Elena Barasheva, Leng Hong, Song Shiyi

Keywords： Northern Cities; Russian Polar Cities; Shrinking Cities; Economic Index; Social Index; Population Loss; Anti-shrinkage

Abstract：

Shrinking cities is a phenomenon on international scale that has affected developed and developing countries. According to previous researches, more than half of Russian cities have experienced shrinkages to differents extents. The situation is even more serious with Russian cities in harsh climatic conditions. The purpose of this study is to analyse the shrinkage process of Northern Russian cities by determining the dynamics of socio-economic development of the case study cities, and outline policy responses to the current shrinking situation. The authors select three cities for analysis that have been experiencing population decline over the past 30 years: Norilsk, Dudinka, and Igarka. Firstly, this study reviews the research of shrinking cities in Russia; secondly, it calculates indicators of the social and economic situation in cities. The authors use two integral indicators: the economic index, which reflects the per capita industrial output and the social index, which reflects the level of social well-being. Finally, the work discovers the growth of disproportions in the socio-economic development between Northern cities of the region. The main findings are: the direct connection between economic well-being in the city and the living standards of the population was proven; the summary of case study cities’responses to urban shrinkage revealed an underdevelopment of government’s anti-shrinkage support.

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