In your country, how strong is the divide between capital city and rest of the country?

36 comments

1. It’s mostly jokes about the slow bureaucrats in Bern. The real hate goes only against the snobs in Zurich.

2. I don’t think our government is aware that areas exist outside of Dublin

3. the divide is so strong I’d say life in Serbia is pointless outside of Belgrade and Novi Sad. that’s where jobs are, that’s where you go for any meaningful education, that’s where all the investments go.

   it’s like the government has forgotten the fact that there are places outside of those 2 cities. the support for vucic is dropping by the day in big urban centers so we need to pump even MORE money and starve the rest of the country! hooray, government!

   I wouldn’t be surprised if in a few decades belgrade and novi sad hold some 80% of the entire serbian population

4. Well, there’s London and then there’s the rest of us.
   There’s a very London-centric vibe in the UK which, depending on who you talk to is getting worse or less the case.

5. Your description of Finland fits Austria very well.
   I would say the dynamic is really similar, as well only have 1 big city, with the 2nd largest (Graz) being much smaller than Vienna.
   But imo public Transport works pretty well in Graz, Linz, Salzburg, and they are also all quite walkable.

6. Pretty strong in Lithuania too. Only a handful of young people choose to live in smaller towns, rest are staying in major cities, and there is a plethora of reasoning for it, but mostly because of infrastructure and service availability. Even if real estate is a lot cheaper, small towns still struggle to attract highly skilled people even with good pay offers. But that’s just a tip of the iceberg, there are even deeper problems within, and some small town folks struggle to find jobs in their line of work, so they move to cities.

7. There’s probably going to be at least one Dutch person who says eVerYonE OuTsIdE AmsTerDaM haTeS AmSterDam. That’s not necessarily the case, plenty of people move to Amsterdam or one of the other bigger cities such as Rotterdam, The Hague, Utrecht or Eindhoven for economic reasons and to experience life outside smaller towns.

   I don’t think the divide is that big, Amsterdam, Rotterdam, The Hague, Utrecht and Eindhoven are all relatively big, and Amsterdam is not exactly a metropolis. Most Dutch cities are left leaning.

   If there is a divide it’s a Randstad (so that’d be roughly Amsterdam, Rotterdam, The Hague and Utrecht) versus the rest, but I think for many Amsterdam also epitomises that divide because it’s practically overrun by tourists so many Dutch visitors can feel quite alienated when visiting the city centre and see how it’s catered to foreign tourists and at the same time to the South of Amsterdam there’s the Zuidas which is sort of like the City in London in that it is a district with a massive concentration of white collar jobs which is basically dead in the weekend. In my opinion people actually underestimate that Rotterdam is also a major business centre and it’s not just dock workers, just have a look see around Weena.

8. There’s an occasional disparaging saying in Latvia saying that the country only has two parts, Riga and the rural part. Said in reference to people in Riga, or the government, forgetting about everything outside.

   About a third of Latvia’s total population lives in Riga proper, about one half in the metro area. Riga accounts for over 50% of the Latvian GDP and is seven times bigger than the second city. Population is dropping in the entire country but internal migration is mostly to Riga or suburbs so the centralization keeps increasing.

   Due to these scale differences, there’s of course a pretty large divide.

9. In Kosovo everyone is going to live in Prishtina one day

10. Our government hates the capital so much that they tried making it an extra voivodeship so they would have better control over the region. They also tried artificially making it bigger, by adding surrounding villages to its borders. They hoped it would give them enough voters (rural areas tend to vote for PiS), but in the end the plan failed.

    The president of Warsaw is Duda’s rival from the 2020 presidential elections. Was kinda funny when people were talking about “the president” and had to specify they mean the President of Poland (we call heads of big enough cities presidents).

11. The biggest thing that unites the rest of Sweden is how we all talk down on Stockholm and how they love the smell of their own farts.

12. 🇪🇸🇪🇸[How strong is the division – visual representation](https://imagenes.20minutos.es/files/image_990_v3/uploads/imagenes/2021/03/04/espana-de-noche.png)

13. It is Athens, and then it’s the rest of the country.

    Not only for the government, but for the media too. For example, the wildfire in Evros which has been burning for 16 days straight, only attracted media attention during its 4th day, when there was an other fire in Parnitha, Attica. That was the only day the national channels interrupted their schedule with breaking news, mainly focused on Parnitha, also mentioning Evros wildfire.

14. Romania is also pretty Bucharest-centric, but other big cities like Cluj-Napoca, Iasi and Timisoara are catching up and developing pretty fast. At least in terms of tech scene, Cluj-Napoca is a close second, while also being a very important university center with a lot of foreign students.

    But, as with most European countries, there is a large population gap between the capital and the second largest cities, so it’s somewhat natural that most of the cool stuff happens in the capital.

    Mentality-wise, there are also differences reflected in stereotypes, such as the Transylvanians being laid-back and calm and the people from Bucharest in a constant hurry.

15. It’s not as strong as in other countries but it’s becoming more of a trope with each passing year.

    Ireland was an agrarian country for far longer than the rest of Western Europe, and so it’s rare that you’ll find anyone living in an urban area who doesn’t have at least some recent rural ancestors. It was only sometime in the 70s that we actually became an urbanised country (i.e. with more than half of the population living in urban areas). In that sense you could say we’re not very “removed from the soil”, and Irish people are very familiar with urban and rural settings/people.

    But as I say, it’s definitely becoming more noticeable, especially politically. Our main parties (FF/FG, and Labour to some extent) were fairly monolithic until the last decade or so, winning representation in cities and the countryside, but now the vote has splintered. There’s a sense that rural Ireland is being left behind in terms of services and security, but most importantly with pressure growing on farmers to cut emissions in line with Ireland’s climate and energy goals. So party gains are now divided over this issue, and there’s even talk of a rural/farmer-based party entering the mix in the near future. At the same time, the Green Party and many left-wing parties are seeing their support increasingly confined to urban constituencies.

16. Depends on what you want to compare.Berlin is our biggest city by far but still it is not a situation like Finland or Austria where a double digit percentage of our population lives in Berlin. Things that start in Berlin usually spread to the next bigger cities pretty fast and from there all over the country.

    In regards to the things you recognized about Helsinki:Most of the bigger German cities in the west, north and south vote either centre left, green or centre right. Usually two of these have a comparable portion in each city (most often around 20 % each). In the east it is most often also one of these plus right wing populist. Berlin and Magdeburg (if seen as east German) are exceptions to this. Berlin last time was centre left and green (both ~20 %), but also centre right almost as big as these two (18%) and left party at fourth place (14 %). So I’d say most bigger German cities are left leaning but Berlin even more so.

    What you describe about traffic fits most German cities, even many of the smaller ones and is not unique to Berlin.

    On how the rest of Germany relates to Berlin, it’s hard to say. It is looked up to and down upon at the same time. It is a cultural centre and where most young people want to go. Even if people leaving the cities is a trend in Germany, in 2021 Berlin was one of two or three cities where the balance of influx and people leaving is still positive. Berlin is also economically weak when measured in GDP. It is seen as “the only actual city in Germany” by some, as dirty, poor, unpleasant and unfriendly by others while also being in the top 10 of most expensive places to live in Germany. Berliners are seen as liberal-minded and cosmopolitans by some and as living in a bubble and arrogant by others. With Berlin, most things are double edged and there is a lot of perspectives.

    edit: Personally, I get why people like Berlin and that many of the negatives are just the price you pay for the positives. Still I’d get depressed living there. It is not for everyone and many people only spend a part of their life there and leave for their home region again or go some place entirely different. I think it fits perfectly for a phase of orientation and exploration and wanting to connect a lot but when you are done with that and maybe got on the path to your dream, there is other places in Germany where you can fulfill these without the downsides.

    I’ve also seen the different way though with family members that are Berlin natives, left for most of their live and returned when old. There certainly is also some luxury and comfort in this city and most things you could ever want from a city are just a few minutes away.

17. The UK as a whole it tends to be that there’s London, then there’s the rest of it. People also argue that it’s also London and the South East, then the rest of us. This tends to be because there’s the biggest focus of population but also money in that region. It’s kinda seen that politically whatever that area needs or wants is what the country as a whole gets.

    Then there’s a divide within the divided. Taking Scotland for example, there’s a big focus on the Central Belt with Glasgow and Edinburgh taking the main focus (the former being Scotland’s only metropolis and the other the capital). Again, money, politics, trade, media, a lot of things really is focussed on this region. Having grown up in the highlands, you could feel a divide when it came to things like funding. Everyone obsessed over how fast they could make the GLA-EDI train go, meanwhile we were up there with zero public transport and a ferry service that rarely worked.

    And depending on who you ask, the divide is only getting bigger as more people shift about.

18. 2/3 live in the Capital Region of Iceland. The rest of the country however has disproportionate voting power and hence representation.

19. Romania isn’t Bucharest-centric. Only about 10% of the population (including the metro area, cause the city proper is only 8%) lives in Bucharest, so that makes sense.
    Economically, Bucharest plays a big role, about 21% of gdp.However, as you see, it’s not a majority role like Helsinki in Finalnd (which according to google is close to 50% of Finnish GDP).
    The image of Bucharest is an overcrowded city with terrible traffic and public utilies, but with great salaries and the best education and job opportunities. People rarely move to Bucharest because they like the city, but because they like the opportunities it offers. Honestly speaking, as someone who lives here for this reason, other cities (like Brasov, Cluj, Timisoara or Oradea) are much better maintained. This is because the General Mayors of the Bucharest usually care more about national politics than they care about actually running the city.
    The city used to be very important politcally because it used to be a right-wing stronghold (because of anti-communism). Conservative Former General Mayor between 2000-2004 Traian Basescu served as President of the Country and most important politcal figure for 10 years (2004-2014). However, during the past 10 years the city transitioned to being pretty moderate politcally. The left and right get about the same of the vote depinding on wider politcal circumstances. Both the right+centrists and left currently hold 3/6 district mayors, while the current General Mayor is a moderate independent supported by the centrists and the right-wing.

    In recent years, politicians from Bucharest have been less successful. Not one of the current political leaders is from Bucharest. Center-right President Iohannis is from Sibiu, PM Ciolacu (center-left) from Buzau, the leader of the main centrist opposition is from Timisoara etc.

20. Ukraine is probably much less concentrated around Kyiv. Kyiv is big, but (was) only 2 times larger than Kharkiv and Odesa, and 3 times larger then Dnipro and Lviv. And there are many other places where great people are concentrate to do cool staff, which makes our capital just first among equals.

    And nobody really hates Kyiv the way people in this comments seems to describe attitude toward their capital, and how people in Russia tend to feel toward Moscow and its inhabitants from my knowledge.

21. In Denmark there’s been a recent political movement which is very anti “the fine saloons” in Copenhagen. There’s a lot of people in rural Denmark that feels like their voices are not heard, and that the parliament is not taking them into account when making policies.

    This divide is easily recognized when it comes to public schools. In most villages there used to be public schools but over the years more of these have been closed and only leaving options that are quite far away from people living in the countryside. Going from maybe having a school within 4/5 km. To maybe 10km.

    A lot of municipalities claim they want to develop rural areas, but this year is no exception with multiple schools across the country being threatened by closing. All of these being smaller village schools.

    Also there’s the obvious cultural differences that are being used in generalizations against the other part. Fx that people from Jutland are all lesser educated stupid farmers. And that people from Copenhagen all pay 150kr for avocado on toast and has never seen a farm animal.

22. Well 40% of the Irish population live in Dublin and surrounding areas and it’s approaching 50%
    So there’s a huge divide

23. While there are other big cities here, Barcelona is very much the main focus of Catalonia. Out of nearly 8 million, about 5 million live in the Barcelona metropolitan area, so more outlying areas do get ignored somewhat.

24. The division Madrid rest of the country is quite shocking. Madrid has around 3 million people, only about 500.000 more than Barcelona. The next cities by population, Valencia and Seville, are around 800.000.

    So while the difference between Madrid and the other large cities is not incredibly big, the economic contrast is surprising. The areas around Madrid province are a demographic desert with a population density closer to Siberia than to most of Europe. Most of Castille, Extremadura or Aragon are significantly poorer. So there is a huge contrast and resentment between Madrid and the other region, including the multiple local nationalist identities in the peripheral region. While Madrid population is only the 3rd largest, economic disparities and population density compared with the most rural provinces is huge.

    Politically is a weird thing, because the city itself is very progressive and LGTB, but the region has become a conservative stronghold in the last 20 years. It is probably due to the pressence of middle upper clases that favour neoliberalism policies, and the presence of a strong Spanish nationalism in contrast to the regional identities in the peripheric regions.

25. Just look at the last voting for Hungary and you will see how big is the gap.

26. Pretty strong in England. London is very cosmopolitan, multicultural, pro Europe, with a younger demographic and politically left. The rest of the country is the opposite. OK, before people start complaining , there are some notable exceptions, mainly other cities which are more like London than their own environs.

    It is a sweeping generalisation but if you take any major question: monarchy, brexit, who to vote for. then the split seems to be closely tied to population density with the high density urban areas being more progressive and the rural areas being more conservative.

27. Quite strong, especially in salary income. However when we are talking about quality of life, a lot of other cities considered at the same level or even better: such as Lviv, Kharkiv, Dnipro, Odesa. I personally lived in Kharkiv, Odesa and visited Kyiv quite a few times, and I will chose Kharkiv as most comfortable city for life. You can have decent salary (may not be such high as in Kyiv), lower prices for appartments than in Kyiv, much better recreational zones and much less traffic congestions.

28. Moscow feels like a different country. Densely populated, rich and thriving. With better services, education, healthcare. And just like Marx said “being determines consciousness”, Muscovites themselves are different, much more liberal then the rest of Russia (with exception for some abominations like Saint Petersburg).

29. In Italy I would say that there is not a great division, sure, Rome is a very big city, and a lot of administration is centralised, but by the average Italian, Rome is not seen as a world apart. The way I see it, Rome, among the cities of Italy is more like ‘first among equals’; after all, our country has a long history of polycentrism: there are about a hundred cities and of these there are a handful that are in fact centres around which the surrounding regions orbit. Milan for the North (secondarily some smaller centres), Rome for the Centre and Naples for the South. More than anything else, I see a certain separation between Milan, a very cosmopolitan city, and the rest of Upper Italy.

30. I’ve grown to think the 3 biggest urban areas (Helsinki, Turku, Tampere) aren’t too indifferent between each other when it comes to people living in there.

    That said, of course the capital is somewhat different as it hosts the parliament, prseident, biggest events, and is significantly bigger.
    Yet, it doesn’t feel like the people are different to the other bigger urban areas, apart from how they view themselves i guess.

31. For historical reasons, Italy is a polycentric country: besides Rome (the capital) there are a number of other large cities (Milan, Naples, Turin, Florence, Genoa, Bologna to name a few) which actually used to be the capital of smaller states.

    Each of them has its own economic, social and cultural identity. Until two or three decades ago, they also had a political identity (Bologna, Florence, Genoa, Turin were leaning left) but it changed a lot more recently.

    There is still a divide between larger cities and smaller centers/rural areas. The latter tend to lean left and be more populist. *Edit: they lean* ***right****, not* ***left****.*

    Other habits may depend on local constraints: I never used my car when I lived in Milan, but now it is a necessity as public transportation in my area is almost non-existent.

32. There’s a different attitude towards Warsaw, even a simple word like Varsovian might have pejorative connotations, despite it clearly means a dweller of Warsaw.
    Some people think that Varsovians are cocksure snobs. But I can imagine it might be the case in other countries too.

    Warsaw is the capital, and as others have mentioned, it is the most developed city in the county.

    However, there’s no such division as it is seen in other counties. There live about 2 mn people in Warsaw, which is about 5% of the total population of circa 38 mn, whereas there are other major cities in the country, some of which have a population above 400k, and I’d personally say that’s a rough indication of lesser national division in comparison to other countries.

    To give a wider picture, here’s the population across larger cities in Poland, above the barrier of 400k:

    – 2 mn Warsaw

    – 800k Krakow

    – 660k Lodz

    – 650k Wroclaw

    – 530k Poznan

    – 470k Tricity of Gdansk, Gdynia and Sopot

    – 400k Szczecin (Stettin)

    There are also 4 other major cities above 200k, so the distribution of population is evenly spread and basically each region has its own major city, which is good, because there’s only a handful of regions where unemployment is high and quality of life is poor.

33. Same can be said for Sweden alot of people in Stockholm tend to not understand how it is we get around in the northern part of sweden they usually talk about “just take the buss and or subway” but the problem with that is that there isnt any subways up here and the busses are very give or take so to speak

34. Brussels is its own separate region with its own government and own parliament. Even the traffic lights look different.

    Also despite being an enclave in Flanders, barely anyone speaks Dutch there. The fact that the Flemish can’t communicate in their own language in their own capital is one of the main reasons why many Flemish love to hate on Brussels.

35. In general 80% of the population lives in just 20% of the cities

36. Yeah divide is pretty big, especially in last years. Generally Slovak sub reflects Bratislava quite well : lot of IT people(earning way more than “average Slovak”), liberal, voting mainly for PS/SAS etc…In rest of Slovakia, outside of few big cities you will find complete opposites, especially politics wise(irl I don’t know single person who votes for PS/SAS).

    Rest of Western Slovakia is basically just car factories, agriculture and interesting nature and places(especially castles and mysterious Tribeč mountains). Central Slovakia is full of beautiful nature(a lot of bears) and mountains. Eastern Slovakia also have beautiful nature, but is poorer than rest of the country and lot of people from here work in Bratislava. Generally people from Western Slovakia say there is “nothing there”, only a lot of Romani slums(Lunik IX is still decent looking compared to village ones).

    Ofc this is very oversimplified explanation.