REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT

Modern regional development has its intellectual roots in efforts during the 1950s and 1960s to build a new approach to geography, one that is analytically rigorous and addresses theoretical abstraction and real world problems, as well as their interrelation. This research concentration shares substantial overlaps with the fields and practices of economic development, urban planning, and regional science. Scholars in regional development at the University of Arizona tend to concentrate in population geography, economic geography, and urban geography. Methodologically, regional development has often been aligned with the tools of spatial analysis – spatial statistics, mathematical modeling, optimization, simulation, and GIS – but as the subfield has become more diverse theoretically and substantively, so too has its range of techniques. The University of Arizona’s regional development faculty work closely with those identifying with critical human geography and human-environmental geography, and vice-versa.

Current research areas in regional development at the University of Arizona include:

• National and trans-national migration
• Quality of life
• Urban governance
• Regional growth and decline