"Boundary effect" and development of marginal areas

Territories may become marginal because of many reasons. These driving forc es of change pushing individual areas out of main development trends may "o perate" in isolation, but mostly occur in clusters. Marginality should be t hus treated as a complex phenomenon rather than viewed from one sector or s ide perspective. Two marginal territories - Sumava Mts and Broumovsko - hav e become model areas for our comparative study. Historical causes of margin ality, description of present situation there and chances estimation of the ir future socio-economic development have become the main issues addressed in this paper.