Abstract

According to the 2017 World Economic Forum, the factors that pose a serious risk to today’s global economy are rising inequality and the polarization of societies, which in turn threat the social cohesion. This doctoral dissertation contributes to the understanding of these major current challenges, by investigating the ex- tend of unequal access to opportunity in education and in the labour market in the former communist countries; the potential of diversity in the South African multi- cultural society in terms of employment; the formation of interpersonal trust at the individual level in Germany.