MOBILITY IN MARGINAL AREAS: A REGIONAL STUDY OF THE PORTUGUESE BORDER

Fátima Velez de Castro, University of Coimbra, Portugal

The migratory reality in Portugal suggests a spatial distribution pattern of the immigrants that covers basically Lisbon Metropolitan area as well as other urban coastal areas, namely between Braga and Setubal and the Algarve. The diversity of activities of the work market, the access to a varied type of commodities and services and the existence of foreign communities with some dimension are points that seem to attract and promote fixation of these foreigners along the coastal areas. A new scenario, however, has been gaining ground, assuring the depressed and unpopulated interior as a destination point for immigrants, who occupy a territory that was and still is repulsive from an economic and social point of view for younger autochthon generations. In face of this new situation, a clarification of the conditions is necessary, in order to understand who are these immigrants, where did they come from, what do they do and which are their plans for the future, i.e., if they themselves can be agents of regional development in marginal areas, specially in border areas. For that to be done, a field study conducted in a Portuguese border region (Arronches, Elvas, Campo Maior) is presented, where the incidence of immigrants has struck the territory. This work is being conducted in the scope of the doctoral in Geography which I am developing in the Faculty of Letters of the University of Coimbra. The presented results are a consequence of the participation in the project “Iberian Cultures, Border Societies: Territories, Societies and Cultures in Times of Change”, supported by the Iberian Studies Centre of the Guarda City Hall (Portugal).