Identifying Clusters of Regions in the European South, Based on Their Economic, Social and Environmental Characteristics

Regional development has been the focal point of both academics and decision makers in the central and local governments of many European countries. Identifying the key problems that regions face and considering how their solutions could be effectively used as a basis for planning their development process, are essential in order to improve their conditions. The growth of a region depends on its ability to attract and retain both business units and the right blend of people to run them. In this context, we introduced a variable which is referred to as the image of a region and quantifies its attractiveness. A regions image depends on a variety of factors, economic, social and environmental, some of which are common for all potential movers and some specific for particular groups, and expresses its current state of development and its future prospects. The paper examines a number of south European countries and focuses on their NUTS 2 level regions. Its objective is to estimate the image values of those regions and to group them into different clusters on the basis of the characteristics used to define their image. The results are presented and discussed.