Zsófia Ignácz - Böcker

The euro crisis, several sovereign debt crises, the Great Recession, the refugee crisis, and Brexit have all challenged Europeans’ willingness to show solidarity with other European citizens and member states of the European Union. European Solidarity in Times of Crisis provides a clear theoretical framework to understand European solidarity for the first time. It offers a systematic empirical approach to determine the strength and causes of European solidarity. The authors distinguish between four domains of solidarity and test a set of theoretically derived criteria with a unique dataset to investigate European solidarity.Based on a survey conducted in thirteen EU member states in 2016, the empirical analysis leads to some unanticipated results. Europeans display a notably higher degree of solidarity than many politicians and social scientists have presumed so far. This especially applies to the support of people in need (welfare solidarity) and the reduction of territorial disparities between rich and poor EU countries (territorial solidarity), but also to the domain of fiscal solidarity (financial support of indebted EU countries). This optimistic view is less true for the domain of refugee solidarity. While citizens of western and southern EU countries accept the accommodation of refugees and their allocation between European countries, the majority of people in eastern European countries do not share this point of view. The book will appeal to students and scholars in fields such as comparative sociology, political science, social policy and migration research, and European studies. It is also relevant to a non-academic audience interested in the development of the European project.

The euro crisis, several sovereign debt crises, the Great Recession, the refugee crisis, and Brexit have all challenged Europeans’ willingness to show solidarity with other European citizens and member states of the European Union. European Solidarity in Times of Crisis provides a clear theoretical framework to understand European solidarity for the first time. It offers a systematic empirical approach to determine the strength and causes of European solidarity. The authors distinguish between four domains of solidarity and test a set of theoretically derived criteria with a unique dataset to investigate European solidarity.Based on a survey conducted in thirteen EU member states in 2016, the empirical analysis leads to some unanticipated results. Europeans display a notably higher degree of solidarity than many politicians and social scientists have presumed so far. This especially applies to the support of people in need (welfare solidarity) and the reduction of territorial disparities between rich and poor EU countries (territorial solidarity), but also to the domain of fiscal solidarity (financial support of indebted EU countries). This optimistic view is less true for the domain of refugee solidarity. While citizens of western and southern EU countries accept the accommodation of refugees and their allocation between European countries, the majority of people in eastern European countries do not share this point of view. The book will appeal to students and scholars in fields such as comparative sociology, political science, social policy and migration research, and European studies. It is also relevant to a non-academic audience interested in the development of the European project.

Fairness of wage distribution – or the perception of such – is a phenomenon crucial for the stability of new democracies. While theories exist about how change of the political system trickles down to the attitudinal level, the systematic analysis of the effect of economic transition on public attitudes has been neglected to a large extent.Wage Distribution Fairness in Post-Socialist Countries proposes a conceptual framework to measure the fairness of wage distribution. Indeed, looking particularly at wage distribution fairness in three post-socialist societies (Hungary, East Germany, Czech Republic) since the transition in 1989, this challenging monograph also aims to understand if, and to what extent, the experience of a socialist regime motivates individuals to consider wage distribution as fair.Contributing to our understanding of the relevance of socialization and other situational factors influencing economic legitimacy, Wage Distribution Fairness in Post-Socialist Countries will appeal to undergraduate and postgraduate students, as well as postdoctoral researchers, interested in fields including: Sociology, Eastern European Studies and Political Economics.