Teaching staff:
Labrianidis Lois
Professor, University of Macedonia

Theories of regional development: Regional Policy.  The meaning of local development. What is regional development, indicators used to quantify it.  Explanations of the uneven regional development: theories of development and underdevelopment.
The spatial aspects of production:  What are the mechanisms that determine the location of production activities. Main theoretical approaches.
Transport and Communications:  Distance as a cost. Decrease in the flow of people, trade and information with distance. Development of the transport and communication networks. Annihilation of space.
The concept of rural areas: Changes in the concept of rurality through time. Theoretical approaches to rurality. Empirical definitions of rurality. Urban – rural relations and its development through time. Policies for the development of rural areas.
Population: population structure. How people are spread in space. Population changes, the role of migration.
Organisation of the settlements’ network:  Functions of settlements and their relations. Settlement hierarchy on what basis?.