Monitoring geographical disparities: Regional convergence
This report examines the ‘right to stay’ across EU regions, exploring why some communities thrive while others decline. Examining the issue in six critical aspects – access to essential services, labour market opportunities, environmental quality, digital connectivity, housing availability and institutional effectiveness – the research maps the combination of factors that either encourage people to remain or drive them away.
What are the conditions that facilitate people in choosing to build their lives in one place rather than another? The new Eurofound Freedom to Stay (FTS) index maps EU regions based on six critical dimensions: access to essential services; economic conditions and job opportunities; environmental quality; digital connectivity; housing availability; and institutional quality, thereby operationalising the concept of ‘freedom to stay’ (or ‘right to stay’) proposed in the Letta report Much more than a market. Furthermore, via a set of 10 case studies, the research explores the solutions that can be adopted in education and healthcare to improve access to services in scarcely populated regions or regions experiencing depopulation.
