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The article provides an overview of the main theoretical approaches to research on educational choices and anticipated labour-market opportunities from a gender perspective. It then presents the results of three quantitative analyses of secondary data. The objective is to help facilitate a complex understanding of the mechanisms of the reproduction of gendered social
structures. The genderedness of the social institutions in the education system and the labour market in relation to the socialising trends in the family is described in three parts: 1) gender segregation in employment in the context of segregation in education – the author shows that the horizontal dimension of these social institutions plays a more signifi cant role than the vertical dimension; 2) the factors that condition girls' and boys' educational aspirations and choice of schools – the author demonstrates how secondary school choices are gendered (though the analysis did not reveal the differences between the factors that infl uence girls' and boys' aspirations); 3) the factors that condition parents' educational and class aspirations for their sons and daughters – the author uncovers several aspects of the socialising effect of the reproduction of the two traditional career trajectories based on gender. In conclusion, the article answers the question of how structurally gendered expectations cohere with individual career trajectories, and based on the three analyses formulates questions for further research and offers a revised theoretical conceptualisation of gender as an analytical category.

This article focuses on the connection between fi nancial aid systems in higher education and the development of inequalities in access to higher education. Although the student financial aid system is just one of a number of factors that infl uence a person's chances of studying in higher education, its role in a person's decision to pursue higher education may be of fundamental significance for those with lower socio-economic status. Therefore, the authors of this article focus on the effect of the fi nancial conditions of study on the chances that individuals from families with low socio-economic status have obtained higher education. The analysis looks at developments in the Czech Republic and the Netherlands, because Czech and Dutch student financial aid systems have been evolving in very different directions over the last two decades, while their secondary school systems continue to share very similar features. The analysis reveals that student financial aid based primarily on direct financial support (as in the Netherlands) was accompanied by a decline in inequalities in access to education, even though students had to pay tuition, while a system of financial aid primarily involving indirect support (as in the Czech Republic) applied over the same period did not inhibit increasing inequalities, despite the fact that during the period under observation students were not required to pay tuition.

Numerous Czech studies have been conducted on how the education system reproduces inequalities. While most of them have dealt with the reproduction of class inequalities, relatively few have focused on the reproduction of gender inequalities. In this article, the authors apply a conceptual understanding of the category of gender to research on education, an approach that avoids both universalising the category of woman, as well as the opposite extreme of individualisation. We claim that female students, even though they differ among themselves in various social and personal ways, are serialised as women by institutions in the education system. They are expected to perform differently, with different motivations, their performance is valued differently and they are expected to follow different professions than male students. The paper focuses in detail on the gendered nature of educational institutions, both in terms of the gender segregation of fi elds and levels of study, as well as in terms of the importance of the interaction that occurs during the processes of teaching and ascribing value and significance to the performance of male and female students. The authors argue that education, generally expected to function as a social ladder and a route to better-paid jobs in the labour market, serves men and women in segregated ways.

The objective of this article is to contribute to the analysis of the factors that influence the educational aspirations of boys & girls in the Czech Republic & vertical inequality in the Czech education system. Drawing on Mateju & Strakova's monograph Unequal Chances in Education, the authors enhance the discussion with a look at the gender aspect of choices of educational trajectory. The authors review existing theories to present the main arguments from research on educational aspirations by gender. They point out the ambiguity of studies to date on the effect of gender in the education system, as they have often arrived at contradictory findings. The authors look at the theories in which the differences in educational aspirations are related to gender & the theoretical & empirical arguments that reject gender as a category for distinguishing educational aspirations. The authors summarize the research to date on gender segregation in the education system, & then offer their own conclusions, based on a secondary analysis of data from the PISA-L in 2003. Their results reveal, in conformity with the analysis by Mateju & Strakova, that while according to these analyses gender does not have an effect on differences in the educational aspirations of boys & girls, it does have an effect on some aspects of the resulting segregation of the education system & thus on a student's choice of secondary school.

Článek prezentuje výsledky kvalitativního výzkumu realizovaného mezi českými organizacemi nabízejícími programy environmentální výchovy a orgány veřejné správy, které tyto programy finančně podporují. V rámci výzkumu byly řešeny tři základní výzkumné otázky: jaké evaluační strategie organizace používají? Jak tyto strategie souvisí s metodikou realizovaných programů, resp. do jaké míry odpovídají programy hodnocených organizací požadavkům na efektivní environmentální výchovu? Do jaké míry vycházejí orgány veřejné správy při finanční podpoře těchto programů z jejich skutečné efektivity? Výzkum prokázal poměrně malé zastoupení evaluačních strategií přinášejících relevantní informace o efektivitě programu, metodické nedostatky ve většině hodnocených programů a nedostatečnou schopnost orgánů veřejné správy formulovat a vyhodnocovat požadavky na efektivitu podporovaných programů. ; The article presents the results of qualitative research that has been undertaken among Czech environmental education centres, and regional and municipal government institutions providing financial support in this area. Three research questions were discussed: what evaluation strategies are used by the organisations? How are the strategies connected with the methodology of the programmes, or how do the programmes correspond with the standards for effective environmental education? How important is the real effectiveness of the programmes for a local government's decision regarding their financial support? The research proved that few organisations use evaluation strategies that provide relevant information about programme effectiveness, there are methodological weaknesses in the majority of analysed programmes, and local government institutions do not have and do not demand relevant information about the effectiveness of supported programmes.

The aim of this article is to explain educational reproduction in the Czech Lands between 1906 and 2003 from the perspective of educational mobility. Mobility trends in the intergenerational transmission of educational status identified in an analysis are presented in the context of findings on odds ratios in education and in a historical context. The analysis is based on observations of the intergenerational transmission of educational status, i.e. educational mobility, in two educational transitions between three educational levels (lower secondary, upper secondary, and higher education). Mobility tables and their log-linear analysis are used to help explain what mobility processes shape the educational inequalities that have proved stable over the long term and also odds ratios between the main levels of education. The article helps fill in the gap in knowledge about the long-term development of the educational structure in the historical Czech Lands and Czechoslovakia and provides information about typical mobility trajectories and varying mobility patterns in periods before 1948, between 1948 and 1989, and after 1989. An understanding of these structural contexts helps clarify what occurred in the past and what is occurring now in the area of unequal access to education and to explain one of the main findings from the analysis – that in Czech society the transmission of a family's educational status from one generation to the next continuously follows the same patterns.

The article is based on the first sociological study of the attitudes and preferences of Czech men who identify themselves as gay towards (gay) fatherhood, family, and parenthood. The main arguments of the study evolve around the themes of the (overwhelmingly positive) parental desires of the gay men participating in the study; their internalised moral dilemmas connected to gay fatherhood; the reproductive choices and limits that structure the attitudes of gay men towards parenthood and family; and gender stereotypes about family/parenting models and the roles these men occupy. The article is divided into two main parts. The fi rst part introduces the context and current state of sociological scholarship and research on gay fatherhood and homoparentality. The second part of the article discusses results, an interpretation, and an analysis of the empirical findings of the study.

The article focuses on the development of the labor market in the Czech Republic from the perspective of employment & unemployment between 1998 & 2004. Using data from the Czech Statistical Office, & within a reference framework of EU countries, the authors discuss & analyze the factors that determine unemployment & employment in Czech society. The authors use latent logistic regression to verify the assumption that the odds of unemployment are not evenly distributed across the entire Czech population & to identify three segments of the labor market in the Czech Republic. In each of these three segments the employment & unemployment odds differ, & the factors that determine these odds function differently in each segment.

The article focuses on the changes in the determination of educational aspirations that took place in the Czech Republic during its social, political and economic transformation. The aim of the article is to contribute to a deeper understanding of the changes in the stratification system after 1989, which were significantly influenced by changes in the causal mechanisms behind the formation of educational aspirations. Those changes in the determinants of educational aspirations were themselves largely driven by the expansion of economic returns to education and thus the increasing significance of education for life success. The empirical research is based on a comparison of data from the 'Family '89' (Rodina '89) survey conducted in January 1989 and the Czech module of the longitudinal survey PISA-L 2003. The analyses were carried out with the hypothesis that the social origin of the background family had a much stronger direct impact on the educational aspirations of adolescents in 1989, while in 2003 social origin had a much stronger indirect influence. The stronger direct impact in 1989 was due to the very limited access to higher education under socialism and the role higher education played in the reproduction of the cultural elite. But with the gradual expansion of, and the rapidly increasing returns to, higher education during the transition period, social origin began to have a largely indirect effect on aspirations, particularly through the value pupils began to place on higher education as a means of ensuring a higher degree of life success. The authors' empirical findings confirm the hypothesis about the change from direct to indirect effects and highlight the importance of researching educational aspirations from a historical point of view and in the context of social change.

The problem of linking 'explanation' & 'understanding' remains unresolved -- as Weber left it. This paper challenges the view that their reconciliation is impossible, as some theorists have maintained. Their case is that the entities involved -- subjective meanings & objective relationships -- are too ontologically different to be combined. From the stratified ontology of Social Realism, which acknowledges that different properties & powers pertain to different components & levels of social reality, this is no barrier in principle to their combination. However, in practice Realists have not given an adequate account of how 'subjectivity' & 'objectivity' are linked, which also weakens Realism's solution to the 'problem of structure & agency.' This paper offers a refinement: the human power of reflexivity is viewed as mediating between our subjective concerns & our objective social contexts. Reflexive deliberations account for what agents actually do -- and they do not all do the same thing -- under very similar social circumstances. The introduction of reflexivity enables the (socially) objective & the (personally) subjective to be combined into a single account of socially structured & structuring action.

EU programme documents designed to influence the social policies of the member states are filled with concepts of social exclusion and social inclusion. This paper aims to clarify these concepts as they are employed in academic and public policy discourse and to discuss the societal function of this discourse and the impact of the European agenda of social inclusion. The authors show that although concepts of social exclusion and social inclusion are far from straightforward in meaning, their influence on public policy discourse and agenda is evident. The reason is that they redirect social policy towards a multidimensional approach, towards balancing rights and obligations, and towards more complex but also local and individualised policies, though the corresponding discourse bears the normative features of a social 'vision'. The EU's social policy agenda exhibits aspirations towards and some potential for achieving real policy change. On the other hand, there are reservations about its true impact. In this respect, the specifi c societal and political context of its implementation plays a crucial role.

This article provides a look at the main turning points in research on educational inequalities, both at the level of the fi eld's subject matter and its methodology. The text focuses on authors and concepts that in their time constituted a major innovation, signifi cantly advancing analysis and knowledge in the fi eld of research on educational inequalities. In the article the authors propose viewing researchers in the fi eld of educational inequalities through the lens of their era and in relation to the major turning points between them, which can be identifi ed in terms of subject matter and methodology, and even chronologically. The authors define three basic periods, and for each one present two key concepts. The first period is represented by the basic model of the stratification process and by the socio-psychological model. The second period is characterised by the concept of educational allocation and the theory of 'maximally maintained inequality' (MMI). Presented for the third period are the multinomial transition model and the theory of 'effectively maintained inequality' (EMI). Across these stages of development the authors highlight three of the cited concepts as ground-breaking methodological innovations (the basic model of the stratification process, the concept of educational allocation, and the multinomial transition model) and the other three as innovations in subject matter (interpretive), though closely tied to the advancement of quantitative methods used in the analysis of educational inequalities (the socio-psychological model and the MMI and EMI theories).

In this article the authors map the theoretical arguments on the gender dimension of the welfare state. They propose three integral dimensions of conceptualising the exercise of parenthood in Czech society in relation to gender equality in the labour market that co-determine the position of parents in the labour market. The authors analyse these dimensions using data from two representative sociological surveys. 1) The right to be a parent (to care for one's child) and the right to work: the measures provided in the Czech welfare state are based on the myth that there are two separate worlds of work and care in conformity with the gender principle, even though there are no significant differences between Czech men and women in terms of the value of work in their lives. 2) Equality or non-discrimination in parenthood: the right to work of mothers of young children is violated in the context of generally increasing gender inequalities in the labour market. 3) The opportunity to achieve a work/life balance: in Czech society flexible forms of employment are uncommon, working hours tend to have a fi xed start and finish, or there is negative flexibility, which renders a work/life balance impossible. The way in which state policy defi nes and employers apply the conditions of parenthood in relation to the labour market and in the context of the gender structure of Czech society makes parenthood a significant handicap for the social inclusion of women who are mothers of young children in the Czech Republic.