TEPSA is happy to present the student paper “Addressing the urban-rural divide in the European Union. Fostering solidarity by helping rural areas to catch up” by David Piesk, a Master’s student at Institut Barcelona d’Estudis Internacionals.
David Piesk argues that “the increasing gap between cities and the countryside represents one of the biggest current challenges for Europe in the context of social cohesion”. He, therefore, argues that “If the EU wants to stay a community where its own proclaimed values of freedom, equality and human dignity matter, it is crucial that policymakers on European and national level as well as civil society translate these values into policies allowing rural areas to catch up and to be part of an EU integration project that puts solidarity – socially and economically – at the core of its agenda”.
