Como se pode distinguir Évora do resto do Alentejo?: Uma abordagem de estatística espacial[How can Évora be distinguished from the rest of Alentejo: A spatial statistics approach]

Évora (county and above all, the city) is often cited as a case of success in terms of regional development, as it stands out in terms of social, economic, and demographic indicators from the rest of the region where it is located, i.e. the Alentejo (Portugal). This fact makes it relevant: (i) to measure the 'distance', in terms of those indicators, between the municipality of Évora and the municipalities of the rest of Alentejo, and (ii) to detect the occurrence of spatial clusters in order to verify to what extent is positioned in advantage in relation to its neighboring counties, its NUT III (Alentejo Central) and its NUT II (Alentejo). In methodological terms, those two tasks are performed in the paper through the use of spatial statistical techniques, including multidimensional scaling and determination of local indicators of spatial association. These techniques, by their simplicity and easiness of application, can be readily used in other cases, which can be seen as a pedagogical purpose intrinsic to this work.