ABSTRACT

Public perception of poverty is assumed to have a significant effect on the legitimacy and viability of welfare policies. The paper compares the public perceptions of poverty in the United States and in East-Central Europe and tests whether they reflect the individualism–structuralism dimension. It examines attributions for poverty in a preselected county in each area. Primary data collection is carried out using the methods of systematic data collection. These methods first certify a certain level of cultural competence in the field of interest, then provide reliable results with the use of a significantly smaller sample than mainstream social science methods. The paper concludes that the structural and individual explanations of poverty are endorsed to the same extent in both countries. Public perception of poverty does not reflect the differences of the welfare systems. The distinction between the two examined areas is sharpest with respect to health and health care-related items, to the family size, and to the role of friends. Policy makers need to be aware that it is vital to keep their minds open to both individualism and structuralism when working out anti-poverty strategies.

摘要

公众对贫困的看法被认为对福利政策的合法性和可行性有重大影响。这篇论文比较了美国和中东欧公众对贫困的看法，并检验了它们是否反映了个人主义-结构主义维度。它检查了每个地区预选县的贫困归因。主要数据收集是使用系统数据收集的方法进行的。这些方法首先证明在感兴趣的领域具有一定水平的文化能力，然后使用比主流社会科学方法少得多的样本提供可靠的结果。本文的结论是，对贫困的结构性和个体性解释在两国都得到了相同程度的认可。公众对贫困的看法并不反映福利制度的差异。在健康和保健相关项目、家庭规模和朋友的角色方面，这两个检查领域之间的区别最为明显。政策制定者需要意识到，在制定反贫困战略时，对个人主义和结构主义保持开放的心态至关重要。