@article{Bobzien2023, author = {Bobzien, Licia}, title = {Income inequality and political trust}, series = {Social indicators research}, volume = {169}, journal = {Social indicators research}, number = {1-2}, publisher = {Springer Nature B.V.}, address = {Dordrecht}, issn = {0303-8300}, doi = {10.1007/s11205-023-03168-9}, pages = {505 -- 528}, year = {2023}, abstract = {Political trust—in terms of trust in political institutions—is an important precondition for the functioning and stability of democracy. One widely studied determinant of political trust is income inequality. While the empirical finding that societies with lower levels of income inequality have higher levels of trust is well established, the exact ways in which income inequality affects political trust remain unclear. Past research has shown that individuals oftentimes have biased perceptions of inequality. Considering potentially biased inequality perceptions, I argue that individuals compare their perceptions of inequality to their preference for inequality. If they identify a gap between what they perceive and what they prefer (= fairness gap), they consider their attitudes towards inequality unrepresented. This, in turn, reduces trust in political institutions. Using three waves of the ESS and the ISSP in a cross-country perspective, I find that (1) perceiving a larger fairness gap is associated with lower levels of political trust; (2) the fairness gap mediates the link between actual inequality and political trust; and (3) disaggregating the fairness gap measure, political trust is more strongly linked to variation in inequality perceptions than to variation in inequality preferences. This indicates that inequality perceptions are an important factor shaping trust into political institutions.}, language = {en} } @article{FritschLiedl2022, author = {Fritsch, Nina-Sophie and Liedl, Bernd}, title = {Who belongs to the middle income class in Europe?}, series = {International journal of sociology}, volume = {53}, journal = {International journal of sociology}, number = {1}, publisher = {Routledge, Taylor \& Francis Group}, address = {Abingdon}, issn = {0020-7659}, doi = {10.1080/00207659.2022.2151765}, pages = {59 -- 82}, year = {2022}, abstract = {For many years scholars and politicians discuss the economic importance of the middle income class. Our article contributes to broaden the present state of research by not only examining the structure of the middle class whilst focusing on individual attributes, but by especially taking the role of gender-specific occupational characteristics and country-specific conditions into account. Based on the EU-SILC data 2020 for 17 countries, we analyze which factors affect the structure of the middle income class on the individual, on the occupational and country level. Our findings show that occupational attributes (e.g. part-time rate) prove to be highly relevant in this realm. Moreover, significant gender differences can be observed: women who work in an occupation which is mainly performed by women bear a higher risk of belonging to the lower income class as compared to men.}, language = {en} } @article{HodgesCaperchionevanHeldenetal.2022, author = {Hodges, Ron and Caperchione, Eugenio and van Helden, Jan and Reichard, Christoph and Sorrentino, Daniela}, title = {The role of scientific expertise in COVID-19 policy-making}, series = {Public organization review}, volume = {22}, journal = {Public organization review}, number = {2}, publisher = {Springer}, address = {New York}, issn = {1566-7170}, doi = {10.1007/s11115-022-00614-z}, pages = {249 -- 267}, year = {2022}, abstract = {Immense uncertainty and the need for drastic interventions cause politicians to rely heavily on scientific advice for underpinning or legitimating their COVID-19 decision-making. This paper explores the role of scientific advice in this policy field in Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and the UK. It shows that scientific advice is based on the disciplinary, mainly medical, backgrounds of advisors but is also influenced by social and economic values, which are core to what politicians find important. During the pandemic a growing gap between scientific advice and political decisions is observed.}, language = {en} } @article{Schmidt2020, author = {Schmidt, Max Oliver}, title = {Kirchenasyl als Solidarisierung}, series = {Pax Zeit : Zeitschrift der Deutschen Sektion von Pax Christi}, journal = {Pax Zeit : Zeitschrift der Deutschen Sektion von Pax Christi}, number = {1}, publisher = {Pax Christi-Bewegung, Dt. Sektion}, address = {Berlin}, pages = {16 -- 17}, year = {2020}, language = {de} } @article{KohlerPost2023, author = {Kohler, Ulrich and Post, Julia C.}, title = {Pulp Science?}, series = {Gesellschaft, Wirtschaft, Politik : GWP : Sozialwissenschaften f{\"u}r politische Bildung}, volume = {72}, journal = {Gesellschaft, Wirtschaft, Politik : GWP : Sozialwissenschaften f{\"u}r politische Bildung}, number = {4}, publisher = {Budrich}, address = {Leverkusen}, issn = {2196-1654}, doi = {10.3224/gwp.v72i4.09}, pages = {475 -- 483}, year = {2023}, language = {de} } @article{LimSamperMejia2024, author = {Lim, Misun and Samper Mejia, Cristina}, title = {Race and cohort differences in family status in the United States}, series = {Socius : sociological research for a dynamic world}, volume = {10}, journal = {Socius : sociological research for a dynamic world}, publisher = {Sage Publications}, address = {London}, issn = {2378-0231}, doi = {10.1177/23780231241241041}, pages = {1 -- 4}, year = {2024}, abstract = {In this visualization, the authors show changes in family patterns by different race groups across two cohorts. Using data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979 (born from 1957 to 1965) and 1997 (born from 1980 to 1984), the authors visualize the relationship-parenthood state distributions at each age between 15 and 35 years by race and cohort. The results suggest the rise of cohabiting mothers and the decline of married and divorced mothers among women born from 1980 to 1984. Black women born from 1980 to 1984 were more likely to experience single/childless and single/parent status compared with Black women born from 1957 to 1965. Although with some visible postponement in the recent cohort, white women in both cohorts were more likely to experience married/parent status than other race groups. The decline in married/parent status across the two generations was sharpest among Hispanic women. These descriptive findings highlight the importance of identifying race when discussing changes in family formation and dissolution trends across generations.}, language = {en} } @article{KuehlerDrathschmidtGrossmann2024, author = {K{\"u}hler, Jakob and Drathschmidt, Nicolas and Großmann, Daniela}, title = {'Modern talking'}, series = {Information polity}, volume = {29}, journal = {Information polity}, number = {2}, publisher = {IOS Press}, address = {Amsterdam}, issn = {1570-1255}, doi = {10.3233/IP-230059}, pages = {199 -- 216}, year = {2024}, abstract = {Despite growing interest, we lack a clear understanding of how the arguably ambiguous phenomenon of agile is perceived in government practice. This study aims to alleviate this puzzle by investigating how managers and employees in German public sector organisations make sense of agile as a spreading management fashion in the form of narratives. This is important because narratives function as innovation carriers that ultimately influence the manifestations of the concept in organisations. Based on a multi-case study of 31 interviews and 24 responses to a qualitative online survey conducted in 2021 and 2022, we provide insights into what public sector managers, employees and consultants understand (and, more importantly, do not understand) as agile and how they weave it into their existing reality of bureaucratic organisations. We uncover three meta-narratives of agile government, which we label 'renew', 'complement' and 'integrate'. In particular, the meta-narratives differ in their positioning of how agile interacts with the characteristics of bureaucratic organisations. Importantly, we also show that agile as a management fad serves as a projection surface for what actors want from a modern and digital organisation. Thus, the vocabulary of agile government within the narratives is inherently linked to other diffusing phenomena such as new work or digitalisation.}, language = {en} } @article{SeewannVerwiebe2020, author = {Seewann, Lena and Verwiebe, Roland}, title = {How do people interpret the value concept?}, series = {Journal of beliefs and values}, volume = {41}, journal = {Journal of beliefs and values}, number = {6}, publisher = {Routledge}, address = {Abingdon}, issn = {1469-9362}, doi = {10.1080/13617672.2019.1707748}, pages = {419 -- 432}, year = {2020}, abstract = {Value research has a long and extensive history of theoretical definitions and empirical investigations using large scale quantitative surveys. However, the way the general population understands, defines, and relates to the concept of values, and how these views vary across individuals is seldom addressed. The present study examined subjective interpretations of the term through focus group interviews, and reports on the development of a Value Conceptualisation Scale (VCS) that distinguishes six dimensions of different views on values: normativity, relevance, validity, stability, consistency, and awareness. Focus group interviews (n = 38) as well as several surveys (n = 100, n = 1519, n = 903, n = 94) were used to develop, refine, and test the scale in terms of response variety, temporal stability, as well as convergent and discriminant validity. These systematic results show that views on values do indeed vary significantly between participants. Correlations with dogmatism, preference for consistency, and metacognition were found for corresponding dimensions. The VCS provides an original measure, which enables future research to explore this variation on the conceptualisation of values.}, language = {en} } @article{GraeberKritikosSeebauer2021, author = {Graeber, Daniel and Kritikos, Alexander and Seebauer, Johannes}, title = {COVID-19}, series = {Journal of population economics}, volume = {34}, journal = {Journal of population economics}, number = {4}, publisher = {Springer}, address = {Berlin}, issn = {0933-1433}, doi = {10.1007/s00148-021-00849-y}, pages = {1141 -- 1187}, year = {2021}, abstract = {We investigate how the economic consequences of the pandemic and the government-mandated measures to contain its spread affect the self-employed — particularly women — in Germany. For our analysis, we use representative, real-time survey data in which respondents were asked about their situation during the COVID-19 pandemic. Our findings indicate that among the self-employed, who generally face a higher likelihood of income losses due to COVID-19 than employees, women are about one-third more likely to experience income losses than their male counterparts. We do not find a comparable gender gap among employees. Our results further suggest that the gender gap among the self-employed is largely explained by the fact that women disproportionately work in industries that are more severely affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. Our analysis of potential mechanisms reveals that women are significantly more likely to be impacted by government-imposed restrictions, e.g., the regulation of opening hours. We conclude that future policy measures intending to mitigate the consequences of such shocks should account for this considerable variation in economic hardship.}, language = {en} } @article{ForsterHeinzel2021, author = {Forster, Timon and Heinzel, Mirko Noa}, title = {Reacting, fast and slow}, series = {Journal of European public policy}, volume = {28}, journal = {Journal of European public policy}, number = {8}, publisher = {Routledge, Taylor \& Francis Group}, address = {Abingdon}, issn = {1350-1763}, doi = {10.1080/13501763.2021.1942157}, pages = {1299 -- 1320}, year = {2021}, abstract = {The COVID-19 pandemic created extraordinary challenges for governments to safeguard the well-being of their people. To what extent has leaders' reliance on scientific advice shaped government responses to the COVID-19 outbreak? We argue that leaders who tend to orient themselves on expert advice realized the extent of the crisis earlier. Consequently, these governments would adopt containment measures relatively quickly, despite the high uncertainty they faced. Over time, differences in government responses based on the use of science would dissipate due to herding effects. We test our argument on data combining 163 government responses to the pandemic with national- and individual-level characteristics. Consistent with our argument, we find that countries governed by politicians with a stronger technocratic mentality, approximated by holding a PhD, adopted restrictive containment measures faster in the early, but not in the later, stages of the crisis. This importance of expert-based leadership plausibly extends to other large-scale societal crises.}, language = {en} }