The Impact of the Borderline Factor on the Population Settlement Pattern (on the Example of the Orenburg-Kazakhstan Section of the State Border)

摘要

As a result of the USSR collapse new state borders emerged and cut through the previously uniform space of the country. The emergence of these new borders gives scholars a chance to track their influence on social and economic space on an example of population settlement pattern dynamics. The interfaced analysis of the settlement pattern on both sides of the state border is of special interest. The uniform geographical database of the population censuses on the territory of the Orenburg region and the three bordering Kazakhstan regions (the West Kazakhstan, Aktyubinsk and Kostanay) has formed the information base of the research. The population settlement pattern indicators of the region and the frontier zone were compared during the analysis. The geoinformation technologies, in particular the analysis tool of "hot" and "cold" points of the population settlements dynamics were used. As a result of the analysis similarity in the settlement pattern dynamics in the frontier zones and on the territory of the region was revealed. The study hypothesized that the advancing outflow of the population from the frontier zone as a result of the barrier function of the "new" state border and the "skeletization" of the settlement pattern is to the result of the deterioration in the conditions of economic activity and the difficulty of social contacts. This hypothesis did not find confirmation as the settlement zones with positive and negative dynamics proved to be transfrontier and symmetric in regard to the border. The opportuneness degree of natural and social-economic conditions of the territory plays a significant role in the settlement pattern dynamics nature.