The present report explores the implications of applying the ‘generic’ definition of rural areas proposed by Søgaard (2007). Based on a set of criteria (e.g. on robustness, correspondence with everyday usage and compatibility with public definitions used by other countries), the previous report recommended a negative definition, excluding coherent urban settlements with less than 2,000 inhabitants.
It is stressed that the general-purpose definition suggested here will not be suitable for all purposes. However, since the original definition by Statistics Denmark more than 50 years ago, cumulative socio-economic changes have dramatically changed the qualitative content of such concepts as “rural” and “urban”. For example, many small local communities have lost even basic service functions during this period.
A special section is devoted to the implications of the Municipal Reform of 2007, which reduced the number of municipalities from 271 to 98. As a result of the reform, the conventional distinction between urban and rural municipalities seems less appropriate, and the report suggests adding a third group, the so-called heterogeneous municipalities with urban settlements as well as rural areas of some importance.