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Die verschwundene Diplomatie
(2019)
Das sechste Potsdamer Textbuch ist eine solide und kritische Bilanz der Außenpolitik der DDR. Weder rechtfertigt und verklärt sie nostalgisch eingefärbt das vergangene System, noch verurteilt sie pauschal. Den Beiträgen liegen sowohl umfangreiche Recherchen in den Archiven als auch lebensweltliche Erfahrungen mit der Außenpolitik des deutschen Realsozialismus zugrunde. Der Band, der zum 70. Geburtstag des ehemaligen Professors am Institut für Internationale Beziehungen der DDR Claus Montag erschien, macht generelle Linien der ostdeutschen Außenpolitik sichtbar und zeigt zugleich sehr konkret die internationale Vernetzung der DDR in den verschiedenen Phasen des Kalten Krieges.
Understanding and quantifying total economic impacts of flood events is essential for flood risk management and adaptation planning. Yet, detailed estimations of joint direct and indirect flood-induced economic impacts are rare. In this study an innovative modeling procedure for the joint assessment of short-term direct and indirect economic flood impacts is introduced. The procedure is applied to 19 economic sectors in eight federal states of Germany after the flood events in 2013. The assessment of the direct economic impacts is object-based and considers uncertainties associated with the hazard, the exposed objects and their vulnerability. The direct economic impacts are then coupled to a supply-side Input-Output-Model to estimate the indirect economic impacts. The procedure provides distributions of direct and indirect economic impacts which capture the associated uncertainties. The distributions of the direct economic impacts in the federal states are plausible when compared to reported values. The ratio between indirect and direct economic impacts shows that the sectors Manufacturing, Financial and Insurance activities suffered the most from indirect economic impacts. These ratios also indicate that indirect economic impacts can be almost as high as direct economic impacts. They differ strongly between the economic sectors indicating that the application of a single factor as a proxy for the indirect impacts of all economic sectors is not appropriate.
Understanding and quantifying total economic impacts of flood events is essential for flood risk management and adaptation planning. Yet, detailed estimations of joint direct and indirect flood-induced economic impacts are rare. In this study an innovative modeling procedure for the joint assessment of short-term direct and indirect economic flood impacts is introduced. The procedure is applied to 19 economic sectors in eight federal states of Germany after the flood events in 2013. The assessment of the direct economic impacts is object-based and considers uncertainties associated with the hazard, the exposed objects and their vulnerability. The direct economic impacts are then coupled to a supply-side Input-Output-Model to estimate the indirect economic impacts. The procedure provides distributions of direct and indirect economic impacts which capture the associated uncertainties. The distributions of the direct economic impacts in the federal states are plausible when compared to reported values. The ratio between indirect and direct economic impacts shows that the sectors Manufacturing, Financial and Insurance activities suffered the most from indirect economic impacts. These ratios also indicate that indirect economic impacts can be almost as high as direct economic impacts. They differ strongly between the economic sectors indicating that the application of a single factor as a proxy for the indirect impacts of all economic sectors is not appropriate.
Flood damage can be mitigated if the parties at risk are reached by flood warnings and if they know how to react appropriately. To gain more knowledge about warning reception and emergency response of private households and companies, surveys were undertaken after the August 2002 and the June 2013 floods in Germany. Despite pronounced regional differences, the results show a clear overall picture: in 2002, early warnings did not work well; e.g. many households (27 %) and companies (45 %) stated that they had not received any flood warnings. Additionally, the preparedness of private households and companies was low in 2002, mainly due to a lack of flood experience. After the 2002 flood, many initiatives were launched and investments undertaken to improve flood risk management, including early warnings and an emergency response in Germany. In 2013, only a small share of the affected households (5 %) and companies (3 %) were not reached by any warnings. Additionally, private households and companies were better prepared. For instance, the share of companies which have an emergency plan in place has increased from 10% in 2002 to 34% in 2013. However, there is still room for improvement, which needs to be triggered mainly by effective risk and emergency communication. The challenge is to continuously maintain and advance an integrated early warning and emergency response system even without the occurrence of extreme floods.
Flash floods are caused by intense rainfall events and represent an insufficiently understood phenomenon in Germany. As a result of higher precipitation intensities, flash floods might occur more frequently in future. In combination with changing land use patterns and urbanisation, damage mitigation, insurance and risk management in flash-flood-prone regions are becoming increasingly important. However, a better understanding of damage caused by flash floods requires ex post collection of relevant but yet sparsely available information for research. At the end of May 2016, very high and concentrated rainfall intensities led to severe flash floods in several southern German municipalities. The small town of Braunsbach stood as a prime example of the devastating potential of such events. Eight to ten days after the flash flood event, damage assessment and data collection were conducted in Braunsbach by investigating all affected buildings and their surroundings. To record and store the data on site, the open-source software bundle KoBoCollect was used as an efficient and easy way to gather information. Since the damage driving factors of flash floods are expected to differ from those of riverine flooding, a post-hoc data analysis was performed, aiming to identify the influence of flood processes and building attributes on damage grades, which reflect the extent of structural damage. Data analyses include the application of random forest, a random general linear model and multinomial logistic regression as well as the construction of a local impact map to reveal influences on the damage grades. Further, a Spearman's Rho correlation matrix was calculated. The results reveal that the damage driving factors of flash floods differ from those of riverine floods to a certain extent. The exposition of a building in flow direction shows an especially strong correlation with the damage grade and has a high predictive power within the constructed damage models. Additionally, the results suggest that building materials as well as various building aspects, such as the existence of a shop window and the surroundings, might have an effect on the resulting damage. To verify and confirm the outcomes as well as to support future mitigation strategies, risk management and planning, more comprehensive and systematic data collection is necessary.
Flooding is assessed as the most important natural hazard in Europe, causing thousands of deaths, affecting millions of people and accounting for large economic losses in the past decade. Little is known about the damage processes associated with extreme rainfall in cities, due to a lack of accurate, comparable and consistent damage data. The objective of this study is to investigate the impacts of extreme rainfall on residential buildings and how affected households coped with these impacts in terms of precautionary and emergency actions. Analyses are based on a unique dataset of damage characteristics and a wide range of potential damage explaining variables at the household level, collected through computer-aided telephone interviews (CATI) and an online survey. Exploratory data analyses based on a total of 859 completed questionnaires in the cities of Munster (Germany) and Amsterdam (the Netherlands) revealed that the uptake of emergency measures is related to characteristics of the hazardous event. In case of high water levels, more efforts are made to reduce damage, while emergency response that aims to prevent damage is less likely to be effective. The difference in magnitude of the events in Munster and Amsterdam, in terms of rainfall intensity and water depth, is probably also the most important cause for the differences between the cities in terms of the suffered financial losses. Factors that significantly contributed to damage in at least one of the case studies are water contamination, the presence of a basement in the building and people's awareness of the upcoming event. Moreover, this study confirms conclusions by previous studies that people's experience with damaging events positively correlates with precautionary behaviour. For improving future damage data acquisition, we recommend the inclusion of cell phones in a CATI survey to avoid biased sampling towards certain age groups.
Weltweit verursachen Städte etwa 70 % der Treibhausgasemissionen und sind daher wichtige Akteure im Klimaschutz bzw. eine wichtige Zielgruppe von Klimapolitiken. Gleichzeitig sind Städte besonders stark von möglichen Auswirkungen des Klimawandels betroffen: Insbesondere extreme Wetterereignisse wie Hitzewellen oder Starkregenereignisse mit Überflutungen verursachen in Städten hohe Sachschäden und wirken sich negativ auf die Gesundheit der städtischen Bevölkerung aus. Daher verfolgt das Projekt ExTrass das Ziel, die städtische Resilienz gegenüber extremen Wetterereignissen in enger Zusammenarbeit mit Stadtverwaltungen, Strukturen des Bevölkerungsschutzes und der Zivilgesellschaft zu stärken. Im Fokus stehen dabei (kreisfreie) Groß- und Mittelstädte mit 50.000 bis 500.000 Einwohnern, insbesondere die Fallstudienstädte Potsdam, Remscheid und Würzburg.
Der vorliegende Bericht beinhaltet die Ergebnisse der 14-monatigen Definitionsphase von ExTrass, in der vor allem die Abstimmung eines Arbeitsprogramms im Mittelpunkt stand, das in einem nachfolgenden dreijährigen Forschungsprojekt (F+E-Phase) gemeinsam von Wissenschaft und Praxispartnern umgesetzt werden soll. Begleitend wurde eine Bestandsaufnahme von Klimaanpassungs- und Klimaschutzstrategien/-plänen in 99 deutschen Groß- und Mittelstädten vorgenommen. Zudem wurden für Potsdam und Würzburg Pfadanalysen für die Klimapolitik durchgeführt. Darin wird insbesondere die Bedeutung von Schlüsselakteuren deutlich. Weiterhin wurden im Rahmen von Stakeholder-Workshops Anpassungsherausforderungen und aktuelle Handlungsbedarfe in den Fallstudienstädten identifiziert und Lösungsansätze erarbeitet, die in der F+E-Phase entwickelt und getestet werden sollen. Neben Maßnahmen auf gesamtstädtischer Ebene und auf Stadtteilebene wurden Maßnahmen angestrebt, die die Risikowahrnehmung, Vorsorge und Selbsthilfefähigkeit von Unternehmen und Bevölkerung stärken können. Daher wurde der Stand der Risikokommunikation in Deutschland für das Projekt aufgearbeitet und eine erste Evaluation von Risikokommunikationswerkzeugen durchgeführt. Der Bericht endet mit einer Kurzfassung des Arbeitsprogramms 2018-2021.
Die Kernfrage der vorliegenden Arbeit lautet: Sichert die Schuldenbremse die fiskalische Nachhaltigkeit in Deutschland? Zur Beantwortung dieser Frage wird zunächst untersucht, welche Vor-Wirkungen die Einführung der Schuldenbremse im Zeitraum 2010-16 auf die deutschen Bundesländer zeitigte. Dafür wurden die beobachtete Konsolidierungsleistung und der 2009 bestehende Konsolidierungsanreiz bzw. –druck der Bundesländer mit Hilfe einer eigens zu diesem Zweck entwickelten Scorecard evaluiert. Mittels multipler Regressionsanalyse wurde dann analysiert, wie die Faktoren der Scorecard die Konsolidierungsleistung der Bun- desländer beeinflussen. Dabei wurde festgestellt, dass beinahe 90% der Variation, durch die unabhängigen Variablen Haushaltslage, Schuldenlast, Einnahmenwachstum und Pensionslast erklärt werden und der Schuldenbremse bei der Konsolidierungsepisode 2009-2016 eher eine untergeordnete Rolle zugefallen sein dürfte. Anschließend wurde mithilfe der in 65 Expertinneninterviews gesammelten Daten analysiert, welche Grenzen der neuen Fiskalregel in ihrem Wirken gesetzt sind, bzw. welche Risiken zukünftig die Einhaltung der Schuldenbremse erschweren oder verhindern könnten: Kommunalverschuldung, FEUs, Eventualverpflichtungen in Form von Bürgschaften für Finanzinstitute und Pensionsverpflichtungen. Die häufig geäußerten Kritikpunkte, die Schuldenbremse sei eine Konjunktur- und Investitionsbremse werden ebenfalls überprüft und zurückgewiesen. Schließlich werden potentielle zukünftige Entwicklungen hinsichtlich der Schuldenbremse und der öffentlichen Verwaltung in Deutschland sowie der Konsolidierungsbemühungen der Länder erörtert.
This article expands our current knowledge about ministerial selection in coalition governments and analyses why ministerial candidates succeed in acquiring a cabinet position after general elections. It argues that political parties bargain over potential office-holders during government-formation processes, selecting future cabinet ministers from an emerging bargaining pool'. The article draws upon a new dataset comprising all ministrable candidates discussed by political parties during eight government-formation processes in Germany between 1983 and 2009. The conditional logit regression analysis reveals that temporal dynamics, such as the day she enters the pool, have a significant effect on her success in achieving a cabinet position. Other determinants of ministerial selection discussed in the existing literature, such as party and parliamentary expertise, are less relevant for achieving ministerial office. The article concludes that scholarship on ministerial selection requires a stronger emphasis for its endogenous nature in government-formation as well as the relevance of temporal dynamics in such processes.
The article explores how recent changes in the governance of employment services in three European countries (Denmark, Germany and Norway) have influenced accountability relationships. The overall assumption in the growing literature about accountability is that the number of actors involved in accountability arrangements is rising, that accountability relationships are becoming more numerous and complex, and that these changes may lead to contradictory accountability relationships, and finally to ‘multi accountability disorder’. The article tries to explore these assumptions by analysing the different actors involved and the information requested in the new governance arrangements in all three countries. It concludes that the considerable changes in organizational arrangements and more managerial information demanded and provided have led to more shared forms of accountability. Nevertheless, a clear development towards less political or administrative accountability could not be observed.
