ABSTRACT
Historical cultural practices that no longer exist can have modern day effects. Because communism has been linked with distrust of government, it was hypothesized that (a) historical communism would be negatively associated with COVID-19 vaccination rates, and (b) trust in government would mediate the association. Two studies assessed these hypotheses. Study 1 tested the hypotheses among European, Asian, and African countries, while Study 2 focused on East and West Germany within Europe. All samples except Africa found support for an association between historical communism and lower COVID-19 vaccination rates. However, trust in government did not mediate the association in Study 1, though a significant indirect effect did emerge within Germany in Study 2. Associations held controlling for GDP and age of population. Together, the studies suggest that historical communism in Europe and Asia is associated with real-world behavior today, and that trust in government might be partly responsible for the effect within Germany but less likely within Europe as a whole.
ABSTRACT
The experience of the SARS-CoV-19 pandemic can be a source of valuable information for public health authorities. As we have seen, the incidence is not evenly distributed in space, and the factors influencing it are not fully understood. Aspects of biological, demographic, economic, environmental, and political nature are considered, but it is believed that the social factor may be of critical importance. The density and intensity of social relations, general trust and trust in the authorities, norms and values - i.e., social capital - may have a key impact on the scale of infections. The research conducted so far on this subject does not provide clear conclusions, and the post-communist society, inferior in social capital, has hardly been analyzed. Using data for 73 subregions of Poland and performing regression analysis, we investigate how social capital explains the level of infection rate in the first three waves of the epidemic. The analysis results have shown that the factor of "political leaning" was strongly and negatively related to the infection rate in Poland. The research results indicate that, contrary to the previous studies, structural capital has the same positive effect on reducing the epidemic. However, relational social capital promotes more significant morbidity.
ABSTRACT
. The present article describes the approaches and definition of the concept of uncertainty proposed by its authors, a quantitative evaluation of uncertainty, and materials of the empirical study used to explore the said issues on the example of macroeconomics of Georgia. We hope that the views given in the article will be useful for developing countries, particularly for the economic policy-makers in the post-communist states, as well as for the academic and scientific circles engaged in the studies of the above-listed issues.