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RECENT SOCIAL CHANGES IN MID WALES. GWYNDAF WILLIAMS Williams, Gwyndaf. 1985: Recent Social Changes in Mid Wales. Cambria, Vol. 12(2), pp. 117 to pp. 138. Part II of Davies, W.K.D. (ed) Human Geography from Wales: Proceedings of the E.G. Bowen Memorial Conference. ISSN 0306 9796. Mid Wales has long been seen as a classical example of a declining rural periphery. The addition of industrial employment in the area as advocated by the Beacham Report on the area in 1964 only partially explains the demographic resurgence in the last decade. This has produced a number of social changes, described primarily from census sources, that are placed in the context of the development proposals for the region. Gwyndaf Williams, Department of Town Planning, University of Manchester, Manchester, M13 9PL, U.K. Mid Wales accounts for almost forty percent of the total land area of Wales, yet only possesses seven percent of its population. Since the area lost a quarter of its population between 1871 and 1951 it has long been viewed as a classical example of a peripheral area experiencing deprivation, economic marginality and population decline. In this decline the principal cause has been the high level of out-migration which has far exceeded the rate of natural increase in this area. Fears that the regional debilitation produced by long term depopulation would continue to undermine the economic, social and cultural character of the area led to the establishment of a government committee to examine the problems of the region in November 1960. Chaired by the Professor of Economics at U.C.W., Aberystwyth, its influential report, the so-called Beacham Report (1964), has provided one of the main bases for the region's development strategy since that time. The findings of the Beacham Committee now need a thorough re-assessment in the light of the changes that have taken place in the region since the report was written, particularly given the very different social and economic conditions of Wales, the United Kingdom and indeed the World, as well as the changing political and planning climate. This paper is designed to help contribute to such a re-assessment by summarising some of the major social changes in the area during the post-Beacham period, mainly as revealed in the 1971 and 1981 population censuses. As such it is part of a wider study of social and economic change in Mid Wales (Williams 1986) focussing on the 312 community councils in the area, many, but not all of which, are the old parishes of the region.