Dumitru Sandu

Local Demographic Attractiveness in the COVID-19 Pandemic, in an Emigration Society

Dumitru Sandu

Article Information

Pages: 87-106

DOI: https://doi.org/10.24193/RJPS.2023.2.05

Dumitru Sandu

Affiliation(s): University of Bucharest, 9 Schitu Magureanu, 10181, Bucharest, Romania, dumitru.sandu@unibuc.ro

Abstract. The attractiveness of a place is expected to be significantly affected by time and the surrounding space. In general, variations in the attractiveness of places are influenced by conditions of time and space. In the series of time conditions, we take into account those related to the infection through COVID-19 and, in the series of spatial circumstances, those associated with an emigration society from the European Union and its regions. The article’s objective is to see how the local demographic attractiveness of basic administrative units in such an emigration society be can measured, in conditions of pandemic and data scarcity that estimate the intensity and determinations of different types of internal and external migration. Contextualizations at the national level are made with EUROSTAT data on intra-European territorial mobility and regional-internal ones, using official statistical data from Romania. The local demographic attractiveness (DA) in pandemic conditions is estimated as the ratio between the population with habitual residence and the one with permanent residence in the basic administrative unit, in 2021. The testing of the validity of this measurement model is carried out through multiple regression models that have as dependent variables the local demographic attractiveness, specific immigration rates and the local infection rate of COVID-19 in 2021. The analysis confirms the validity of the measure proposed by DA. Developed rural localities, near large cities, with low shares of emigrants abroad, have been the main pole of DA in Romania, under pandemic conditions. The article proposes, for the first time, a simple measure to estimate the DA, suitable for a European emigration society. This can be useful to researchers in the field as well as to decision-makers for spatially oriented public policies.

Keywords: local human development, demographic attractiveness, migration, regional studies

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