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Purpose – This chapter focuses on ways urban – and other non-local – pressures have influenced a rural archipelago area by studying changes in fisheries-related livelihoods, use of natural resources and regulatory regimes.

Design/methodology/approach – The material for this chapter comprises mainly of structured and semi-structured interviews with fishers and other stakeholders in the Archipelago Sea and in the Åland Islands, SW Finland. A governance approach is used, taking into account the interactive social, economic and ecological systems embedded in institutions, social networks and cultures.

Findings – The economic importance of traditional fishing livelihood has diminished, but fishing still holds a strong position in the culture and life mode of the local people in the studied archipelago areas. In families selling fish, this income stands typically for a part of the household income and especially wage work has become an important income source in the pluriactivity. Providing services for the tourists and summer cottage dwellers is a potentially growing source of livelihood. The increased recreational use of the Finnish Archipelago Sea has changed the ownership structure of the land area, mostly due to the popular summer cottage dwelling. New public fishing rights for (often urban) recreational fishers have narrowed the scope of the local decision-making and aroused resistance among the local archipelago people.

Originality/value – Rural–urban relations and governance aspects have been rarely studied in relation to the use of natural resources. This chapter gives new insights into the multifaceted roles of new urban influences in rural settings.

Purpose – To discuss the rural–urban dichotomy and its far-reaching implications, first and foremost from a rural sociological point of view, and at the same time, to structure the volume and present the individual chapters.

Methodology/approach – Literature review and analysis of scientific discourse.

Findings – The rural–urban dichotomy has been very persistent in demographic and other kinds of rural and urban research despite intense discussions about its shortcomings in nearly half a century. However, there are mounting arguments for alternative conceptions of rural–urban relations, some of which are found in the chapters in this volume.

Originality/value of chapter – This chapter presents some new ideas about the rural–urban dichotomy, and alternative, more realistic conceptions of rural–urban relations, at the same time as it gives an introduction to the volume.

Purpose – The purpose is to analyse the initial stages of co-operation between a Finnish community intranet-developing project and a ‘telecottage’ enterprise in a South-eastern Hungarian village community.

Findings – Both the Hungarian telecottage and the Finnish North Karelian intranet initiatives have achieved much publicity in and outside their countries; their success stories and experiences have also spread with the agency of researchers, by their academic publications and the lines of their personal and professional, often international networks. The case in focus is also evidence for more such informal ideas/innovation–transfer processes, supported by information and communication technologies (ICTs).

Methodology – The author, a Hungarian researcher working in Finland, has been an increasingly involved participant and observer of the evolving joint project, hence is the more subjective voice, and the action research-approach is employed.

Originality/value of chapter – This chapter presents an example of action research in the fast-developing ICT arena which clearly complements other research approaches in the field.

Purpose – The rural–urban fringe is a highly differentiated zone. This chapter takes a closer look at the different types of rural municipalities in the vicinity of metropolitan areas in the northern part of Germany.

Methodology – The examination of the most important dimensions of rural development was done by means of a factor analysis. A cluster analysis was conducted in order to identify certain categories of municipal development paths and to ascertain possible causes for their spatial distribution (e.g., central-peripheral or regional).

Findings – Five different types of development paths were identified: urban, residential, growing, agricultural and stagnant municipalities. The spatial distribution of these clusters suggests that the development of exurban areas is more fragmented than general explanations may suggest. Development paths which resemble a “rural gentrification” may first of all be found in “urban municipalities” and “residential municipalities”. Anyway, often in immediate vicinity to these municipalities we either find municipalities which are characterized by a rapid growth of the population or still show clear traces of a local dominance of agriculture. Local development paths are shaped by a multitude of factors reaching from macro-economic impulses to the implications of regional planning and further down to the local socio-political dynamics in the municipality itself.

Originality/value of chapter – The chapter analyses data on periurban development in Germany and contribute in this way to the scientific discourse on periurbanity in Western Europe.