Original scientific paper
https://doi.org/10.5673/sip.62.2.3
Programme Rijeka 2020 European Capital of Culture Measuring Social Cohesion
Nenad Karajić
; Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, Department of Sociology, Zagreb, Croatia
Abstract
The purpose of this paper is to provide the professional and the broader interested public
with a general insight into the conceptual model and the first data on some aspects of social
cohesion on the example of a local community: the City of Rijeka and Primorje-Gorski Kotar
County. The theoretical framework is based on the modification of the Social Cohesion Radar
(SCR), an international comparison of social cohesion from 2013, developed by the Bertelsmann
Stiftung. Three basic areas (social relations, social connectedness and the common
good) were measured through nine dimensions with a total of fifty variables. Two alternate
dimensions were also used in the conceptualization and operationalization of the concept: the
modification of the social cohesion and trust scale (Sampson, Radenbush and Earls, 1997) and
self-report measures of family functioning (Bloom, 1985). The analysis is based on data from
a survey conducted in 2019 by a computer-assisted personal interview technique on random
and representative samples of citizens of Rijeka and the Primorje-Gorski Kotar County. The
samples were constructed as stratified random samples of citizens over 16 years of age from Rijeka
(N=410) and Primorje-Gorski Kotar County (N=425). The results of the initial research
are based on descriptive statistics and processing data. In accordance with such an approach, a
greater number of basic indicators have been recognized which can encourage and strengthen
or weaken and hinder the process of social cohesion, dimensioned as the potential of citizens
to participate in the community and society. By connecting all the presented results in a completely
general picture, it seems that social cohesion at the local level manages to retain itself
more through mutual mechanisms of solidarity, trust and support of traditional primary (family)
and secondary (friends, neighbours, relatives living outside of the households) of informal
relationships and connections, while the tertiary sphere (formal institutions, associations and
organized activities) is deficient and less represented as a factor of social cohesion and integration
among respondents.
Keywords
social cohesion; social relations; connectedness; common good; programme Rijeka 2020 European Capital of Culture
Hrčak ID:
321570
URI
Publication date:
30.9.2024.
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