The outermost regions of the European Union: From the beginning to the present

The main objective of this article is to analyse the concept of the outermost regions, which, on the one hand, correspond to areas of the EU located at great distances from Europe and, on the other, promote a positive discrimination between regions by granting specific economic benefits. A literature review and analysis of socio-economic data are the main methods used to achieve the proposed objectives. The research focused on the legal evolution of the ORs in the EU Treaties, the development support programmes under European cohesion policy, and the main indicators that make it possible to characterise the current economic and social situation of these remote areas. From this type of analysis, it was possible to see that the majority of the ORs are still far from the average values of the EU-27, both economically and in terms of the standard of living of their inhabitants, despite the substantial progress that has been made over the last 30 years, as a result of an increasingly consolidated outermost status in European politics.