sustainability Article Socio-Spatial Aspects of Shrinking Municipalities: A Case Study of the Post-Communist Region of North-East Poland Katarzyna Kocur-Bera * and Karol Szuniewicz Department of Geoinformation and Cartography, Faculty of Geoengineering, University of Warmia and Mazury in Olsztyn, 10-719 Olsztyn, Poland; [email protected] * Correspondence: [email protected]; Tel.: +48-895-234-583 Abstract: Urban shrinkage has become a common feature for a growing number of European cities and urban regions. Cities in Europe have lost populations during the previous few decades, many of them in the post-communist countries. A similar phenomenon has been observed in smaller units: municipalities and villages. Shrinking towns/municipalities/villages grapple with insufficiently used housing infrastructure, a decrease in labor force, investment and in the number of jobs. This analysis examines the socio-spatial factors present in municipalities in the north-east of Poland, which are expected to experience the greatest population decrease by 2030. The study focused mainly on determinants with the greatest impact on the good life standards. It also sought to answer why the population growth forecasts for these units are so unpromising. The findings have shown that the majority of determinants adopted in the conceptual model describing the good life standards are below the reference values. The applied taxonomic measure of good life standards (TMGL) method allowed for identifying five municipality clusters representing “different speeds” at which these forecasts are fulfilled. Two clusters have dominant determinants in five criteria and three clusters, in two criteria adopted in the conceptual model. The findings indicate that approx. 35% of the Citation: Kocur-Bera, K.; Szuniewicz, municipalities under analysis have a chance for stabilization of the population size, provided local K. Socio-Spatial Aspects of Shrinking stakeholders take some targeted actions. Municipalities: A Case Study of the Post-Communist Region of Keywords: urban shrinkage; shrinking municipality; conceptual model of the standard of good North-East Poland. Sustainability living; reference model 2021, 13, 2929. https://doi.org/ 10.3390/su13052929 Academic Editor: Karina Pallagst 1. Introduction Received: 27 January 2021 Reducing poverty and inequalities and achieving economic welfare are all global Accepted: 4 March 2021 challenges in line with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals 1, 8 and 10 [1,2]. Published: 8 March 2021 It is very difficult to achieve those goals in spatial entities inhabited by local communities and it requires both the residents and the decision-makers to be involved in the process. Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral Failure to take the relevant actions results primarily in a considerable decrease in population with regard to jurisdictional claims in size at some locations despite the global forecasts indicating a steady population increase published maps and institutional affil- until the year 2100 [3–6]. Globally, the largest population increase is forecast for Asia and iations. Africa. However, the increase is inversely proportional to the level of development of a specific continent, country or region. Depopulation results in urban shrinkage [7,8], a phenomenon noticeable on the micro-scale, even leading to the disappearance of some villages [9]. The definitions of shrinkage have seen a shift in the literature since the latter Copyright: © 2021 by the authors. half of the 20th century [10]. It applied mainly to critical demographic issues, such as Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. a low fertility rate and an increase in the elderly population [11,12]. Only recently has This article is an open access article the discourse focused on “the challenges” before urban shrinkage in terms of policy [13] distributed under the terms and and planning [14–16]. According to the definition, urban shrinkage/shrinking cities is an conditions of the Creative Commons empirical phenomenon resulting from the specific interplay of different macro-processes Attribution (CC BY) license (https:// at the local scale [7,17–19]. A population decrease there is larger than would result from creativecommons.org/licenses/by/ the trends observed in the country/region/town. Other theoretical explanations of urban 4.0/). Sustainability 2021, 13, 2929. https://doi.org/10.3390/su13052929 https://www.mdpi.com/journal/sustainability Sustainability 2021, 13, 2929 2 of 20 shrinkage have also been offered. Possible causes include depreciation of the national infrastructure (i.e., motorways) and suburbanization [20]. Pallagst [21] also suggests that the shrinkage is a response to deindustrialization since jobs are transferred from the centers to cheaper suburban areas. Other factors include (a) current urban development model—urbanization is a cyclical process and the town downfall will ultimately result in an increased growth rate [22]; (b) urban monostructures focused on one branch of economic growth are susceptible to rapid slumps [22]; (c) state-owned companies in the post-communist countries of Eastern Europe did not survive privatization, which resulted in shutting down factories and mass unemployment [22]; (d) Intelligent downfall, “planning less means fewer people, fewer buildings, less land development”: urban development is oriented towards improving the life quality of the current residents without taking into account their needs, thereby pushing more people out of the town center [20]. The term urban shrinkage/shrinking cities is therefore used to stress that fact that it is a multidimensional process with multidimensional consequences; it has an economic, de- mographic, geographic, social and physical dimension [19], which is evolving as a result of global and local reality. Much research has been conducted on metropolises/cities [23–26]. The phenomenon is also noticeable in smaller units, such as municipalities, small towns and villages [9]. According to historical sources, the process of their shrinkage has been observed since antiquity. The most common factors which make its intensity increase include emigration, economic crises, a deteriorating socio-economic status of the society [9], environment pollution, a peripheral location and economic marginalization, as well as epidemics [27,28]. Depopulation is an unfavorable phenomenon. It affects the aging of the society, leads to an unfavorable economic structure, depreciation of real estate, landless cultivation or abandonment of agricultural areas, in addition to a lack of inheritance of the cultural landscape. Such locations are also becoming unattractive for entrepreneurs due to the un- favorable age structure of the population. As a consequence, this leads to the deepening of infrastructure collapse and further depopulation [29–32]. This paper attempts to determine the main causes of shrinking municipalities (SM) in Poland. Poland has been a member of the European Union for 16 years and membership has had a substantial impact on its social, economic and infrastructural development. The question is: why are population-related forecasts so adverse at some locations despite the large financial investments in the region development? The study authors put forward two research questions: what is the level of socio-spatial determinants in the municipalities threatened with SM relative to the reference ones? Can the SMs under analysis be grouped in terms of how close they are to achieving the good life standards? This paper is organized in the following manner: The introduction is followed by a presentation of the Polish perspective of rural and urban-and-rural municipality shrinkage, a description of information sources together with the study object, primary data used in the study and its methodology. These parts are followed by a presentation of the research results and discussion. The paper also includes graphics to support the phenomenon analysis. The final part presents the conclusions from the study findings. Shrinking Municipality—Polish Perspective It has been noted that the population decrease in some locations in Poland is much higher than the average. The population is projected to decrease in 1665 out of 2478 munic- ipalities in Poland by 2030, with the decrease exceeding 5% in 1007 municipalities and 10% in 322 [33]. The majority of the municipalities with the largest forecast population decrease are situated in the east of Poland (the so-called “eastern wall”). These municipalities are situated mainly in the Podlaskie Voivodship (44% of the municipalities in the voivodship), Warmi´nsko-MazurskieVoivodship, in the southern part of the Lubelskie Voivodship, close to the Russian border, in the eastern part of West Pomerania and in the mountainous area in the south-east of Poland (see Figure1). According to forecasts, a good demographic situation is enjoyed by municipalities situated in the following Voivodships: Małopolskie, Sustainability 2021, 13, 2929 3 of 21 Sustainability 2021, 13, 2929 3 of 20 demographic situation is enjoyed by municipalities situated in the following Voivodships: Małopolskie, Pomorskie, Wielkopolskie and the central part of Mazowieckie. The regions Pomorskie,(municipalities) Wielkopolskie with the andlargest the forecast central part popu oflation Mazowieckie. increase Theare situated regions (municipalities) in the immedi- withate neighborhood the largest forecast of the populationlargest urban increase centers. are The situated increase inthe results immediate