To apply a territorial method in the research was an important demand from the viewpoint of the concept underlying the book and the compilation of its chapters, as well as from the point of the participants’, the authors’ default orientation, research and professional interests. Geographers, sociologists and urban soci-ologists, a political scientist, and an economist participated in
the research. The scientific curiosity for spatial processes was ba-sically not triggered by this but rather by the fact (as it could be read in the Foreword) that the Stiglitz Report does not deal with territorial dimension at all. Therefore it seemed right to ask the question whether we can experience any differences resulting from the territorial location of the surveyed population in the do-mestic manifestation of the eight dimensions.
The researches and analyses underlying the content of the book revealed and they describe the characteristics of the metropolitan region specific indicators of Stiglitz’s objective and subjective well-being model as well as their spatial endowments in details.
For these reasons, and by taking a series of methodological and measurement solutions into account, the answer is a definite yes:
spatial endowments undoubtedly appear in the identified social issues, in the well-being features of different social groups, in the forms of well-being of people living in metropolitan and rural re-gions, although they are influenced by the differences in the so-cial status groups of the investigated metropolitan and rural micro-regional population. And this is one of the most important findings of the underlying researches.
Different research has shown that the effect of spatial endow-ments depends on the social positions of the groups involved: in case of lower social positions (lower education and income, quali -fications) place of residence has stronger determining force than in higher-status social groups. Socially disadvantaged groups are not or less able to break out of the ‘prison’ of regional conditions: their income, material conditions, their health, learning, training, or job opportunities, the ability and desire of living their own life, their con-tacts, their sense of security, their commitment to democracy, and their openness to culture are the consequences of local conditions.
Higher social status, education, better income, but also subjec-tive factors, expectations, needs give more ‘area of freedom’: almost independently from local-regional endowments, but at least the various activities of everyday life can much more independently be organized: therefore cultural and other consumer habits also less follow the characteristics of space. In this situation, in the ab-sence of local options a way may open up to even for seeking and finding a better job, appropriate to expectations in another place in the wider region, and finding the needed medical supply, cul-tural institutions and events.
Along with this, the relations of both ‘spatially vulnerable’ low-er social positions, and ‘spatially free’ highlow-er social status are in-fluenced by local-regional processes. That is the reason why we see major differences between the social well-being levels of people of similar social status (i.e. high, medium, and low status) living in metropolitan and rural regions. It is so, because regional cir-cumstances ‘intervene’ into organization of effects that may theo retically be expected from social situation: favourable geo-graphical conditions exert positive, negative ones and the nega-tive influence. This is shown by the fact that the well-being level of low-social status people living in metropolitan areas is better than of those living in rural areas. It is for the same reason why the well-being level of people of high social status living in metro-politan regions is better than the well-being characteristics of those living in rural areas.
There are other reasons why it cannot be stated that spatial en-dowments do not appear in the social well-being level of middle class or upper class members. After all, these are the social groups, living mostly in bigger cities whose members just live in places, where physical, social and economic environment are beneficial, where workplaces offering well-paid and interesting jobs, learning, training, or good health opportunities are concen-trated. But also here appear subcultures based on life model shaping values, expectations and past experiences which repre-sent not only the importance, the necessity of social well-being, but also contribute to its spread. Local social relations, including residential segregation, i.e. the overweight of people of similar so-cial position also reinforce those expectation models and sub-cultures, which radiate out to the individuals, and create aspira-tions for individual well-being visible for the others as well.
However, the analyses also showed that despite all the beneficial living conditions internal differences still exist among the inhabi-tants of metropolitan areas which are characteristic differences between the well-being of people of high medium and low social status. These differences can be explained partly by social status factors, by structural factors defining the positions of high, medium and low social status, by the incomes characteristic for diffe r -ent individual strata, by vocational skills, educational attainm-ent, demographic backgrounds, but also by zone differences, that is again a spatial factor. They can also be explained by the diffe r
-65This has methodological and questioning technical reasons as well: on scales people usually prefer to place themselves into the middle. To eliminate this, multiple scales were listed on the questionnaire, for answering that particular question 11 units of scale were prepared.
ences in the specifics of physical and social endowments between the different zones and districts of urban areas, by the their hier-archical structure within metropolitan area, by the intertwining of social and spatial slope in metropolitan regions and by the whether positive or negative but by all means cumulative conse-quences of the two types of slope as well as by their integration.
When reading the respondents’ opinions a rather strange phe-nomenon occurs: in many cases the surveyed population evalu-ates its living circumstances (e.g. income or health conditions) better than what real facts indicate. People are much more satis fied than dissatisfied with a variety of factors (which is surp -rising, since according to international comparative studies the character of Hungarian society is fundamentally pessimistic).
On scales indicating social, including well-being hierarchies, people usually place themselves in the middle or a little bit high-er65: these scales are not really correlated (for example, with the data of social situation explored by questionnaire survey) with the standard deviation of occupational, educational attainment and material living conditions, with the actual situations. People consider the income status of their own usually better than their real incomes might suggest, therefore there is a contradiction be -t ween -the ra-ting of social posi-tion and -the ac-tual da-ta of s-tan- stan-dard deviation of income.
The respondents consider middle classes as the largest group of metropolitan region’s society, which is accompanied by a much smaller number of top and also an insignificant lower class, so they have an imagination that today’s structure researches can only hope for (especially in terms of the middle class). Perhaps the process of gentrification ongoing in the metropolitan areas can one explanation for this as it is manifesting in higher ratio in mid-dle classes than on national level and compared to the proportion in year 2005. Another reason for that is residential segregation, i.e.
the spatial separation of different social strata and its conse-quences: the more or less similar social structure of immediate resi dential neighbourhood units assimilated neighbours with simi
-lar consumption patterns, the (presumably) simi-lar homes simi-lar cars standing in the street, i.e. all the daily life experiences, which suggest that the lifestyle including well-being of people living in the neighbourhood is mostly similar, “they” just as well as “I” have medium-level income and medium-level social situation.
An important finding of the analyses, therefore, is that the measured dimensions of social well-being follow the hierarchical developmental levels of the spatial core—periphery model: well-being is the highest in downtown areas and (the now more and more dynamically developing) suburbs, that is where the majori-ty of high social status individuals live. In terms of well-being de-veloped and undede-veloped suburbs have been levelled, expressing today’s structural changes, the new social composition of the previously underdeveloped seemed municipalities, the inflows of graduates, and their dispersion in the suburban zones.