A New Framework for Definitions and Measures of Territorial Identity

Part B of the book explores the relationship between local endowment of cultural heritage, territorial identity and economic development. This chapter provides an overview of the notion of identity and territorial identity as conceptualized by both public institutions and the academic literature. With the objective of defining, delineating and eventually measuring territorial identity an original taxonomy is conceived and proposed in this chapter. More specifically, territorial identity has been interpreted as the perception of sameness felt and experienced by the inhabitants of a specific territory. In other words, all the people living in a same territory share a similarity condition that constitutes the basic requirement for territorial identity. This sameness condition can be then expressed according to two main dimensions: a behavioral and a geographical dimension. The perception of being similar to a certain group can be associated with a feeling of solidarity which is present whenever a certain correspondence between private and common interests is recognized by the participating individuals. Furthermore, the fundamental feeling of sameness can be felt and experienced toward different geographical levels (e.g., the neighborhood, the city, the region, the nation, the European Union) either exclusively or simultaneously. A classification has therefore been conceived as a consequence of different combinations of these aspects. Four typologies of territorial identities have been identified: individualistic localism (exclusively local territorial identity with scarce solidarity); parochial localism (exclusively local territorial identity with solidarity behaviors); place-less cosmopolitanism (simultaneously local and supra-local with scarce solidarity); and inclusive cosmopolitanism (simultaneously local and supra-local with solidarity behaviors). Eurobarometer data have been therefore used to measure the four modes of expression of territorial identity and each European region has been associated with one of them.