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The two german electorates
(1996)
Introduction
(1996)
Economic and sociological institutionalism in organization theory : two sides of the same coin?
(1998)
Although past research has emphasized the importance of international regimes for international gover-nance, systematic assessments of regime effects are missing. This article derives a standardized measure-ment concept for the effectiveness of international environmental regimes. It is based on a simultaneous evaluation of actual policy against a no-regime counterfactual and a collective optimum. Subsequently, the empirical feasibility of the measurement concept is demonstrated by way of two international treaties regu-lating transboundary air pollution in Europe. The results demonstrate that the regimes indeed show positive effects;but fall substantially short of the collective optima.
Political Science research encounters inferences across levels of analysis; however, they are fraught with challenges. After introducing voting examples of aggregation bias, problems posed by aggregation bias are summarized more generally. Subsequently, the article reviews the major methodological approaches to overcome aggregation bias and to solve the ecological inference (disaggregation) problem. The article highlights the possibility that aggregation bias may lead governments to accept (or reject) international climate agreements when negotiating as blocs of countries as compared to the distribution of the preferences of all countries involved in the negotiations.
Perhaps like no other country, Germany has radically changed its policies towards regulating air pollution in the European context. Acting originally as a dragger in the 1970s to regulate transboundary air pollutants due to pessimism about the relationship between causes and effects, Germany responded very decisively to its own damage assessment in the early 1980s. In particular the adverse effects to forests (Waldsterben" or forest decline) led to the formulation of strict air pollution regulations in the domestic context, efforts to spread the regulatory system within the European Union, and activities within the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe to foster stronger, continent-wide emission reductions. Using three conceptual models (rational actor, domestic politics, and social learning), we show that Germany deviated strongly from the ideal policy cycle consisting of (i) domestic policy formulation, (ii) international negotiations, as well as (iii) implementation and compliance with the provisions of international environmental agreements. Both national policy-making as well as partial implementation have been well on the way towards compliance even before Germany entered international negotiations on substantive protocols. Therefore, one may conclude from this country study that push countries may use the results of their national policy processes to influence the policy of other countries.
Managing parliaments in the 21st Century : from Policy-Making and Public Management to Governance
(2001)
Social Organization
(2001)
Germany
(2002)
State, administration and governance in Germany: competing traditions and dominant narratives
(2003)
Introduction and Preview
(2004)
Weï re here, weï re queer, and weï re not going shopping! : queering space : Interventionen im Raum
(2004)
The nation-state in question
(2004)
Charles Horton Cooley
(2005)
Confounding is one of the major types of bias encountered in observational epidemiologic surveys designed to study the relation between an exposure factor and a health event. A common way to remove confounding bias during the statistical analysis phase is to adjust for the confounders in a regression model. If a confounding factor is assessed as a continuous variable, it is necessary to define how the variable is entered into the regression model. In the case of logistic regression, we illustrate through simulation that coding by a binary variable or a categorical variable with broad categories may lead to substantial residual confounding. Specific approaches can be used to define a coding method that limits residual confounding. Among these, we briefly present nonparametric approaches and describe in detail several semiparametric approaches (generalised partial linear models, spline regression and fractional polynomials). These can be used to estimate the relation between a continuous factor and the health event of interest by a smooth non pre-specified function. In semiparametric models, the effect of certain covariates is coded by a parametric function, whereas the coding of one or two continuous variables is represented by a nonparametric function. These models can be used in exploratory analyses to describe dose-effect relations between the confounder and the health event, and thus help to define a relevant coding for the confounder
Queer Studies
(2005)
The article structually estimates an on-the-job search model of job separations. Given each employer pays observably equivalent workers the same but wages are dispersed across employers, an employer's separation flow is the sum of an exogenous outflow unrelated to the wage and a job-to-job flow that decreases with the employer's wage. Using data from the Danish Integrated Database for Labour Market Research, the empirical results imply, as predicted by theory, that search effort declines with the wage. Furthermore, the estimates explain the employment effect, defined as the horizontal difference between the distribution of wages earned and the wage offer distribution
The era of public management change is said to challenge traditional "command and control" modes of governance, encouraging a move toward either more informal forms of (co-) governance or market-type incentives and competition. Regardless of whether these claims are made by reform advocates or by more sceptical observers within the wider governance debate, less attention has been paid by either side on the mechanisms that are supposed to facilitate the spread of new forms of control. This article seeks to advance this state of affairs in two ways. First, it utilizes the notion of institutional isomorphism to explore the nature of change of modes of control. In particular, it assesses the mechanisms for change, whether control mechanisms are changing due to coercive, mimetic, or professional mechanisms. Second, it explores the impact of these mechanisms in the federal context of Germany in two policy domains, prison and local government supervision (in the field of building administration). Finally, this article suggests that cultural theory offers considerable insights for the study of institutional isomorphism by emphasizing conflicting worldviews and the diversity of related policy ideas as driving forces of change in modes of governance
While the notion of governance has received considerable scholarly attention, much less is known about change, and its sources, across modes of governance within respective policy domains. This article explores these neglected issues in two policy domains characterized by multi-level governance characteristics: Land (state)- local relationships in the domain of building administration and relationships governing the prisons domain in Germany. It does so in three steps. First, the article explores governance and considers endogenous and exogenous sources of change. Second, it discusses the institutional arrangements in the two domains and analyses modes of governance and their change. Third, the article compares the different dynamics of change and links these findings to wider debates regarding change across and within modes of governance. The analysis of the two domains suggests that 'hunting around' effects (i.e. permanent instability) are less prominent than suggested by cultural theory, while external pressures for change are filtered by the preferences of the actors within the respective domains
Previous research has documented only a modest success rate for imposed sanctions. By contrast, the success rate is higher in cases that are settled at the threat stage. In this article, the authors provide new insights about the circumstances under which sanctions cause behavioral change only after being imposed. First, the target must initially underestimate the impact of sanctions, miscalculate the sender's determination to impose them, or wrongly believe that sanctions will be imposed and maintained whether it yields or not. Second, the target's misperceptions must be corrected after sanctions are imposed. A game-theoretical model with incomplete information is used to develop and clarify the argument
The article departs from the discussion of the Sources of the scholar interest in civil societv and proceeds to the functional expectations about it. It claims that the concept of civil society, as it is frequently used in scientific and political debates, has specific cultural roots, which makcs a trans-cultural analysis difficult or perhaps even impossible. Furthermore, the article addresses three conceptual problems of civil society, namely the issue of what constitutes civil society, its autonomy and impact as well as the challenge of civil society to the state. The central argument of the article is that in order to examine the impact of civil society on governance and democracy, it is recommendable to include three levels of analysis, namely the structure and functions of civil society (including also the possibly negative impact of civil society), the type of state co-existing with civil society as well as the character of the relationship between state and civil society
New Regional Identities and Strategic Essentialism : Case studies from Poland, Italy and Germany
(2007)
Regional identity has become an important issue in debate on current changes in Europe. However, that has happened at a time when many scientists and some social movements adopt critical stances regarding the concept of identity. This paradox encourages the authors to explore current discourses on regions and regional identity. Major questions are:- What do current discourses on regional identity look like? - Is there any relationship of current projects, institutionalisations and discussions of regional iden-tity with the criticisms of the notion of collective identity? - Do current projects and debates of regional identity pay attention to problems pointed out by such criticism (for example the relationship to the "other", i.e. those who are culturally different)? Key features of the book include:- Case studies on regions in Poland (;wi;tokrzyskie, ;l;skie and Warmi;sko-Mazurskie), Italy (Trentino-South Tyrol, Friuli Venezia Giulia and Veneto) and Germany (Brandenburg including its relation to the city-state Berlin).- Accounts of nation state contexts and current developments in regionalisation, regionalism and federalisation debate.- Thorough exploration of fields most important to the shaping of regional identity (school, regional media, representations of history, regional politics...). - Demonstration of much variation in discourses and projects of regional identity.- Reflections on strategic essentialism and heuristic use of that concept.The authors - sociologists from Warsaw, Trento, Bolzano and Potsdam - collaborated in a project which was funded by the Volkswagen Foundation in its initiative "How do we perceive or shape 'foreign' and 'native' cultural identities? Research on processes of intercultural dissociation, media-tion and identity-shaping"."New regional identities and strategic essentialism" appeals to readers interested in current European regionalism and regionalisation as well as to those more inclined to examine general questions of collective identity coming especially from sociology, political science, social geography, regional sciences, contemporary history, social anthropology or cultural studies.
Introduction
(2007)
Conclusions : Governance and Democracy at the Local Level - Structures, Processes and Tensions
(2007)
The power of business
(2007)
This article examines the relation between policies, institutions and time by addressing the case of eastern enlargement policy and the European Commission. Our main question is how the special challenges and requirements of EU eastern enlargement policy impacted on the administrative level of the Commission, i.e. the level in charge of structuring, monitoring and steering the policy's implementation. We provide empirical data on institutional change in the Commission from the mid-1990s until 2004 and examine temporal categories at both the policy level and the institutional level. This analysis shows that - especially the temporal - requirements of enlargement policy drove the Commission to adapt its internal organization and time management; internal structures and procedures changed; actors were bound in a temporal grid. This allowed the mobilization of the actors and the in-time synchronization of their input. On the whole, our results open a new perspective on institutional change and time in the context of European governance.
Manuscript Type: Empirical Research Question/Issue: Why do firms in China, which has a higher level of economic development, communicate less CSR than firms in India? We use a model that includes country-, industry-, and firm-level factors to predict CSR communications intensity, a proxy for CSR activities. Research Findings/Insights: Using data on 68 of the largest multinational companies in China and India, our study shows that Indian firms communicate more CSR primarily due to a more rule-based, as opposed to relation-based, governance environment. Firms in the manufacturing industry tend to communicate more CSR. Firm-level characteristics such as size, duality of CEO and board chairperson, and percentage of external members on the board also have a significant influence on CSR communications. Theoretical/ Academic Implications: The main theoretical contribution of our study is to bring a three-level perspective, relying not only on firm- and industry-specific factors, but also on the governance environment, to the study of firms' CSR behavior. We show that the national governance environment dominates the national income level in affecting CSR communications intensity. We demonstrate that the macro institutional environment in a country strongly affects firm CSR behavior. Our findings suggest that CSR should be studied by considering multilevel antecedents. Practitioner/Policy Implications: Our study suggests that in order to improve the CSR of firms, policy makers in India and China must first try to improve public governance at the national level. Executives doing business with Chinese and Indian companies need to better understand the contrasting governance and their effects on the CSR practices in each country. For the international community and those concerned about product safety and other social issues related to China and India, our findings suggest that improvement will not be immediate since the governance environment changes relatively slowly.
Many parliamentary systems are marked by regular periods of higher and lower legislative activity. This legislation cycle is characterized by an increase in the legislative output shortly ahead of elections and a decrease in legislative initiatives in the second half of the legislative term. This article shows that legislative cycles at the European level are different. First, it shows that the initiation of legislation peaks at the end of parliamentary terms rather than at the beginning. Second, the article shows that the adoption of legislation is only partially connected to the electoral cycle. Instead, the reallocation of agenda powers within the European Parliament twice during a legislature better explains the timing of the adoption of bills than the end of Parliament's term. This finding is especially relevant for legislation adopted under the co-decision procedure. The 'procedural cartel theory' of Cox and McCubbins (2005) combined with the 'economic theory of legislation' provide the theoretical basis that may explain this finding.
Preferential trade agreements pose a big challenge for the multilateral trading system. Throughout the first decade of the twenty-first century, their number has grown significantly. However, these agreements have a range of disadvantages compared with the multilateral regime, for example, in trade facilitation and in dispute settlement. Whereas it will be difficult to stop the further spreading of this wave of preferential agreements, attempts can be made to reduce the negative effects of trade agreements that do, by definition, discriminate against other countries. In this article, a range of potential remedies are discussed, from a moratorium to the better enforcement of World Trade Organization rules on preferential agreements as well as improved monitoring.
This article addresses the different institutional and cultural contexts which must be considered when implementing E-Government in sub-Saharan Africa. Although E-Government is a global phenomenon, simply transferring ICT solutions and related organizational concepts from developed to developing countries seems inappropriate. E-Government undoubtedly has the potential to reduce administrative and development problems. However, it is obvious that compared to developed countries, additional effort is necessary when implementing E-Government in developing countries. More than in developed countries, the different initial institutional, cultural, and wider administrative contexts must be considered to avoid unintended effects. It is oversimplifying the issue to merely state that E-Government projects fail in Africa and other developing regions. Although E-Government in African countries lags far behind developed countries, this should be considered more as a state failure or lack of capacity in general. In particular, the different administrative contexts and rationalities must be taken into an account when implementing E-Government projects and strategies. Therefore, especially for African countries, a context-oriented approach seems to be a more promising route to the successful implementation of E-Government. The results of this approach may not seem ambitious from a western perspective, but could contribute to the solution of real-life and development problems in African societies.