ABSTRACT
This chapter provides clarification about the content and structure of the ten country chapters, the concepts used in the study of the coalition life cycle in Central and Eastern Europe, and the measurement of specific variables. The analysis conducted in each chapter is based on eight tables including several indicators which capture not only the institutional characteristics of the single country but also the three stages of the coalition life cycle. They also serve to structure its analysis, making the ten cases comparable. In this chapter, we use the data collected for the case of Latvia to illustrate how these tables are structured in terms of time periods and variables.
