Assessing disproportionate territorial development: insights from 10 countries

Abstract

Territorial development disparities are an undeniable reality for all the countries of the world, which implies that no country can practically avoid them. However, how different countries respond to these disparities is another matter. The effectiveness of policies in overcoming territorial development disparities depends significantly on how deeply these disparities are recognized and studied. In this context, assessing disparities in territorial development is necessary, and the article proposes a methodology for its implementation. The methodology examines territorial development indexes and their relative standard deviation. In the article, the developed methodology was also applied to 10 countries, as a result of which the levels of territorial development disparities in Canada, Poland, Bulgaria, Hungary, Finland, Serbia, Georgia, Moldova, Kazakhstan, and China were evaluated. Based on the assessments, general conclusions are also presented for each country in the article.