Factors of Tolerance in Post-Socialist Countries

Modern states, including the post-socialist ones, devote a large amount of financial and human resources to social programs dedicated to increasing the level of tolerance, but recent events in the world indicate that the intolerant attitude towards some minorities is only growing. In this paper, there was made an attempt to understand whether the level of tolerance in post-socialist countries has changed since 2010, comparing the results with those for Western European countries to find out which way tolerance is going in post-socialist countries. The main goal of the study was to identify the factors that influence tolerance in post-socialist countries in 2016, in order to understand what determinants are important for states when planning social programs devoted to increasing tolerance among the population. It was revealed that the level of tolerance has changed since 2010: there has been an increase in tolerance towards one minorities, and a decrease towards another minorities. In addition, the hypothesis that tolerance has a structure was confirmed, the types to which people are intolerant were identified: "marginal", "people of a different culture", "people who require social support." It also turned out that in different countries and in relation to different types of minorities, the factors affecting tolerance are different.