Urszula Kobylińska

The author of the article focuses on the subject of the quality of life within rural areas. She presents possible actions that might be undertaken at the local levels in order to improve the satisfaction of life in the country. The main area of the presented research concerns the Podlasie region, a typical agricultural part of the country. The author of the article analyses the defi nition of the quality of life and presents the variables shaping it, as well as focuses on the research initiatives within the area of the quality of life in Poland and other counties. The article demonstrates results of the research in the area of quality of life in Podlasie region, indicates its weak and strong sides, and examines the causes of the current states of affairs. At the end of the article, the author analyses instruments of fi nancial support form UE founds dedicated to improvement of quality of life in Podlasie region.

One of the ways to make radical improvements in the functioning of Polish administra-tion is to act on the performance, with measures, of the efficiency of public services. In the paper different definitions are presented of efficiency in public services. The main objective is to define measures of to increase the efficiency of public services. The author of the article describes the essence of public services, and shows that the term „efficiency in public services” is hard to define. The article also presents guidelines to build a model to measure efficiency in public services. The author presents the main areas of which councils introduce measures of efficiency. There are certain perspectives that define the measures such as: customer, processes, knowledge and finance. The examples of these measures are universal and possible to use in many types of councils. Considerations in the article don’t exhaust the whole issue – there is only the given in-formation necessary to understand the problem and the way of solving it.

Background. In many economies, both developed and developing rapidly, we can observe the potential of administration as organizations which under appropriate conditions may show high levels of innovation. The administration on one hand may be an active participant and on the other hand act as a creator of conditions conducive to innovative activities. Both of these roles are important and complementary to each other because the administration can create a legislative base as well as adequate infrastructure and space for innovation, and then actively participate in the process of their diffusion. In recent years, the European Union has shown increasing interest in the actions for measuring innovativeness of the European administration and stimulating its growth.
Research aims. The aim of the study is to compare the degree of innovativeness of Polish and Spanish administration and the activities undertaken to stimulate it. In research on the innovativeness of the EU economies (Innovation Union Scoreboard, 2014) both countries were in the group of "moderate innovators", although there are noticeable differences in the approach to the implementation of innovations and cultural conditions of their diffusion.
Methods. The adopted research method was analysis of the reports on public sector innovativeness in the EU and foreign and national literature studies.
Key findings. The analyzed research results clearly show a higher degree of innovativeness of Spanish administration in comparison to Polish administration. Spanish administration has more experience in implementing innovations in the field of management systems, communication, involvement of entities outside the sector to work on innovation and shaping the organizational culture conducive