Abstract
Comparative research into intergenerational social mobility has been typically restricted to a relatively small number of countries. The aim of this paper is to widen the perspective, and to ...provide an up-to-date account of rates of intergenerational class mobility across 30 European countries, using a newly-constructed comparative data-set based on the European Social Survey. Absolute mobility rates are found to vary quite widely with national differences in the extent and pattern of class structural change. As regards relative rates, countries are best seen as falling into groups within comparatively high and low fluidity sets, within which groups a high degree of cross-national commonality prevails. Further results indicate that country differences in relative rates play only a very limited part in accounting for country differences in absolute rates, confirming that the latter are primarily determined by class structural change. Based on our findings, we suggest a restatement of the FJH-hypothesis to the effect that in societies with a capitalist market economy, a nuclear family system and a liberal-democratic polity, a limit exists to the extent to which relative rates of class mobility can be equalized, which countries may move closer to or, in the case of post-socialist societies, recede from.
This article contends that envisioning the future of housing planning in post-socialist cities necessitates the acknowledgment of a pressing reality: Many societies are undergoing rapid aging and ...depopulation. Latvia’s capital city of Riga, the focal point of this study, stands at the forefront of these global trends. However, due to entrenched neoliberal practices that idealize youthful, robust, and entrepreneurial residents, considerations of aging are conspicuously absent from urban planning visions. Drawing on ethnographic research conducted in the capital city between 2021 and 2023, this article establishes a link between urban lived experiences while aging and the intersecting dynamics of housing. The critical analysis is informed by data derived from observations, conversations, media sources, official discourses, and perspectives gathered through expert interviews. Ultimately, this article advances an agenda aimed at urging people to think about more hopeful futures for aging in cities, an issue of paramount significance in the post-socialist societies of the 21st century.
Currently, when discussing the development of urban areas in post-socialist countries, it is common to highlight a new stage of urbanisation known as smart city creation. Nowadays, increasingly more ...cities are labelled as intelligent or smart; however, there is no clear-cut definition that specifies the criteria for considering a city as intelligent or smart. The existing sets of criteria are relatively ambiguous and have different priorities depending on the region. The socio-economic transformation of post-socialist countries generated new circumstances in terms of managing cities, especially in social and governance aspects. European funding allows for building smart infrastructure. Thus, it is essential to determine whether, to what degree and on what grounds post-socialist cities may be considered smart in the entire context of their human and technical dimensions.
•Polish cities have potential to transform according to the smart city concept.•Assessing urban smartness in Poland based on statistical data is very difficult.•Indicators proposed in Western Europe often do not conform to Polish conditions.•Numerous smart initiatives in Polish cities are not systematic and orderly.•Urban smart initiatives are not followed by any concrete entries in urban policy.
This article offers a comparative assessment of significant factors of influence, major developments, national specifics, and the challenges confronting the Baltic States since independence in ...transitioning their economies from a central planning model to that of a market economy. The investigation took into consideration company law, competition law, and insolvency law of the respective countries and three stages of legal development – creation, the main reforms, and current developments. Further, the article asserts that the Baltic States have managed to create a sufficiently diverse palette of business forms that are properly constituted under law, are flexible, and convenient for all business types, especially small and medium business. Competition and insolvency laws of the Baltic States align closely with laws of the European Union and are being further developed. Stories of the success of Baltic States could serve as an example for other post‐socialist countries.
This article assesses the trajectory of postsocialism as a concept and mounts a fivefold critique of postsocialism as: referring to a vanishing object; emphasising rupture over continuity; falling ...into a territorial trap; issuing from orientalising knowledge construction; and constraining political futures. This critique serves to sketch the contours of an alternative project that still recognises difference but foregrounds links and continuities, develops a political edge, and theorises not just about but with and from this part of the world.
The aim of this article is to distinguish types of the suburbs that are typical for post-socialist European countries. The typology organizes the variety of suburban forms according to the degree to ...which they favour the creation of public spaces, or the access to such spaces in the city or nearby town. A new typology is based on six criteria: (1) the level of neighbourhood (spatial scale), (2) the time when the neighbourhood was erected, (3) spatial interaction with the nearest town/city, (4) the prevailing type of investment, (5) street layout, (6) access to the city centre by public transport. Suburbs are diversified in terms of their potential for the establishment of public spaces. It has been proved that individual housing in the form of neighbourhoods which are planned, densely populated and based on street grid is the most preferred type from the perspective of building social capital. The typology was developed for Warsaw Metropolitan Region, although it may be applied also in the research of post-socialist countries other than Poland and urban regions within them.
•Different process of suburbanization in post-socialist countries requires the adoption of a new typology of suburbs.•The typology allows to indicate the most preferred types of suburbs from the perspective of creation of public spaces.•The typology may serve as a guideline in preventing the replication of the monofunctional ‘bedroom’ neighbourhoods in the future.
Consumption in modern, capitalist countries is studied through the lens of fashion. We claim that it is fruitful to apply the concept of fashion to an analysis of consumption in a modern socialist ...country. By using the example of the wall unit, we discuss the emergence of fashion through the mechanism of state policy in Poland under the Communist regime. The socialist state was responsible for the propagation and implementation of modernity. The idea of progress was internalized by citizens and enacted by social emulation. Additionally, our study reveals that social class was a means of determining different attitudes toward fashion: members of the working class saw value in imitation and exact copying (revealing a monocentric approach to fashion) while the middle class engaged in a polycentric approach, that is, they valued individual creativity, mixed various styles, and were inspired by trends from western countries.
Countries of Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) have transformed from a centrally planned communist system to a market economy and liberal democracy after 1990. The rapidly changing social and power ...relations have been gradually manifested in the spatial pattern of cities. After the turn of the millennium, a growing number of papers reported that the regeneration of inner-city neighbourhoods intensified, generating population change in certain areas. Authors writing on urban renewal and gentrification in CEE have been inspired by the typology of gentrification elaborated in Western contexts, even though historical legacies and specific local conditions set serious limitations on the use of such concepts. The aim of this paper is to scrutinise the essential features of urban change and gentrification in post-socialist cities, discussing the main pre-conditions for, actors in and the resulting types of this process. Existing literature in the field has been systematically collected, analysed and compared. According to our findings the classic stage model of gentrification cannot be used in post-socialist cities, partly because the process is still in its infancy and partly because several hybrid forms of gentrification-like processes hide the spatial effects of market-based renewal. The variegated forms of urban change are the result of historical legacies, path dependencies and a set of factors embedded in local contexts. The paper highlights some of the research gaps in the field.
1990年后，中欧和东欧 (CEE) 国家从中央计划的共产主义制度转变为市场经济和自由民主。迅速变化的社会和权力关系已经逐渐体现在城市的空间格局中。在世纪之交之后，越来越多的报纸报道，市中心街区的重建力度加大，导致某些地区的人口发生变化。阐述中欧和东欧城市更新和绅士化的作者从西方背景下阐述的绅士化形态汲取灵感，然而，历史遗产和特定的地方条件对这种概念的使用构成了严重的限制。本文的目的是审视后社会主义城市中城市变化和绅士化的基本特征，讨论这一过程的主要先决条件、参与者和结果类型。我们系统收集、分析和比较了该领域的现有文献。根据我们的发现，典型的绅士化阶段模型不能在后社会主义城市中使用，一则这一过程仍处于初级阶段，二则几种混合形式的类绅士化样过程掩盖了基于市场的更新的空间效应。城市变化的多样化形式是历史遗产、路径依赖和当地环境的一系列内置因素的结果。本文强调了该领域的一些研究空白。
China's informal settlements-villages inside urbanized areas-are often characterized by local governments as dirty, chaotic, and dangerous places. This negative discourse inevitably leads to ...recommendations for demolition. A number of criteria have been invoked in state decisions regarding the demolition of informal settlements; however, rarely are these places evaluated from the residents' perspective. This paper, following a long tradition of residential satisfaction research in Western nations, uses a household survey to examine this topic in the cities of Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou. We find that local contexts not only matter, but may be the principal determinants of residential satisfaction. The residential satisfaction of village dwellers is not necessarily low, and most socioeconomic attributes are not statistically significant determinants of resident satisfaction. Migrants and low-income groups are not less satisfied than nonmigrants or middle-range income earners; the most important determinant is social attachment within the community. The perception of being excluded, or lacking neighborhood social attachment, significantly reduces residential satisfaction. No facilities can compensate for this negative exclusion factor. We conclude that demolishing informal settlements does not help to build a "harmonious society," which is the purported goal of such programs. Removing the social and institutional barriers for migrant integration into the city is likely the most effective way to enhance residential satisfaction and neighborhood quality.
PDF
