Gender and social policy: comparing welfare states in Central and Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union

How are the distinctive gender regimes in Central and Eastern Europe and th e former Soviet Union changing? What is the impact of the transition - and especially of the loss of state expenditure and state legitimacy - on women as paid workers, partners/wives, mothers, carers and citizens? Have women become more familialized as a result of transition processes.' The MONEE st atistical database of 27 countries, and Policy questionnaires to 12, show g rowing social, economic and cultural diversity Brit the soviet legacy and t he transition processes give these countries common ground too. Equal right s at work and women's need for paid employment remain from the soviet era. Bit the gap between rights and practice widens Legal eqliality in marriage remains, brit domestic violence and the domestic division of labour give ev idence of unequal relationships. While the soviet state socialized marry co sts of motherhood and care work, in some countries families are now bearing much heavier costs. Women as citizens note have more freedoms to organize, brit action is more focused on coping and survival than on wider politics: women are - broadly - more familialized, more dependent on family relation ships if perhaps less dependent in them.