Spatial Differentiation of Slovenia According to the Migration Mobility of the Population

Abstract

The present study of the spatial mobility of the population represents
the first concluded part of a broadly conceived research into the demogeographic development in Slovenia since the World War II. It helps us to throw
light on the development of the old classic agrarian structure as well as on
the development and progression of the new industrial regional structure. In
his permanent tendency to improve his social status and the conditions of
living man in the modern industrial society in Slovenia j ust as anywhere
else frequently migrates or changes the plače of his residence and employment The spatial or horizontal mobility of the population, which is frequently bound up with the so-called social or vertical mobility, is a very
good indicator of the regional demogeographical differentiation and hence
also the fundamental element in the programming of the prospective regional
development of an industrial country. Since after the World War II Slovenia witnesses a rapid advance of
industrialization accompanied by industrial technology, it is also the value of
the space for living and the space for the distribution of economic and noneconomic activities that has been rapidly changing. The population is increasingly migrating and concentrating in areas which offer better conditions for living, work, and recreation. Corning into existence are areas of
emigration as well as of immigration. The areas of emigration continue
to be agrarian, underdeveloped regions with ali the characteristic features
of old agrarian oountryside. The areas of immigration which are at the same
tirne the areas of the concentration of population are graduallv becoming
urbanized and spatially more or less differentiated into residential areas
and employment areas.
The spatial mobility of the population and the changes in the settlement
(so characteristic of Slovenia during the last two decades) are closely related
to the intensive changing in the social strata according to occupation, i. e.
to the changes of the occupation of members of farming households from
farming to non-farming occupations, and to the changing of the occupation
of non-agrarian active population from one economic branch into another
economic or into a non-economic branch of activity of urban character, and
to the increased employment or women. This social mobility is indicative
of the wishes and possibilities of the population to improve the social status.
Since such an improvement is generally not to be reached through employment in the plače of one's home, there are many forms of migration: from
migration from one plače to another to temporary migration abroad to do
season work, or do daily migration from the plače of residence to the plače
of employment and back. Each of these forms of migration exercises its own
influence on the shaping of the regional demogeographical and of the economic structure as well as on the external apperance of the countryside.
The results of the investigations into the mobility of the population
serve also as an indicators in the delimitation between agrarian underdeveloped areas and areas of accelerated economic development and urbanization related to it.