Recent trends in urbanisation and rural repopulation in northern Ireland

Abstract

For some considerable time the principal demographic trend identified within Northern Ireland has related almost exclusively to the deconcentration of population out of Belfast into neighbouring districts. Unfortunately, little direct attention has been devoted to changes occurring further down the settlement hierarchy and indeed within essentially rural environments. Thus, despite, considerable investigation into the emerging rural trends in other parts of the United Kingdom and Ireland, little is known of the changing patterns within Northern Ireland in recent years. This paper intends to review such changes. Importantly, while rural repopulation, rural rejuvenation or counterurbanisation trends elsewhere have been associated with urban or metropolitan population decline and, accordingly, a weakening of the urbanisation process, evidence from Northern Ireland suggests that both processes can occur simultaneously.