Typology of rural settlements in the West Herzegovina Canton

Abstract

The paper presents the typology of rural settlements in the West Herzegovina Canton. Since the middle of the 20th century, the rural areas of the Canton have been facing numerous negative economic and demographic processes. Given that, according to the OECD criteria, they make up over 90% of the county's area, they therefore deserve more attention. Based on the analysis of existing typologies, a new typology was created for the purposes of this paper, which is based on a disaggregated model, and six types of rural settlements were defined based on the analysis of natural geographic and socioeconomic factors.