SLOVAK REPUBLIC IN THE CONTEXT OF DISPARITY DEVELOPMENT

Abstract

Many countries try to settle differences between their regions by implementing their economic policy. There are various key factors of development for each country or different indicators that also affect criteria selection, upon which the regional disparities are to be evaluated. Author focuses on regional disparities in the development of individual Slovak regions. The aim of the paper is to define regional disparities, the reasons for disparities and to analyse development of disparities in the particular Slovak regions using a set of selected social and economic indicators. For this purpose, the multi-criteria method – cluster analysis - has been used. It is a statistic method, which forms clusters based upon the similarity within the cluster, i.e. region, as well as the major difference between individual clusters. This method is considered to be more precise than the other ones (e.g. point method) and that is why it is often used for regional homogenity determination. The following indicators have been chosen: unemployment rate, average wages, number of small and middle-size companies, the number of entrepreneurs per 1,000 citizens, density of road network, density of highways and speedy-ways. Based on the analysis of selected indicators, we can confirm that the Bratislava region has been the most developed region within the Slovak Republic for a long time, followed by the Žilina region, which is closest to Bratislava the most. The Košice and the Banská Bystrica regions belong to the least developed ones.

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5755/j01.em.18.4.4247