Neighbourhood effects and determinants of population changes in Italy: a spatial perspective

Population trends in Italy are strongly spatially differentiated, with some municipalities showing a systematic loss of population and others an equally continuous demographic increase. Here, we focus our attention on the spatial dimension of population change, addressing how different socio-economic and demographic dimensions affect population changes, as well as their spatial effect. After a preliminary descriptive analysis of the trends of population growth and decline in Italy over the last forty years and the relevant demographic components, we used a spatial Durbin model (SDM) to investigate the existence of a diffusion process and the determinants of the average annual growth rate between 2011 and 2019 at the municipal level. The spatial dimension and local heterogeneities in Italy appear to have extreme relevance in the analysis of population decline, and exploit the relationship of demographic, social and economic factors with the demographic growth/decline of the municipality in the subsequent ten years. Among the different covariates included in the model, the demographic composition of the population, the female activity rate, the youth employment rate, and the presence/absence of a school proved to be strongly related to population growth and decline of the Italian municipalities.