Centre Versus Periphery. Territorial Imbalance from Perspectives of the Multiple Capital Dimensions

The concentration of populations, functions, services, infrastructures, technologies, and knowledge in coastal or urbanised areas to the detriment of rural and/or inner areas has led to a strong polarisation of values towards the former and depletion in the latter, generating strong asymmetries. The need to identify a new development process capable of interconnecting abandoned and marginalised areas with dense, attractive, and congested ones responds to the need for a rebalancing necessary to improve the overall functioning of the territorial system. This study proposes from the perspective of an axiological approach to the territory, an analysis model aimed at highlighting the relationships and oppositions between urban areas (Centre) and peripheries (Inner areas). The proposed methodological approach was based on the estimation of aggregate indices of the territorial capital forms. The estimation of the aggregate indices provides a measure of the asymmetries in terms of the value of the territorial capital forms and offers a knowledge base on which to improve or develop policies and actions aimed at rebalancing the territory. The estimation of the indices and their mapping has showed forms of polarisation between “Central” and “Inner areas” in the Sicilian territory.