Social exclusion in rural areas of the European Union - a comparative approach

Social marginalization has become an element in the functioning of any modern society as a result of the intensification of social inequalities. Social exclusion has become a dynamic and multi-dimensional phenomenon. These processes including poverty coincide with one another other creating cause and effect relationships. The aim of this paper is to present the problem of social exclusion in rural areas in the European Union, including the scale of the differentiation of this process in terms of individual national economies. In the research problem, the authors used literature analysis and the data available from Eurostat for EU Member States (NUTS-1). For the purpose of this research, a synthetic index was also prepared that constitutes the basis for the assessment of risk for the areas examined related with the social exclussion process. Furthermore, this index permitted a preparation of the hierarchy of areas analyzed in terms of the risk level of the marginalization and exclusion of local communities. The group with the lowest level of index includes the following countries: United Kingdom (6,0), Czech Republic (6,9), Germany (7,4) and Austria (7,4), but the group with the highest level (with the highest exclusion risk) includes the following countries: Spain (68,8), Greece (65,6), Bulgaria (56,3), Portugal (52,1). The characterization of the social exclusion of those living in rural areas of the EU was prepared be on the basis of objective factors, such as: the scale of poverty, unemployment and level of education.