If regarded more closely, it is particularly the “unused” part of the mountains and its specificity that
attracts people. The distinctive nature of areas not apt to ordinary categories of land use has been re-
evaluated recently. In particular the dichotomy of intensive use in the valleys and those areas which
are not serving settlement uses (in this wide sense) is increasingly addressed and initiatives to
preserve the “natural” element of the regions are spreading. To some extent the former handicap is
re-coined as an amenity feature of mountain areas. It has thus become part of a strategy to use this
development potential (Dax 1998b).
3. Regional dynamics in the mountain regions of Austria
The Austrian mountain area forms part of two of Europe’s mountain massifs, the Alps and the
Bohemian massif. The latest area classification, carried out in the course of accession to the EU
according to Art. 3, para 3 of EU Reg. 75/268 (later Reg.(EC) 950/97), is the clearest spatial
backdrop in this context. According to this classification the mountain area comprises 70% of the
Austrian territory.
With a population of 2.8 million (1991), it is home to 36% of the Austrian population. This
percentage is the same as at the middle of the 19th century. It decreased until the end of the 19th
century, then remained stable until the Second World War and increased again since then.
In absolute numbers, however, there had been a clear population growth, in particular because of
high birth-rates. This tendency has been most significant in the western three provinces Tyrol,
Salzburg and Vorarlberg within the last decades. In contrast, there appeared shrinking population
numbers in the mountain area of the provinces of Lower Austria and, lately, Styria, both in the East
of Austria (Dax 1998c, p. 10).
The general development of business and employment in the alpine area is subject to the same
tendency as in the ”non-alpine area”: the number employed in agriculture and forestry is falling,
industry and manufacturing still account for a considerable share of total employment, despite in
some cases marked job losses, and the shift of jobs towards the tertiary economy is continuing in the
alpine area as well. In contrast with the eastern alpine area, the labour market in the western alpine
area is developing dynamically. In the 70s and early 80s, the unemployment rate in the alpine area