Quality of life touches on areas of life relevant to everybody, such as relations with family and friends, as well as on issues pertaining to public policy, such as housing and social relations in the community. This report draws on two rounds of the European Quality of Life Survey, carried out...

What are the factors that give rise to a feeling of satisfaction with one's life and do these vary from country to country across Europe? This report explores the role of different aspects of an individual's life - such as income, age, employment, marital status and health - in shaping the...

Having a job is a crucial factor in determining individual life satisfaction. This report explores the extent to which a good quality job can influence overall quality of life. The findings are based on the Foundation's First European Quality of Life Survey which was carried out across 28...

This paper considers the creation of a new region in Europe since the opening of the borders following the so-called "revolutions" in East-Central Europe. The "buffer zone" consists of a privileged group of post-Communist countries sandwiched between some of the most affluent countries of the...

This article uses Andreas Wimmer’s model of ethnic boundary making to examine ethnic boundaries among the Russian-speaking minorities in Lithuania and Latvia, two countries with contrasting integration policies. We argue that the exclusive inte-gration policies of Latvia, particularly with...

The paper considers the 'embeddedness' of economic activities in the work of small-scale cross-border traders between the Central European 'buffer zone' countries of Poland, Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovakia and the countries further East. Shuttle trading has become a significant feature of...

This paper considers one aspect of social transitions in post-Communist Eastern Europe: that of attitudes to economic change. Although much has been written about economic and political transformation, little has been done in a systematic way with regard to the attitudes of the population to...

This paper provides what we believe to be the first collection of data on social capital in the transition countries of central/eastern Europe and of the former Soviet Union. Using data from the World Values Survey 1990 and 1995 we document the degree of trust and of civic participation and find...