María del Carmen Dircio-Palacios-Macedo, Paula Cruz-García (p), Fausto Hernández-Trillo, Emili Tortosa-Ausina

Miriam Marcen

Access to financial services is unequal around the world. In many countries, less than half of the population has an account at a financial institution, and this lack of access to finance is often the critical mechanism for generating income inequality and uneven growth. This is the case of Mexico, where financial exclusion affects large shares of the population—mainly in rural and poorer localities. This is an ongoing concern for policymakers, given the way it thwarts socioeconomic opportunities to families and businesses alike, hampering economic growth and development. However, assessing the relevance of the issue requires a careful measurement of financial inclusion which, up to now, has been achieved to a limited extent. We contribute to the literature and in this context by proposing a multivariate index of financial inclusion for Mexico, at the municipal level for the period 2013-2021. This index covers different dimensions, including Access, and Usage. The results corroborate that the proportion of unbanked population are still large, although it is unevenly distributed in space.

Miriam Marcen (p), Marina Morales

Elżbieta Zysk

This work examines the effect of next-generation broadband on marriage rates among opposite- and same-sex couples in Spain. Given that the decision to sustain a relationship and enter into marriage is influenced by a broad spectrum of opportunities, high-speed broadband access can play a pivotal role in reducing search frictions, enhancing communication, and influencing cultural norms, thereby exerting a positive impact on marriage rates for both homosexual and heterosexual individuals. However, it is not clear whether the magnitude of the impact is the same for both groups. To explore this issue, we exploit plausible exogenous geographic and temporal variations in next-generation broadband coverage. We merge microdata on all Spanish marriages from 2013 to 2022 with the annual proportion of households with access to next-generation broadband via Fiber-to-the-Home (FTTH) at the municipal level. Our findings indicate that an increase in local FTTH coverage is associated with a higher crude marriage rate, controlling for municipality and time fixed effects. The response of same-sex marriages is twice as large as that of heterosexual marriages, relative to their respective average marriage rates. Empirical evidence does not support improved positive assortative mating as an explanation for the differing response observed among same-sex couples. High-speed internet access reinforces positive assortative mating by education and occupation for opposite-sex couples. Supplementary analysis, using data on public funding, shows that government support for expanding FTTH through the Next Generation Broadband Expansion Programme translates into an increase in the crude marriage rate, highlighting the appeal of areas with high-speed internet in addressing depopulation.

Elżbieta Zysk (p)

Paul Kalfadellis

Urban development and population growth present new challenges for the development of urban public spaces (UPS) in cities. Efficient (UPS) management and the creation of welcoming public spaces is an important determinant for creating egalitarian and inclusive cities. Considering the diversity of needs and expectations of (women) as residents and users of urban public spaces is a key task facing modern city managers. Women's public participation is important because identifying their needs and taking them into account in urban spatial policy contributes to the creation of safe, egalitarian and inclusive cities, tailored to the needs and expectations of residents and users, according to the ‘everyone is important’ principle. The aim of this article is to identify women's needs and expectations of urban public spaces in selected European countries. Various research techniques and methods were used to achieve the objective. The added value of the research carried out is to fill a research gap in urban planning in cities to focused sensitive groups such as women.

Paul Kalfadellis (p)

Paula Cruz-García

Greece’s population is predicted to fall to 6.4 million people by the end of this century (PopulationPyramid.net). The implications for Greece are existential. Fewer people mean less economic activity, less working age people to support an aging population, a shrinking job market forcing an exodus among those who can leave, thus creating a vicious cycle effect of continual population decline. How is this decline to be arrested?

This paper based on research and analysis of documentary texts argues, the solution rests with immigration and the permanent settlement into Greece of the ‘other’. This will require a major rethink on the part of Greek society not only in its attitude to immigration, but ultimately who can belong as a Greek citizen. This will not be easy for Greeks, where the dominant national narrative post-national resurrection in 1821, has been that Greece is the home of the Hellenes (Beaton 2019), a nation strongly defined in ethno-cultural terms, underpinned by the idea of a common ancestry, culture and language (Veremis, 1990; Kitromilides, 1990). Greece has been unified by a national consciousness, that over the last 200 years has been instilled by the state through policies and education that have espoused religion (Greek Orthodoxy), the family and the state (Triandafyllidou & Kokkali, 2010).

For immigration to be an inclusive process of settlement and belonging, it will require the abandonment of ‘jus sanguinis’ on the part of the Greek State, as the main basis of conferring citizenship rights (Voutira 2012) in favour of ‘jus solis’ and ‘jus domicile’. Such citizenship rights over time, will result in an ethnically diverse country, no longer just a nation born of Hellenes but inclusive of those who became Hellene. The implementation of such a public policy shift will require government “to bring the Greek people along” with the need for such change. This will not be easy, due to the resistance it is likely to face by many Greeks, including nationalist politicians looking to exploit the xenophobic sentiment of the Greek population (Koutouza 2019).

However, as Albanian migration to Greece has highlighted, becoming Greek rather than being born Greek is definitely possible. As the largest identifiable ethnic group in Greece (Kotzamanis 2022), Albanians have integrated well into Greek society (Kokkali, 2011), an integration that challenges and brings into question the historical Greek narrative around identity, belonging and Greece as the nation born of Hellenes (Triandafyllidou & Kokkali 2021).