An important issue for rural research is to clarify the concept of rural areas. A study of the literature here points to the existence of many and varied definitions under which the rural area is variously treated as a physical, social or economic space. This merely strengthens our conviction that there is no uniform definition of such an area. However, the one option that seems to have gained widest acceptance may well be the traditional definition, whereby a rural area is a physical space of relatively low population density, dispersed settlement and extensive land use. According to Polish statistics, a specific form of the rural area is a suburban zone. In the author's opinion, those territories should be considered as a separate space.

5-15