Berthomière, Maurel & Richard, 2019; Camarero & Sampedro, 2019; Tulla, 2019), in general terms, literature has not researched mobility/migration under the perspective of the local development in rural areas. In fact, as an emerging branch of migration studies, the features and impacts of mobility/migration on scarcely populated rural municipalities, including multi-dimensional mobilities, are only beginning to be understood by the academic community (Bell & Osti, 2010; Mendoza, Morén-Alegret & McAreavey, 2020). Some of these rural municipalities may in fact serve as laboratories: we will be able to watch the challenges and opportunities of mobility/migration processes as they unfold. These processes may be familiar in established urban gateways, but relatively new contexts of reception require closer attention, in order to propitiate better theoretical and empirical knowledge.
The project has a largely interdisciplinary approach, and it explores key themes such as: globalisation/neo-liberalism and localised economic opportunities (e.g. ‘glocalisation’, Morawska, 2014); settlement patterns, intercultural relations and integration (McAreavey, 2012); cosmopolitanism (Woods, 2018; Morén-Alegret et al., 2021); gentrification and counter-urbanisation (Martin & Smith, 2018, Smith et al., 2021); well-being and happiness (Sekulova & Van den Bergh, 2016); territorial resistance and resilience (Paniagua, 2017); transnationalism (McAreavey & Krivokapic-Skoko, 2019, Zapata-Barrero & Hellgren, 2020); environmental justice and energy transition (Kallis & March, 2015); gender and migration (Soronellas et al., 2014; Annes, Wright & Larkins, 2021); employment, rural economy and public attitudes (Dax & Fischer, 2018; McAreavey & Argent, 2018).
The multi-dimensional approach of this project proposal is in line with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The SDGs set out objectives covering the social, economic, and environmental dimensions of sustainable development. These goals provide a framework for shared action for people, planet, prosperity, peace, and partnerships to be implemented by all countries and stakeholders, acting in collaboration. Accordingly, one key objective of this project is to study, over the course of two years, how the situation is evolving in scarcely populated rural municipalities in peripherical regions of Portugal and Spain, in terms of the 2030 SDGs, paying special attention to mobility and migration as key issues for their sustainable development.
While European public debate on migration and freedom of movement tends to focus on macro-scale policies and solutions, the opinions expressed in these debates may be shaped by place-situated, local experiences. It is already patently clear that small-scale initiatives are making the greatest difference across Europe as communities devise home-grown solutions for migrants’ accommodation. Examples of good practice at the local level may be studied and then transferred across Europe, and this will be especially valuable in scarcely populated rural municipalities where residents have relatively little historical precedent to draw on when formulating responses. The project has therefore the capacity to illuminate economic development opportunities arising from regulated migration for individuals, and for society more generally, and it will stand in opposition to harmful xenophobic claims. Furthermore, it will emphasise the contribution that new arrivals may make to create new economic activities, stimulate social life and face environmental challenges.
On the institutional side, the project is in line with four main strategic principles that define the R+D+I policies of the Government of the Canary Islands, the Government of Spain, the European Union and the United Nations. In this way, a considerable level of economic and social impact of its results is guaranteed.
In line with Horizon 2020 objectives, the research data will be findable, accessible, interoperable, and reusable (FAIR) to the public, after a five-year embargo. The data openly accessible consist of the transcribed interviews carried out for the research project once fully anonymized. The researcher will check thoroughly that personal details will be deleted before data are accessible to the public. The anonymised data will be available in the digital repository ACCEDA of the Universidad de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria (https://accedacris.ulpgc.es) and it could be freely used only for the purpose of a research project.
A key ELDEMOR objective is to provide local and regional stakeholders with tools to fight/prevent sociospatial unbalances, in search for well-being and environmental sustainability among people living in rural areas, a major challenge faced in peripherical regions of Portugal and Spain. The correct understanding of the factors behind inequalities is key for the planning and development of public policies to develop a sound basis for endogenous local policies and practices. Thus, the project will make the right steps to involve other researchers, social agents, and experts in the discussion of the results and conclusions, through a scientific-informative seminar and a digital platform hosted in the ULPGC library. In this way, new lines of action and eventually new projects on local development from other perspectives could be develop.
Finally, under the IP supervision, material collected in the fieldwork will be available to students on the Geography, Tourism, Sociology and Anthropology fields who might consider writing their doctorate, master, and degree thesis on this topic.
ELDEMOR adopts a gender+ intersectional approach (Hearn et al., 2016) in recognition of the power dynamics that impact mobility opportunities and futures, on one hand, and exacerbate vulnerabilities and inequalities, on the other. Indeed, not recognising intersectionality creates a blind spot in research. While the project aims to analyse multiple types of mobilities, it will also broaden the categories and indicators included in the analysis to address intersections, which produce variabilities in perceptions and experiences (Hawkey & Ussher, 2022). This is an essential approach in analytical terms as mobility background and intersections with inequalities related with gender, disability, age, ethnicity, nationality, migration status, religion, sexual orientation, and economic status enables a deeper understanding of the impacts of individual factors across different contexts. Moreover, gender or sexual orientation alone is not sufficient to understand emplacement as individuals negotiate complex identities in their everyday encounters and perceptions of their own living conditions. These differentiations will be given attention when constructing the qualitative interview sample. Beyond the analytical importance of a gender+ or LGTBQ+ intersectional approaches, the primary goal of this project is to develop policies that harness the benefits of mobility to counter brain drain and labour exploitation, build human capital and promote rural development and sustainability. These different policy areas need to contemplate diversity and intersectionality to ensure that they do not have unequal outcomes.
In practical terms, the project is especially interested in lifestyle migration, and under this perspective, it explores the interconnections of personal/family decisions, mobility/migration and labour/social incorporation in the host country. The project will consider the migration/mobility patterns of different types of families, including those of same-sex partners. This is an innovative research avenue since until recently the literature on mobility/migration has not explicitly dealt with sexual difference, implicitly assuming the typical migrant to be heterosexual (Mendoza, 2013; Mole, 2018). We also explore gender-related issues in both the workplace and home, given that many economic activities in rural areas require complex family arrangements (e.g., farming tasks). Moreover, following initiatives of the Portuguese/Spanish governments and the European Commission, the project is interested in studying issues on agricultural property shared by household´s members, as well as the role of women in farming. In this way, the project can raise awareness of different forms of inequality and discrimination and disseminate methods and resources designed to correct them.
