Regional opportunity structures: A research agenda to link spatial and social inequalities in rural areas

Abstract

This paper introduces and discusses regional opportunity structures as a concept for analysing the interlinkages between structural conditions in space, social inequalities, and people’s agency, with a focus on non-metropolitan areas. The concept adds value in the following ways: (1) it emphasises the regional scale as an important spatial context of access to opportunities; (2) it accounts for the complexity of the regional context, which provides a plethora of opportunities; (3) it recognises the interdependencies of regional effects and other drivers of inequality; and (4) it takes the regional level seriously as a background of the agency of a region's inhabitants.

Disadvantaged and Disadvantaging Regions: Opportunity Structures and Social Disadvantage in Rural Peripheries

“…Using cross‐nationally comparable quantitative data comes at the cost of failing to capture less easily quantifiable dimensions of opportunity structures, such as opportunities for civic participation (Bernard et al . 2023), and more subjective forms of social disadvantage. Existing qualitative studies of living conditions in peripheries capture more sensitively how their residents perceive and evaluate their situation and how the social position of individuals intersects available opportunities (Bernard 2019; Knabe et al .…”

“…We use the concept of regional opportunity structures (Bernard et al . 2023) to refer to the potential constraints imposed by structural regional disadvantage, and the concept of social disadvantage (Midgley et al . 2003).…”

“…Bernard et al . (2023) distinguish four types of regional opportunity structures: economic opportunities accessible predominantly through regional labour markets, public and private services, opportunities for community and civic engagement and opportunities arising from the natural and built environment. Previous research on spatial opportunity structures has mainly focused on the scale of urban neighbourhoods, even if some scholars have emphasised the salience of multi‐level spatial contexts in people's lives (Petrović et al .…”

“…Emphasising regional disadvantage as an essential outcome of peripheralisation has opened up new research questions that expand the traditional focus of regional economics. It explicitly emphasises the perspective of residents' lives by asking how peripherality contributes to the (re)production of social inequalities, what forms of disadvantage inhabitants of peripheries are exposed to, and how they respond to their conditions (Bernard et al 2023; Bürk 2013; Bernard and Šafr 2019). The importance of studying peripherality in this way has been amplified in recent years by the experience of the pandemic because, as Biglieri et al (2021) put it: the virus was concentrated particularly in the peripheral, in spatial and social terms.…”

“…We base our understanding of rural peripherality on the concept of ‘regional opportunity structures’ (Bernard et al . 2023) to capture the structural drawbacks of peripheral regions to which the inhabitants are exposed, and the concept of social disadvantage to describe the increased concentrations of poverty and reduced well‐being. We explicitly take into account that both opportunity structures and social disadvantage are multidimensional concepts.…”