Rural–Urban Relationships for Better Territorial Development

Well-established relationships between urban and rural areas are key drivers for a balanced territorial development. By promoting spatial and functional interdependencies between cities and countryside, they provide opportunities for inclusive, smart, and sustainable development. The chapter presents different contributions related to various types of urban–rural relationships among different types of spaces, across different sectors, using different instruments or initiatives, which overall contribute to targets of territorial cohesion. It collects reflections on the following inquiry: theoretical, methodological, or empirical reflection on smart rural–urban relationships; digital technological developments, to incorporate digital tools as opportunities for smart solutions to live, work, and move; entrepreneurship and new business models to attract labor markets and ways of cooperation between urban and rural actors as an opportunity for new value-added chains; social innovation as initiatives and creative ways to improve social services across rural–urban areas, to reduce, adapt, or address natural risks. Finally, the chapter shed light on some of the relevant future trends in the urban–rural relationship. © 2021, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.