The growing role of logistics in the economic space of large metropolises is visible in an increasing number of objects of this kind as well as in their high spatial concentration. Taking into account these circumstances, a phenomenon known as ‘logistics sprawl’ is considered in the article. This is one of two problems concerning the development of logistics in metropolitan areas. Studying the Katowice conurbation in Poland, the authors note, however, that in this region the opposite phenomenon, which they define as a ‘logistics anti-sprawl’, is more noticable. Its characteristic feature is a location of logistics facilities not in the outer zone of the conurbation, but in its core. This phenomenon undoubtedly differs from the patterns of localization of logistics facilities in all major CEECs. It is caused by some chief factors which are disscused in the paper. Therefore, an attention is drawn on the period of socialist development of the region, its contemporary postindustrialism, urban shrinkage, as well as the polycentricity of the conurbation. The crucial question whether the expected reduction of the ‘sprawl logistics’ phenomenon may be based on the development model observed in the Katowice conurbation is also discussed in the article.

Increased geopolitical competition and growing economic nationalism after 2014 have gradually started to slow the trend of liberalization of international trade. Relations among certain national states have turned into trade wars – a hybrid phenomenon shaped at the intersection of geopolitics and geoeconomics. The paper explores global and regional trends in trade regulations introduced by the world's largest economies and, at the same time, its major military powers. The G20 countries’ role in these processes was illustrated through references to empirical data on the dynamics of the introduced trade regulations in 2009–2018. The effectiveness of the regulations index is proposed. Apart from the harm that deepening such negative trends in the global geostrategic balance does to broader bilateral relations, the role of trade wars in re-shaping globalization's established conditions is also discussed.

Thirty years after the start of democratic change, Bulgaria’s population has decreased by about 2 mln people. During this period (1989–2019), the country recorded one of the highest rates of population decrease in the world. These circumstances have confronted the Balkan country with a number of difficulties in regional development. The article outlines a specific national sociopsychological discourse on demographic processes in the conditions of Bulgaria’s socioeconomic transformation. The main dilemma here is whether this is a demographic crisis or a demographic catastrophe. In addition to assessments of this problem at the national level, the author has attempted to interpret its ethnic and regional aspects. The chief theses are confirmed by selected empirical data, which illustrate the serious scale of depopulation of Bulgaria and regions of the country. The author emphasizes the helplessness of Bulgarian society and state policy, which have long suffered the lack of an operational approach to neutralizing negative demographic trends and depopulation in a number of regions.

In this study we focus on the evolution of the identity of those urban neighbourhoods which have formerly been separate towns. This problem is discussed using the example of the polycentric conurbation of Katowice in southern Poland, which came into being because of its mining and industrial functions. The administrative integration of this multi-level polycentric urban system is the primary background for the development of those neighbourhoods that used to be separate towns. Assuming that changes in legal and administrative status may have certain consequences regarding the social connections and identity of such neighbourhoods, this study aimed to identify such places within the analysed region. The authors also attempted to construct paths of local identity for such spatial entities, confronting them with the thesis that economic factors make them relatively homogeneous. The implementation of new development factors and the paradoxical diversity of the identities of the former towns in this mining-industrial region are also significant elements of the region's social transformation in terms of economic and spatial development.

In constantly expanding its fields of application, sustainable development is becoming the basic approach to planning and governing the twenty-first century city. This article examines sustainable urban development policies through the lens of utopian thinking and indicates the opposing scholarly interpretations of modern utopianism. On the one hand, this is approached as dreaming and fantasizing about the future; on the other, it is approached as well-calculated planning activities. More specifically, this article explores how the urban community in a post-socialist, post-industrial city faces the implementation of the challenge of a twenty-first-century sustainable development project. Using the example of the city of Katowice in southern Poland, the article examines three discourses of sustainable urban utopianism. It is first seen as strategic planning for a pursued better future; second, it is seen as an image of the city of the future; and, third, it is seen as a difficult-to-achieve vision for the city of the future in light of specific local barriers to development. Apart from Katowice’s successes in transforming its traditional industrial profile—based on coal mining—this study also draws attention to the successful construction of a new image for economic changes, urban design, and sustainable development, which has been confirmed by numerous recognitions at the national and international scale.