Changing Ruralities: Between Abandonment and Redefinition in the Catalan Pyrenees

In this article we discuss the process by which the upper areas of the Alt Urgell, in Northern Spain, are redefining themselves in order to survive in the new postindustrial order. These communities, during the twentieth century, witnessed a steady demographic and economic collapse that resulted in a progressive decline of agricultural activities and the abandonment of mid-mountain villages. In the sixties, the area deepened its milk production specialisation that offered, for a while, a path towards economic sustainability via connections to national networks of consumption. This solution was severed by the entry of Spain into the European Union. The new European regulations obliterated the industrial production of milk and disconnected the area, once again, from national markets. The early nineties saw these valleys fully engage in a postindustrial economy based on leisure and heritage. This case study allows us to examine how macroeconomic changes that affect rural communities in the Western world rede...