Small towns are a global phenomenon. Since early times to the present day, a substantial part of the world’s population have resided in small towns and cities. Such communities remain important centres of economic and cultural activity as well as of regional integration. They function now as in the past at the interface of urban and rural society, they anchor the urban hierarchy, sustain metropolitan centres, and help underpin transnational urbanism. The role and future of small towns is highly relevant to the current public discourse on inequality, population decline and resilience.

Despite their importance, small towns and cities have been too often neglected in the older scientific literature. Recently however there has been new interest in the subject from social scientists and historians*. Still, there is a need for more comparative, interdisciplinary study, bringing together researchers from the Global North and South to examine key themes in small town development from the Middle Ages up to the present day from a transnational perspective.

The Small Towns Network was established at the EAUH Barcelona conference in September 2026. Membership is free. The purpose of the Network is to facilitate and promote comparative, transnational research on small towns and cities from the Middle Ages to the present, with a particular concern to stimulate interdisciplinary and global collaboration and cooperation between individuals and institutions:

by circulating news on researchers and their projects working in particular fields.
by circulating information on publications.
by encouraging and helping to promote session proposals for international conferences such as EAUH and Global UH Network . Also by reporting on conferences.
by supporting the development of joint projects.

We welcome information on researchers, projects, publications, conference proposals and conferences.

*Jerzy Bański, ed., The Routledge Handbook of Small Towns, 2022; Anne Lorentzen and Bas van Heur, eds., Cultural Political Economy of Small Cities, 2011; Paul Knox and Heike Mayer, eds., Small Town Sustainability: Economic, Social, and Environmental Innovation, 2009; Heike Mayer and Michela Lazzeroni, eds., A Research Agenda for Small and Medium-Sized Towns, 2022; Peter Clark, ed., Small Towns and Cities in World History, 2026.