Introduction to the special issue

The article is the introduction to an Urban Research and Practice special issue conceived with the aim of exploring some of the different ways EU regional policy may have influenced the development process of four Southern European cities, Porto (PT), Malaga (ES), Palermo (IT), and Thessaloniki (GR). The selection of case studies relates to cities at the ‘margins of Europe’ in both the sense of places outside the geographical core of the continent and located in those regions – the ‘less developed regions’ – where EU Cohesion policy has been manifested in significant investment over an extended period of time. For that reason, the special issue also seeks to provide an urban perspective to regional marginality, often neglected in the debate around the urban dimension within EU Cohesion Policy.