The following arguments are presented. 1) Corruption in its various forms is a serious social ill. 2) Democracy is not a safe cure against corruption. 3) Increased gender equality seems to be one im-portant factor behind ...

It is necessary to conceptualize and provide better measures of good governance because in contrast to democratization, empirical studies show that it has strong positive effects on measures of human well-being, social ...

It is well known that social and labor market policies vary greatly among the advanced industrialized countries, not just in terms of overall spending but also in terms of the allocation of resources across different ...

In 1936, while Sweden gave birth to one of the most peaceful solutions to class conflict (i.e. the Neo-Corporatist Welfare State) with the iconic signature of the Saltsjöbaden Accord, Spain gave birth to the most violent ...

The importance of social trust has become widely accepted in the social sciences. A number of explanations have been put forward for the stark variation in social trust among countries. Among these, participation in ...

The main question addressed in this paper is how the great variation in the level of social trust between different countries can be explained? Most empirical research on this question has been based on survey data which ...

Does a more generous welfare state make people happier and increase their life satisfaction? Available empirical research gives a clear and positive answer to this question. This goes counter to many arguments that the ...

What factors lead to greater levels of generalized trust in society? The research field has established four channels through which it is commonly argued trust is affected at the macro level—economic inequality, civic ...

During the past decades research on governance and quality of government (QoG) has highlighted the detrimental impact of bad governance on peoples‘ living conditions. At the same time, much thanks to remarkable efforts ...