ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. This book empirically analyses the implications of the financial crisis for evolution of regional income and employment disparities in European countries. It focuses on European Union (EU) enlargement towards the east and raises new questions concerning the ties between integration and convergence, given the very special features of the countries involved in the last two enlargements. The chapter also reviews the main methodologies that assess the evolution of income disparities or income convergence. Starting from regression analyses it focuses on approaches explicitly taking into account the role of spatial factors and on non-parametric methodologies. The last part of the chapter discusses a series of stylized facts on the evolution of regional income disparities in Europe and the simultaneous reduction in some disparities and the emergence of new ones cannot be fully understood within the framework of the old and new growth theories.
