John Gelissen

Social Capital in Europe Measurement and Social and Regional Distribution of a Multifaceted Phenomenon

This article sorts the various aspects of social capital (networks, trust, civism) theoretically and constructs an instrument for measuring its multifacetedness. The instrument is validated using data from the 1999/2000 wave of the European Values Study survey. Using the same data, the article describes how social capital, by its various aspects, is distributed geographically among European countries and regions (North, West, South, East), and socially among social categories of European citizens. As far as the geographical distribution of social capital is concerned, there are some particular differences, but, on the whole, European countries and regions, with the possible exception of Northern Europe, appear not to be substantially different in aggregate levels of social capital. In Scandinavia, social capital levels tend to be slightly higher, with the exception of family bonding. Some remarkable European patterns are found in regard to the social distribution of social capital. There is evidence of accumulation of human, economic and social capital; social capital is strongly gendered and is related to religious beliefs and behaviour, and to a political left–right stance.

Popular support for institutionalised solidarity: a comparison between European welfare states

In this article, we study the determinants of supportiveness for the welfare state as a system of institutionalised solidarity. We distinguish between two types of support; namely, 1) whether people hold the state responsible for achieving social-economic security and distributive justice, and 2) peoples preference for the range of these goals that should be realised if the state is indeed held responsible. Using data from the Eurobarometer survey series, we investigate how, and to what extent, both kinds of support for the welfare state are related to position in the stratification structure, demographic characteristics, and social-political beliefs, as well as to features of European welfare state regimes. The results of a two-level hierarchical model suggest that moral commitment to the welfare state dominates at the individual level, whereas self-interest enters the picture mainly if a person is highly dependent on the provisions of the welfare state. Further, the findings give no support to the claim of a systematic variation between levels of popular support for the welfare state and its institutional set-up.

Welfare States And Dimensions Of Social Capital: Cross-national Comparisons Of Social Contacts In European Countries

We set out to describe and explain differences in the amount of some dimensions of social capital within and between European societies. Social capital refers to a wide range of social phenomena; however, we focus on social contacts with family and friends. We derive hypotheses about cross-national differences in social capital from theories on the nature of welfare state regimes. We test these hypotheses with multi-level analyses on Eurobarometer data, collected in thirteen countries. We find significant variance across different countries. This variance is partly explained by individual characteristics: religious people and people living in medium-sized or rural towns have more social contacts. Moreover, we find quite differential effects of other individual characteristics on social contacts and no effects of political stances. Differences in the cross-national compositions in educational attainment and household size also account for the variance in social contacts. Finally, people living in social-democratic regimes turn out to have the smallest amount of social contacts, whereas people living in the Latin Rim have the largest amount. In between, we find people living in liberal, respectively, conservative-corporatist regimes. This explanation is opposed to the hypothesis that it is the difference in social security rates that causes differences in social capital.

Public health care in the balance: exploring popular support for health care systems in the European Union

Which factors explain intra- and inter-country variations in levels of public support for national health care systems within the European Union, and why? We propose that public opinion towards public health care is dependent on (1) the type of welfare state regime to which the various European welfare states belong, (2) typical features of the national care system and (3) individual social and demographic characteristics, which are related to self-interest or morality oriented motives. To assess the explanatory power of these factors, data from the Eurobarometer survey series are analysed. Support for public health care appears to be particularly positively related to social-democratic attributes of welfare states, whereas support drops with increasing degrees of liberalism and conservatism. Further, support for public health care proves to be associated with wider coverage and public funding of national care services. We also find higher levels of support in countries with scarce social services for children and the elderly, and larger proportions of female (part-time) employment. Lastly, with respect to individual characteristics, we find remarkably little evidence for self-interest oriented motives affecting the preference for solidary health care arrangements.

The multidimensionality of welfare state attitudes : A European cross-national study

When evaluating the various aspects of the welfare state, people assess some aspects more positively than others. Following a multidimensional approach, this study systematically argues for a framework composed of seven dimensions of the welfare state, which are subject to the opinions of the public. Using confirmatory factor analyses, this conceptual framework of multidimensional welfare attitudes was tested on cross-national data from 22 countries participating in the 2008 European Social Survey. According to our empirical analysis, attitudes towards the welfare state are multidimensional; in general, people are very positive about the welfare state’s goals and range, while simultaneously being critical of its efficiency, effectiveness and policy outcomes. We found that these dimensions relate to each other differently in different countries. Eastern/Southern Europeans combine a positive attitude towards the goals and role of government with a more critical attitude towards the welfare state’s efficiency and policy outcomes. In contrast, Western/Northern Europeans’ attitudes towards the various welfare state dimensions are based partly on a fundamentally positive or negative stance towards the welfare state.

Popular explanations of poverty: A critical discussion of empirical research

Various authors point to the connection between public perceptions of poverty and institutionalised strategies of dealing with the poor. The way the general public perceives the poor, and especially the causes of poverty, is generally assumed to have a profound influence on the legitimacy of anti-poverty policies. Yet studies on popular perceptions of and attributions for poverty are relatively infrequent. Moreover, a considerable share of existing research appears conceptually and/or methodologically inadequate. This article provides a critical review of existing literature that is interwoven into the discussion of the two most common approaches to studying lay poverty attributions: the factor analytical approach and the forced-choice-question approach. With respect to the latter, we present an empirical analysis and interpretation of the four response categories that constitute the core of the forced-choice question included in Eurobarometer.

Popular explanations of poverty in Europe : Effects of contextual and individual characteristics across 28 European countries

In this contribution we describe and explain the differences in popular poverty attributions that exist within and between 28 European countries. On the basis of the existing literature we distinguish five predictors: awareness of the existence of poverty, personal experience of disadvantage, personal values, socio-demographic background and structural and cultural country-level characteristics. Using data from the European Values Survey (EVS) 1999/2000, we assess for most of these predictors the extent to which they relate directly to people’s partial ranking of popular poverty attributions. The results of rank-ordered logistic regression models show that differences in popular poverty explanations relate directly to whether one lives in a country with a Catholic tradition and a high level of poverty, their (subjective) experience of disadvantage and personal values. Furthermore, we find that the size of the various associations depends on people’s particular choices of poverty explanations.

Ranked motives of long‐term care providing family caregivers

Family caregivers provide long-term care to their chronically ill loved ones and as a consequence they experience physical, relational and financial problems. This study investigates how long-term family caregivers rank 12 motives for caregiving. Motives are derived from the views of four philosophical anthropologists and are related to self-reported stress and joy and to several different background characteristics of respondents. Motives that focus on feelings concerning the relationship between caregiver and care recipient are more popular as a first choice than motives stemming from feelings of obligation or a general feeling of happiness and are also more popular than more self-directed motives. An analysis of full ranking data shows that two groups can be distinguished, one group of family caregivers with mixed motives and one group of family caregivers with motives that focus on reciprocal mutually equal relationships. The latter are mainly women taking care for a partner or a child, the former report high levels of stress. Implications for intervention programmes and health policy are being discussed.

Direct and Indirect Effects of Supervisor Support on Transfer of Training

Supervisor support is believed to play a critical role in assuring the effectiveness of corporate training programmes, especially regarding trainees’ transfer of training. Results of studies on the effects of supervisor support on transfer of training are inconclusive, however. One explanation for these differing results is that social (supervisor) support is often considered a one-dimensional construct, however, with a wide variety of conceptualisations of its content. In addition, it is unclear whether the effect of supervisor support on transfer of training is a direct or an indirect effect. The study described in this chapter tested direct and indirect effects of a multidimensional construct of supervisor support on transfer of training among 169 former trainees. Results indicate a small direct effect, as well as a larger indirect effect via the transfer climate and trainee motivation to transfer training. These results thereby stress the importance of supervisor attention for support transfer of training.

The preferred role and perceived performance of the welfare state : European welfare attitudes from a multidimensional perspective

Welfare state support has two core dimensions: attitudes about what the welfare state should do and beliefs about its actual performance. People can combine any position on one dimension with any position on the other, yielding four opinion clusters: people can combine preferences for a relatively strong role of the welfare state with a perception of a relatively low or high welfare state performance; likewise, people preferring a small role of the welfare state can perceive a high or low performing welfare state. We apply Latent Class Factor Analysis to data of 22 European countries from the 2008/9 European Social Survey. We find that each of the four clusters contains a substantial proportion of respondents that differs between welfare regimes. In addition, cluster membership is also related to covariates that measure peoples structural positions and ideological preferences.