Antal Z., László
The Social Background of Public Health

The Social background of healing and the elaboration of the integrative forms of healing, presented in the paper, offer such a theoretical framework to research extending over the different fields of healing which is suited to show how seriously the weakening of the social background of healing endangers the health status of the population.

I relied on the categories elaborated by Karl Polányi for the substantive analysis of economic activities when evolving the integrative forms of healing. It is an essential element of Karl Polányi's logic that self-regulating markel is only one possible method of the integration are also given some role in the performance of economic tasks such as households, reciprocity and redistribution, in which the social embedment of economic activity is of different extent.

I have constructed the integrative forms of healing along the pattern of the integrative forms elaborated for the analysis of economic processes and then I have applied this conceptual framework to the analysis of the social embedment of healing. This conceptual framework is suited for the analysis of health care within and outside public health in a uniform conceptual framework. In addition, it also offers an opportunity for shedding new light upon the role of state health care played in the society. I was encouraged to elaborate a conceptual framework different from the traditional one when studying the social context of healing, that the analysis of the institutions of health care is often limited to the "state-markel" dispute. Such a broader system of reference allows me to distance myself írom this often analysed dimension and to analyse the functioning of the institutions of health care and their role in the totality of healing in a broader context.
 

Böröcz, József-Southworth, Caleb
Social Relations and Income, Hungary 1986-1987

While social network assets have been widely studied - albeit quite inadequately theorized - as mechanisms for social achievement in the capitalist context, they have remained unduly outside of the focus of empirical work under socialism. In the second of a series of studies utilizing "Milieux", the 198fr87 dataset on social networks and stratification in Hungary, this study addresses that weakness in the literature and tests the usefulness of social network resources in income attainment models. It offers a conceptual and measurement-oriented critique of the conventional characterization of ties as either "weak" or "strong", and suggests that the formal-informal distinction is more useful as a basic taxonomy of social network assets. We argue that formal and informal ties criss-cross both the state and non-state sectors of the Hungarian economy - hence we measure them separately in all combinations of economic sectors. OLS hierarchical regression models show that social network resources contributed quite measurably to income inequality under late state socialism in Hungary. We also find that formal and informal network ties have independent and unequal returns; they are hence to be treated as qualitatively different types of ties rather than poles or distinct sections in a one-dimensional spectrum.
 

Csite, András-Kovách, Imre
The Transformation of Rural Societies in East Central Europe

The main topic of our paper is the emergence of new structures within rural society in six countries (Russia, Hungary, Poland, Slovakia, Czech Republic, and Bulgaria) and the development of the institutional environment of these transformation. In the first chapter we present some theories on the nature of rural-urban duality in redistributive state socialism. Thereafter we formulate two hypotheses on wage distribution and unemployment that we see the major factors of the new subjugation of rural people. The third chapter contains the data analysis and presents regional models of transformation.

We stated that the differentiation of wages was less influenced by the rural-urban divide, the wages of rural people are increasingly shaped by the market mechanisms in countries that have gone farthest in building a markel economy. At the same time new variants of income inequalities have evolved, each determined by employment. In coutltries where the rural-urban differences have been least related to the differentiation of wages, unemployment and other forms of employment have become the primarily decisive factors of the new type of inequalities.
 

Moksony, Ferenc
Victims of Change or Victims of Backwardness?
Suicide in Rural Hungary

The research reported in this paper tests two competing explanations of the rise in rural suicide. The first theory regards this increase as the result of the spread of modern industrial civilization into the countryside, whereas the second stresses the negative effect that the physical isolation of small settlements exerts on community integration. I tried to choose between these arguments by laking a random sample of 600 Hungarian villages and performing regression analysis, with suicide as the dependent variable and various measures of modernization as the independent variables. The results indicate that modernization decreases the risk of self-destruction and this impact cannot be due to differences in the composition of the population. It thus seems that the rise in rural suicide is not, as the first explanation suggests, a consequence of great socio-economic changes but, in keeping with the second argument, it is the result of backwardness, of villages being unable to join the main stream of development.
 

Angelusz, Róbert Tardos, Róbert
Changes in Social Stratification and the Social-Political Identification

Transformation theories tend to relate the consolidation of democratic institutions to the process of embourgoisement and the establishment of a strong middle class in East Central European societies. As to the Hungarian case, one can observe in the press, but even in scientific discussions, the coexistence of two more or less contrasting views. Putting an emphasis on the restructuration of ownership (the spread of private property in the wake of the political changes), one of these schools of thought has stated the emergence of a broad well-established middle class. While as a rule not entering a direct confrontation, representatives of the other approach have spoken of polarization tendencies, the (relative or absolute) deprivation of wide strata, including a considerable part of middle class losing ground, as well.

The issue has been dealt with by subtler terms at the scientific scene bringing in a distinction between the objective and subjective aspects of the problem. Those claiming the growth of middle class must by now face hard evidence of opposite tendencies (such as the significant shrinkage in the last decade of households possessing discretional incomes). Not denying these facts some authors still argue for a broadening middle class consciousness on the basis of heightened social aspirations and weakening ties toward working class among lower strata, too. It is this frame of reference that we have addressed by presenting some findings of out recent survey of class identification.
 

Berencsi, Zsuzsa
Intentions of Emigration in Hungary in 1994

After listing the uncertainties surrounding the preliminary measuring of intentions to emigrate, the paper - white keeping in view these uncertainties - attempts to describe those who wish to emigrate temporarily or for good. The socio-demographic characteristics, those of attitude and network, together with motivations and target countries, influencing decisions, are considered on the basis of the dala of the 1994 Household Panel. The paper outlines two groups, in which migration, the planning of migration as strategy has a different meaning and conceivably the realisation of their chances are also different. The paper cannot give estimates of how many people would actually leave the country with a view of laking up jóbs abroad or for good, but it helps in understanding why people seek a way out in the planning of migration.