Cross-border soft spaces of the Upper Rhine

Frontiers in the Schengen space have become increasingly permeable, not least those between France and Germany. But to make the most of the new possibilities, people, firms and administrations have had to cope with different linguistic, socio-economic, cultural and institutional settings. Soft spaces can be seen as one way of helping facilitate the integration of cross-border areas and, since the 1990s, the European Union has stepped up its support for cross-border cooperation. In this context, our research investigated some “EU spaces”, where access to EU Structural Funds has helped influence the emergence of soft spaces.