| Abstract (english) | This doctoral thesis explores young people’s intention to stay in rural areas of the Republic of Croatia, with a particular interest in identifying social determinants of quality of life and social integration as potential predictors of this intention. The scientific contribution of this thesis manifests itself in three aspects: theoretical-conceptual, methodological, and empirical. The theoretical-conceptual contribution refers to the presentation of an overview of the current knowledge about young people from rural areas, i.e., about the potentials and challenges resulting from their specific residential situation. Particular attention is paid to the migration intentions of young people from rural areas, as well as their quality of life and social integration. In addition, the methodological contribution of this paper refers to the construction/adaptation and evaluation of quality of life and social integration scales. It also refers to the use of a mixed methods approach, which is still underutilized in Croatian sociology, and especially in Croatian rural sociology. The main contribution of this doctoral thesis is empirical in nature and relates to determining the prevalence of young people’s intention to stay in Croatian rural areas, their objective and subjective assessment of quality of life and the possibility of social integration into their local rural community. Particular attention is paid to recognizing the most important determinants of quality of life and social integration related to the intention of Croatian rural youth to stay in their rural settlements. The theoretical part of the thesis begins with an overview of the sociological understanding of rural areas, both in general and in Croatia. Rural settlements are understood as smaller settlements with a lower population density, where the natural environment predominates in contrast to the built urban environment (Brown and Schafft, 2011). Following the review of rural physical space, we focused on the representation of the youth population. Young people are understood as a highly heterogeneous social group (Bourke and Geldens, 2007; Wyn and White, 1997) who are in the transitional phase between childhood and adulthood (Ilišin and Radin, 2002; Ilišin et al., 2013). The transition to adulthood is one of the central aspects of young people’s life course, and three main factors are used as determinants of the transition to adulthood: 1. completion of education; 2. marriage and starting a family; and 3. entering the labor market and first employment (Durham, 2017). Today, these transition factors are being extended, so young people are spending more time in education, the age for first marriage and parenthood is increasing, as well as entry into employment and economic independence from parents also being delayed (White, 2019). Having iv determined the population of young people in general, we focused on the population observed in the context of this doctoral thesis, namely young people from rural areas, understood as a group that does not have equal life opportunities due to the spatial-geographical and economic conditions of the area in which they live (Puđak et al., 2022). Young people describe their rural settlements as places characterized by a dense social structure, developed good neighborly relations, a strong spirit of cooperation and solidarity, developed personal security, and a high perception of the benefits of a natural and clean environment (Glendinning et al., 2003; Haukanes, 2013; Leyshon, 2008; Rye, 2006). On the other hand, living in rural communities can also be perceived as restrictive for young people, i.e. there is a sense of isolation, limitations, and social exclusion (Eriksson et al., 2010; Glendinning et al., 2003; Leyshon, 2008; Looker and Naylor, 2009). After presenting the characteristics of young people from rural areas, an overview of migration research on young people both abroad and in Croatia is given. The lives of young people from rural areas are influenced by the "mobility imperative" to gain access to the resources they need to realize their life aspirations, and those who live outside urban areas are differentiated precisely by their decision to leave or stay in their local communities (Farrugia, 2016; Thissen et al., 2010). Determinants that play an important role in the rural youth’s intention to stay are family support, attachment and integration into the local community; satisfaction with one's life and living conditions in the community; attachment to the rural area and the natural environment, rural identification, and a sense of belonging to the place (Bednaříková et al., 2016; Bjarnason and Thorlindsson, 2006; Grgić et al., 2010b; Klepač, 2021; Looker, 2021; Pupak and Trako Poljak, 2021; Thissen et al., 2010; Žutinić and Bokan, 2008). Young people who intend to stay in Croatian rural settlements are characterized as less educated, employed, with spouses/partners and children, and with their own living space (Žutinić et al., 2010). After the detailed introduction of the studied population, we focused on presenting the main concepts of this thesis, namely intention to stay as a dependent variable, and quality of life and social integration as independent variables. First, the intention to stay in the rural areas represents the decision to continue living in the current rural settlement. In addition, quality of life is understood as a multidimensional construct that combines assessments of objective living conditions, but also various aspects of the assessment of subjective well-being. The conceptualoperational elaboration of this phenomenon fully followed the nine domains of quality of life v presented by Eurostat (2017) adding four additional conceptual domains relevant to the rural context of young people. Finally, social integration is conceptualized as social cohesion measured at the individual level, following the conceptualization of Dragolov et al. (2013), characterized by close social relationships, a strong emotional connection with the social subject, and a strong focus on the common good. After a detailed elaboration of the concepts, previous research on the determinants of quality of life and social integration of young people from rural areas was also presented. Finally, we presented the relevant conceptual relationships of these three main concepts. The empirical part of this thesis begins with the presentation of a methodological approach to investigate the intention of rural young people to stay in rural areas. A mixed methods research approach was chosen to achieve all the objectives of this thesis. Thus, a complex, hybrid design was used, consisting of three sequential mixed designs, i.e., a preliminary quantitative component, a qualitative component, and a quantitative component, all occurring in chronological time phases. In the continuation of the methodology chapter, the main methodological features of the prequantitative phase of the research are presented, which referred to the analysis of secondary data collected as part of the Friedrich Ebert Foundation (FES) project "Youth Study Southeast Europe 2018/2019", which was conducted in 2018 and in which young people from Croatian rural areas participated. In addition, the data was collected as a part of qualitative research using the semistructured interview method, and a total of 37 interviews were conducted with young people from rural areas, which enabled us to obtain rich detailed data on the experiences and perspectives of the interviewees. Finally, the quantitative section of the research involved a survey of a sample of young people from Croatian rural settlements (N=351). In the quantitative research, a total of seven different measurement instruments of subjective quality of life, nine indicators of the objective dimension of quality of life, and eight different measurement instruments of social integration were constructed. All measurement instruments were successfully adapted to the population of young people from rural areas, and their evaluation has shown that they reliably measure almost all conceptually assumed domains of quality of life and social integration, thus achieving the first (methodological) objective of this doctoral thesis. The next part of the thesis deals with the presentation of the secondary data analysis and the combined qualitative and quantitative results on the determinants of quality of life, social integration, and the intention to stay. The main findings of the secondary data analysis show that vi young people from rural areas generally rate their satisfaction with various aspects of their lives highly. In terms of social integration, they tend to express trust in other people, have a strong attachment to sub-national and national identity, frequent socializing with friends is important to them and they perceive their environment as fair and just, while at the same time, they show low levels of trust in institutions, social activation (engagement in the form of volunteering) and civic, political participation. This analysis helped us to prepare the field research in the two later sections of the study and gave us an insight into current data on young people in Croatian rural areas, which has been lacking in Croatian rural sociology in recent years. In addition, the integrated results of the quantitative and qualitative analysis on the three main concepts of this thesis – quality of life, social integration, and the intention to stay – are presented. In terms of objective quality of life, participants of both research sections have an average monthly income that provides them with relative economic security, most of them are employed and the vast majority rate their health as good or extremely good and report a high availability of most services and infrastructures. In terms of subjective quality of life, the participants in both research sections are most satisfied with their own living space and its infrastructural facilities, life in general, and the natural and living environment. They are somewhat less satisfied with the services, transport infrastructure and connectivity. They are least satisfied with governance and basic rights, which is by far the worst perceived domain of quality of life in both research sections. In terms of social integration, participants of both research sections rate the domain of social networks the highest. They emphasize the strong support and help from family and friends, the development of trust in neighbors and the general acceptance of people of different ethnicities and beliefs. This is followed by the assessment of the domain of connectedness, which is extremely polarized, i.e. participants in both research sections express a strong rural identification, which is seen as the strongest integrative factor for young people in rural areas, while in the same domain, low level of trust in institutions and a perception of injustice in Croatian society were observed. The domain of focus on the common good was rated the worst – although there is a relatively pronounced altruism of fellow residents and a general respect for social rules, there is an almost complete lack of formal social and political participation among young people from rural areas. Finally, the last part of the empirical research refers to the intention to stay and the main determinants associated with it. In the quantitative part of the survey, 60% of respondents intend to stay and continue living in their current place of residence, while 21% intend to move away vii (19% are still undecided). In the qualitative research, 26 of the total 37 interviewees expressed the intention to stay, while 11 of them expressed the intention to leave their current rural area. It can therefore be concluded that most participants in both research sections expressed the intention to stay and continue living in their current rural settlement. These findings are in line with previous research in Croatia (Šundalić, 2006a; Žutinić and Bokan, 2008; Žutinić et al., 2010), which all show that the intention to stay is greater than the intention to leave rural areas of Croatia. By determining the extent to which young people express their intention to stay in Croatian rural areas, we have achieved the first empirical objective of this thesis. We then conducted a binary logistic regression analysis as part of the quantitative research to see which determinants of quality of life and social integration predict rural youth’s intention to stay. In the quantitative research, young people who belong to the older age group (25-34), have a secondary or lower education, are currently in a marriage/partner relationship, rate their health poorly or are undecided in this assessment, express greater satisfaction with housing conditions, stronger identification with the rural community and greater interest in politics are more likely to stay in their current rural settlement. In the qualitative part of the research, the most important social determinants of young people's intention to stay in Croatian rural areas were primarily identification with the rural community, followed by general satisfaction with current life in a rural settlement, established family life, and satisfaction with current employment. A comparison of the results from both research sections shows the importance of rural identification for young people’s intention to stay in Croatian rural areas. This is in line the with vast majority of previous research (Bjarnason and Thorlindsson, 2006; Glendinning et al., 2003; Grgić et al., 2010b; Klepač, 2021; Looker, 2021; Juvonen and Romakkaniemi, 2018; Riethmuller et al., 2021; Stanić and Schafft, 2021; Theodori and Theodori, 2015; Thissen et al., 2010; Žutinić and Bokan, 2008; Žutinić et al., 2010). By identifying the main determinants of quality of life and social integration related to the rural youth's intention to stay in the rural areas of Croatia, we have achieved the final objective of this doctoral thesis. |
