Manfred Perlik is a Professor at the Centre for Development and Environment at the University of Bern, Switzerland. He is also affiliated with Laboratoire Pacte, Unité Mixte de Recherche (UMR), at the Université Grenoble Alpes, France. As an economic geographer, his focus is on urbanization in mountain areas and his recent research deals with questions of spatial justice, transformative social innovation, and new migration – chosen or forced – into mountain areas.

• List of Figure. List of Tables. List of Plates. List of abbreviations. Preface. Part I: Space, environment, and culture as a social question. 1 Why study mountains? Mountains as a laboratory and pertinent indicator. 2 The theoretical approach to mountain research from the socio-economic point of view. 3 The issue of spatial inequality in a new light. Part II: Devaluation and revaluation of territorial capital in mountain areas. 4 Spatial and socio-economic processes in mountains. 5 The new role of mountains as global suppliers. Part III: A new level of inequality. 6 The shift from state-organized to liberal-productivist regimes. 7 The new spatial disparities. Part IV: The new disparities and possible alternatives. 8 Liberal-productivist mountains: three main aspects. 9 Three possible trajectories for mountain regions. 10 Beyond liberal-productivism. Bibliography. Index

"It is an important scientific mountain book, based on in-depth and years-long research. It makes a major contribution to the questioning of the political positioning of mountain regions in the contemporary world. The critical approach, running through the book, is a goldmine providing an abundance of thoughts and of new avenues of research to examine and discuss the mountain problematique."Gilles Rudaz, Mountain Research and Development, Vol. 39, No. 4.