Urban governance in latvia: Feeling urban and thinking rural

Abstract

Urbanisation is affecting not only countries with high number of residents but also with small number. The aim of the research is to explore urbanisation and shrinking city tendencies in a country with small number of residents in the context of globalization and urbanisation. The “donut effect” will be explored in the capital city Riga and ten municipalities nearby. The main research question is to what extent can the classical understanding and perception of urbanisation be applied to small societies and countries, and what kind of effects does the urbanisation create in such dynamically developing countries. There are several interdependent problems, such as the new patterns of urban–rural relations, as well as city discourse in a small country. The suburbanized ring municipalities included in the research are not only an extension of Riga’s economic geography, but also play an important role to ensure qualitative microclimate around the capital city. Due to these reasons, it is significant to coordinate growth strategies of municipalities around Riga. However, coordination of growth strategies is still lesson to be learned.