A multivariate methodology to uncover regional disparities: A contribution to improve European Union and governmental decisions

The aim of this paper is to present a new methodology to classify the levels of socio-economic development of a country's territory, in order to support regional development policy. This classification is obtained through the use of multivariate statistical methods – factor and cluster analysis, and is based on a wide number of demographic, economic, health, education, employment and culture indicators. The Portuguese continental territory is used as the working example. Results lead to the identification of nine axes of socio-economic characterisation, and the division of the Portuguese territory into four regions with differing degrees of development, reflecting the well-known asymmetry between coastal and inland zones. The ‘socio-economic regions’ uncovered with this methodology allow a much more useful characterisation of the Portuguese territory, for policy making, than does the NUTS-2 classification scheme used by the European Union.