The past thirty years have offered researchers all over the world a generous field of analysis, focused mainly on the changes that took place with “the third wave” of democratization1 (a process that begins with the democratization of Portugal in 1974 and ends with the revolutions in Central and Eastern Europe). The shift from authoritarian political regimes to democratic ones, from planned economy to market economy, as well as the social changes associated with these specific transitions have represented important subjects of reflection and analysis for the researchers in political science, economy or sociology. In an attempt to understand all these changes and offer an appropiate theoretical framework for them, a lot of studies were conducted on the subject during this period of time.