Acting Peripheries: An Introduction.

Abstract

The term periphery is often linked to dominant images of rural areas, mainly portrayed as backward, unattractive and shrinking regions, or as idyllic tourist destinations. These labels are also assigned to actors in these regions and add a discursive element to economic, demographic and political peripheralization. The underlying discourses on such regions and their ‘passive’ residents are often seen as the outcome of uneven power relations and access to resources. However, actors in peripheral regions cannot be seen as passive victims of processes beyond their control, as they have capacities to act bearing potentials for strategic development that are often overlooked in political decision making.

Biographical Note

Thilo Lang (SFB 1199 & Leibniz- Institut für Länderkunde)

Having studied spatial and environmental planning in Kaiserslauten and urban planning in Hamburg, Thilo Lang gained his PhD in Potsdam and Durham. As the head of a department at the Leibniz Institute for Regional Geography, his research interests focus on the production of space and transnational urban and regional development in the context of current processes of socio-spatial polarization and rising disparities across Europe. Further long-term research interests include urban and regional change, shrinking cities and regeneration, as well as peripheralization as a multilevel process. One current focus is on innovation outside of conurbations and alternative local and social economies.

Franziska Görmar (Leibniz-Insitut für Länderkunde)

Franziska Görmar is a researcher at the IfL since 2013. She studied French, Spanish and cultural Sciences at Leipzig University, as well as Czech. She is part of the research area that is focusing on multiple geographies of regional and local development and regional European Geographies.