Divorce determinants in four CEE countries: diversity or uniformity?

Using selected demographic, social and cultural predictors, this paper analyses the risk of divorce in first marriages in four countries of Central and Eastern Europe (CEE): Bulgaria, Russia, Lithuania, and Poland. Due to lack of data, the phenomenon of divorce has been understudied in this region and therefore very little is known about its determinants. Formerly having been part of the socialist bloc, these countries share a lot of similarities in their political history and in their economic and societal development. With respect to their cultural and religious background, certain commonalities and differences can be distinguished that place Bulgaria, Russia, Lithuania, and Poland in various clusters. Drawing on these observations, we aim to investigate effects of various divorce predictors and to examine whether the seemingly easy identifiable similarities and diversities are reflected in behaviour related to first marital dissolution. Effects of non-marital cohabitation and motherhood status at first marriage that have been found to be of high but different significance in each country receive a special attention in this paper. The study is based on data from the Generations and Gender Surveys carried out in the 2000s and applies techniques of event-history analysis.