DIFFERENTIATION OF THE SOCIO-ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT OF THE NUTS-3 SUBREGIONS IN THE COUNTRIES OF CENTRAL AND EASTERN EUROPE

The article focuses on the analysis of the level of the socio-economic development of 239 NUTS-3 level subregions of Central-Eastern Europe based on 31 indicators categorized within the 3 subcomponents (factors) of the regional development: the human capital, the natural environment as well as entrepreneurship and innovativeness. The purpose of the article is to specify the variation in the level of the socio-economic development of the subregions within the arrangement of the NUTS-3 units. The level of the socio-economic development as well as the level of the development of its factors shall be presented based on a synthetic gauge exhibiting the taxonomic distance of a particular subregion from the established pattern of the development. In the study, a hypothesis shall be verified according to which the socio-economic development of Central-Eastern European subregions is highly varied and its highest level is registered in the subregions located around the capitals of the researched states. In the first part of the article an analysis of the theories of the regional development was made with a special consideration of the factors of the socio-economic development. Five stages of the research procedure conducted were then discussed. The results received were comprised within table charts, moreover they were presented in the form of choropleths representing the spatial variation of the level of the socio-economic development of the NUTS-3 unit in Central-Eastern Europe.