Intersections. East European Journal of Society and Politics

Populism, compliance, and social norm enforcement during the COVID-19 pandemic in five European countries

Zsolt Boda, Eszter Farkas, Pál Susánszky, David Abadi, Agneta Fischer — Mon, 05 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0100

In order to reduce the spread of COVID-19, citizens have been cooperating with their governments by complying with protective measures for almost two years. However, compliance with these COVID-19 measures can be imposed not only by the state, but also by citizens’ own reactions to each other’s protective behavior. More specifically, by reacting negatively toward others’ transgression of COVID-19 measures, one can enforce social norms. Social norm enforcement can support the general level of compliance and enhance the effectiveness of COVID-19-related measures. In this paper we examine self-reported compliance and social norm enforcement related to COVID-19 measures in five European countries during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition to socio-demographic characteristics, we include politics-related variables, in particular populist attitudes, and measure these in light of a latent variable analysis. We found that populist attitudes—contrary to our expectations—increase compliance with COVID-19 measures, but there was no significant relation between populist attitudes and social norm enforcement. These results can establish future research on how populist attitudes and COVID-19 behaviors interrelate.

Demographic changes – are they the reason for increasing inequality?

Bent Greve, M. Azhar Hussain — Mon, 05 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0100

A high degree of equality has for a long time been a central feature of the Nordic welfare states – Denmark, Finland, Norway, and Sweden. This article shows that the overall increasing levels of inequality only to a limited degree can be explained by changes in demographic factors such as more elderly people, more living alone, an increasing share participating in longer-term education, and rising levels of assortative mating. There thus seems to be a small impact of demographic changes. Therefore, one also needs to be aware of the impact of political decisions when explaining development in inequality though a large part of inequality development is still unexplained. There are differences in the impact on inequality between the Nordic countries, although the countries belong to the same welfare regime cluster, which implies that even if demographic changes have an impact one needs to look into other factors as well in order to explain observed changes in all countries included in the analysis.

Testing the integration model:

Márton Gerő, Imre Kovách, Luca Kristóf, Andrea Szabó, Gábor Hajdu — Mon, 05 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0100

The aim of our study is to present how models of social integration and disintegration relate to the stratification models of a society and its inequalities. We argue that although the traditional approaches of research to social stratification have proved to be suitable for describing certain trends in post-transition transformations in Central and Eastern Europe, as a result of the social changes of the last quarter-century and the related new intellectual tasks, it is now necessary to establish new models focusing on social integration rather than just update stratification models based on occupation, consumption or the different types of capital. In our study, we present this new line of thinking through the example of Hungarian society. To prove the benefits of a model based on the logic of social integration, we examine the differences between social integration and social inequalities/stratification models. The results show that in terms of criterion validity, the integration model performs better in most respects than we have experienced with other models.

Legal definition of the cryptocurrency in Ukraine in international comparison

Mon, 05 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0100

Legal regulation of digital finance is at an initial stage. It has been proven that many countries are favorable to the full or partial recognition of cryptocurrency as a means of payment, among them: Spain—the official payment system; Germany—monetary unit and form of private money; USA—currency, form of money, Sweden—contractual means of payment; the object of money transfers in certain states, Canada—a means of calculation, etc. It has been established that in Ukraine, the considered conservative nature of legal regulation of financial relations is observed in the context of the implementation of digital financial technologies in view of the task of protecting both public interests and the interests of individuals. Conclusions have been made, first, the issue of legal evaluation of cryptocurrencies is still not finally resolved and their legal nature also remains debatable; second, cryptocurrencies being alternative settlement units poses a threat to the dominance of public currencies, as they enable competition between private financial agents and states; third, according to its essence, electronic money is a kind of electronic promissory note.

Selective privatisation and changing civic spaces in India:

Therese Boje Mortensen — Mon, 05 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0100

Much scholarship has critiqued the fact that non-governmental organisations (NGOs), as a result of global neoliberalism and consequential state retreat, have become private service providers of children’s protection rights. But how can we explain the situation when neoliberal states also undergo autocratisation and take back service provision from NGOs, while at the same time preserving the privatisation to for-profit companies? This tendency, I argue, can be conceptualised as ‘selective privatisation’. To make this point, this article draws on ethnography and policy analysis and showcases how India’s national helpline for children went from being an NGO-state partnership to a fully state-controlled service. When CHILDLINE was a state-NGO partnership, its employees experienced challenges such as limited job security and advocacy restrictions, but they still considered the partnership positive in terms of its ability to influence the state’s child protection policies. In the new state-controlled set-up, however, civil society is diluted to ‘volunteers’ and ‘communities’ who, without formal organisation and funding, do not have the means to walk the difficult but useful tightrope between being implementers and advocates. Instead, they are de facto silenced. The article thus contributes to the literature on ‘changing’ civic spaces by concentrating on the roles of non-profit private service providers for children in neoliberal and autocratising India.

The marketization of family planning: the role of banks as policy actors in Hungarian reproductive policies

Szandra Kramarics — Mon, 05 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0100

This study is part of a doctoral dissertation that deals with the marketization of family policy in Hungary. The current system simultaneously serves selective pronatalism, the growth of inequalities and the creation of ‘traditional’ families. Since 2010, the state has been motivating upper-middle class families to have children, for which it provides significant amounts of state-subsidized loans. These subsidies can be applied for through banks, so they do not function as a classic social policy tool. A full presentation of all state-subsidized loans is not possible within the scope of this article, so the study focuses only on the baby-expecting loan (babaváró hitel), introduced in 2019, as one of the tools of marketization. The article presents, based on 62 semi-structured interviews, the new situations that the marketization system confronts Hungarian families with. The interviews were conducted with people who were involved in the loan in some way (e. g.: successful borrowers, unsuccessful borrowers). The results show that, on the one hand, the general consequences of fiscalization (weakening of social rights, increasing individual responsibility, strengthening of market actors) are appearing, and on the other hand, there is a strong biopolitical pressure, which may even come from banks.

Privatised ECEC in Sweden:

Malin Benerdal, Linda Rönnberg, Joakim Lindgren, Sara Carlbaum — Mon, 05 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0100

This article focuses on experiences of private preschool operators (with varying sizes and profiles) of the governance and organisation of ECEC delivery in Sweden. The aim is to analyse how these private providers relate to, interact with and perceive their relationships with municipal authorities. These private-public governing relationships are analysed by paying particular attention to their affective dimensions through the notion of ‘market care’. The empirical data consists of interviews with 20 private preschool providers, which are analysed through a two-dimensional grid where predictability and conflict serve as analytical focal points. The findings highlight how experiences and perceptions are enabled, provoked and felt differently depending on their embeddedness in diverse local ‘affective atmospheres’. Moreover, they show that interpersonal exchanges and relationships play important roles in the performance and experience of market care. The study contributes empirical insights into the role of local affective atmospheres and market care (or lack thereof) in local Swedish ECEC governance and delivery. It thereby illuminates central aspects of the governance of privatised ECEC that complements the predominantly national and state-focused literature on quasi-market organisation.

Revisiting constitutional review over privatized childhoods:

Boldizsár Szentgáli-Tóth, Orsolya Zita Ferencz — Mon, 05 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0100

Our contribution aims to discuss the latest insights of the constitutional case law on the rights of students in private education. For this purpose, the Pridwin judgment of the Constitutional Court of South Africa was chosen, since this decision entailed considerable global resound and invigorated the discussion on the constitutional framework of private schools. Moreover, the Pridwin judgment provided a proper distinction between the rights and interests of the four main actors: students; private school management; parents of students and state authorities. Based on this analysis, we recommend prioritizing the educational rights of students. However, these should be carefully balanced with the legitimate rights and interests of other relevant stakeholders including private school management, parents of students, and state authorities. Although the fact that this topic has rarely been discussed in Central Europe, it will be demonstrated that the rise of private schooling might result in seeking similar constitutional remedies against private school managements in this region. Therefore, it would be worthwhile to integrate Central-Europe into this strand of academic scholarship.

Privatisation in the form of homeschooling in the Czech Republic and the Slovak Republic

Ondrej Kaščák, Tereza Komárková, Yvona Kostelecká, Veronika Klapálková — Mon, 05 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0100

This study ties in with the debate that exists between the representatives of critical theory in education (Apple, Lubienski, Brewer) and sociologists of education (Aurini, Davies) about the place and significance of homeschooling within the framework of the neoliberal governance of education. While the first group sees homeschooling as a direct tool of neoliberal governance, the second group finds the position of homeschooling within the framework of neoliberal governance unconvincing. Both types of arguments are examined in relation to the situation, forms and reasons for homeschooling in the Czech Republic and the Slovak Republic, where interviews were conducted with groups of homeschooling parents. The arguments about the development of homeschooling as a privatised but not necessarily neoliberalised form of education are particularly valid in the context of the Czech Republic. They are also valid in the case of a significant segment of homeschoolers in the Slovak Republic, where, however, the arguments of critical theorists of education are also valid, but for a different segment of parents – parents who adopt a religious privatist stance demonstrate a degree of affinity with the neoliberal educational ethos.

The process of going private – parental choice and mistrust of the public school system in Norway

Ingvil Bjordal, Mette Nygård — Mon, 05 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0100

This article examines the issue of school choice in a Norwegian educational context. Based on a qualitative study examining parents choosing private schools, the objective is to shed light on how privatisation processes take place within a national context where the public schools command a strong position. Inspired by sociological perspectives on how the ‘context of practice’ is important for parents’ orientation on the school market, the following research question is investigated: How are parents’ choices of private schools in Norway related to the educational context in which the choices are made? Drawing on a broad concept of privatisation the study illuminates how different privatisation processes are interrelated and how privatisation of education, manifested through growth in private schools and increased support for private alternatives, is related to the governance of and regulations for the public school and particularly policies related to privatisation in public education.

Privatisation and its racialised others:

Fanni Puskás — Mon, 05 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0100

This article explores how increasingly privatised primary education is experienced by Roma parents in a Hungarian small town, Akácos. Through the investigation of the town’s primary schooling system, this piece opens up space for an inquiry into the ways the boundaries of public and private are being redrawn by local and national education policy. As these rearrangements occur, the meanings of ‘deficits’ and racialisation shift, cementing education segregation into the social fabric of the town. Applying the lens of critical race theory and its focus on counter-storytelling in relation to deficit positionings, a fourfold local interpretation of the effects of privatisation arises in the context of education. Roma parents experience declining educational resources and the privatisation of schools into church-run institutions as additional material burdens, ‘loving’ segregation, the privatisation of pedagogic added value and the privatisation of blame, materialising in racial othering. Through this, the article sheds light on the complex interplay between the social production of deficits and processes of educational privatisation through the voices of Roma parents in a specific locality.

“It’s about setting priorities” – why parents choose private schools in Hungary

Eszter Berényi — Mon, 05 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0100

This article examines the motivations and narratives of middle-class parents who opt for private primary schools in Hungary. Drawing on 30 in-depth interviews with parents from various localities, the aim is to shed light on how parents are driven towards fee-paying education in this formerly free education system. The findings reveal that the shift towards non-state, fee-paying schools is deeply embedded in the ideology of intensive parenting. The latter places the responsibility for securing a good education mainly on parents, who view the importance of choosing a school for their children as extremely high. The foundation for school choice is laid during the early years of child-rearing by organizing the child’s schedule around various activities. As a result, although their accounts of their child-rearing clearly demonstrate the early use of cultural, social, and economic capital to secure their children’s educational futures, parents tend to interpret their children’s enrolment in private schools not as an outcome of their privilege, but rather as a deserved reward for parental care and sacrifice.

Book Review

Gábor Erőss — Mon, 05 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0100

Walford, G. (ed.) Privatisation, Education and Social Justice (2015). Routledge, Oxford, New York

Book Review

Sára Szabó — Mon, 05 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0100

Editorial

Eszter Neumann, Eszter Berényi, Szabina Kerényi — Mon, 05 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0100

The work of the editors of this special issue was supported by the Hungarian National Research, Development and Innovation Office (grant no. FK-135215, PI: Eszter Berényi) and the János Bolyai Research Fellowship of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (PI: Eszter Neumann).