Purpose Geographical disparities in the light of regional development constitute ever present issue affecting academic debates as well as decision process of policy makers also in the Central and East European countries, mainly during the last two decades. The purpose of this paper is to outline the economic development of one of the most underdeveloped regions in Slovakia, of Banská Bystrica, during the transformation stage of post-socialist societal development, with emphasis on the period after 2000, in the context of the economic performance related to other regions of the country. Design/methodology/approach For this purpose, several economic indicators (unemployment rate, vacancies, employment in economic sectors, wages, gross domestic product, foreign direct investment and housing construction) are utilised, whose common contribution to assessing the economic performance of a territorial system is secured by using the Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (TOPSIS) methodological approach. Thus, analytical part of the study stems from standard statistical data, enriched by 11 in-depth interviews conducted with stakeholders involved in socio-economic and political life of the region. Findings Of internal factors, innovation capacity of the region and supporting the business environment appear to be a key for its further economic development. Attractiveness for foreign direct investment as well as social cohesion of the EU are considered the crucial factors of regional development stemming from the external environment. Originality/value Using TOPSIS method and series of in-depth interviews with regional stakeholders the authors identified development prospects of underdeveloped Banská Bystrica region, in the context of opportunities and threats forming its presence in the near future.

The aim of the study is to evaluate the relationship between the sporting success of football clubs, their market value and the economic performance of the regions they are located in. All member states of the European Union are under consideration, taking into account the success of the clubs in the highest-ranked male national football competitions and in European cups. The data are processed at NUTS 2 level over a period of one decade (2007–2016). From a methodological point of view, it is beneficial to construct original indexes of clubs’ sporting performance – both at the national level, and an overall one that also takes into account results in international (European) competition. To determine the existence of a link between the sporting performance of the club, its market value and the economic performance of the regional level unit it is located in (measured by gross domestic product), correlation and regression analysis is utilised. For example, the results show a high positive statistical link between a club’s sporting performance and its market value, but a relevant direct statistical link has also been confirmed between the economic performance of the region and the market value of the club, with respect to its sporting success. However, the analysis also showed that the club of a relatively poor region (from a pan-European point of view) could reach above-average results at the highest European level, and vice versa – a club with a high market value, from an economically highly over-developed region, could lag behind.

Voting preferences of electorates traditionally split along various structural cleavages in of society, including the urban-rural dimension. The intensity of both the similarity and divergence in voting decisions of inhabitants living in towns and cities on one hand, and in the countryside on the other, show varying rates of (in)stability, not only over time, but also in the spatial context, depending on the socio-economic, political, and historical predispositions of the country and its territorial units. The cardinal ambitions of this paper is both to evaluate the profile of urban-rural voter preferences of the main political parties on the Slovak political scene during the period of 1998-2010 at the national as well as at the regional level, and to reveal the socio-spatial mosaic in the electoral choices of people living in urban and rural environments in different parts of Slovakia using tools of cartographic interpretation.

Political behaviour of citizens is traditionally formed by a wide range of factors that influence their voting decision in the election. Dichotomy of both the space and society into the town and the countryside generates different election results constantly. A key aim of this paper is to assess the extent of rurality concerning the electoral support of relevant political parties operating on the Slovak political scene after the groundbreaking elections held in 1998 until ballots of 2010 not only at national, but also at the regional level. Evaluation of level and dynamics in socio-political cleavage between rural and urban space is one of the most important research ambitions of this study. We shall note the position of particular regions in Slovakia in terms of size and acceleration of the conflict and try to categorize them according to the similarity in values of indicators characterizing this social discrepancy. On the basis of found facts, we shall appraise the electoral success of political parties in urban and rural environment and compose the regional typization of Slovakia concerning the party representatives of urban and rural environment. Finally, we shall evaluate the potential of the regions to be future outbreak sites of latent cleavage influencing their differential political inclination.

When explaining electoral behaviour, cleavage theory with its practical consequences constitutes a traditional question in established Western democracies, but is just emerging in post-socialist countries of Central and Eastern Europe. The general objective of this study is to identify the spatial patterns of election results and inter-electoral shifts in support of politico-ideological blocs (measured by distribution of mandates, gained by parties at 2009 and 2013 regional elections) at the level of self-governing regions of Slovakia, and evaluate the impact of socio-political cleavages that these territorial discrepancies within the country are caused by. Elections for regional self-government held in Slovakia in 2013 are properly evaluated, when a total of 408 regional MPs were delegated to parliaments of eight NUTS3 level regions. Spatial patterns of numbers and inter-electoral changes of the mandates gained by individual political blocs representing the right wing, etatist stream, parties of ethnic orientation, so-called 'Slovak coalition' and independent candidates are displayed not only at the regional scale, but also at the hierarchically lower level of election districts (with 90 territorial units). For regional elections, socio-economic and ethnic cleavages are considered the most important determinants of spatial differentiation related to the voting behaviour of the electorate, and then distribution of power in regional politics, but the phenomenon of independent candidates has the potential to compete with their explanatory value increasingly.