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The planetary commons
(2024)
The Anthropocene signifies the start of a no- analogue trajectory of the Earth system that is fundamentally different from the Holocene. This new trajectory is characterized by rising risks of triggering irreversible and unmanageable shifts in Earth system functioning. We urgently need a new global approach to safeguard critical Earth system regulating functions more effectively and comprehensively. The global commons framework is the closest example of an existing approach with the aim of governing biophysical systems on Earth upon which the world collectively depends. Derived during stable Holocene conditions, the global commons framework must now evolve in the light of new Anthropocene dynamics. This requires a fundamental shift from a focus only on governing shared resources beyond national jurisdiction, to one that secures critical functions of the Earth system irrespective of national boundaries. We propose a new framework—the planetary commons—which differs from the global commons framework by including not only globally shared geographic regions but also critical biophysical systems that regulate the resilience and state, and therefore livability, on Earth. The new planetary commons should articulate and create comprehensive stewardship obligations through Earth system governance aimed at restoring and strengthening planetary resilience and justice.
Electricity production contributes to a significant share of greenhouse gas emissions in Europe and is thus an important driver of climate change. To fulfil the Paris Agreement, the European Union (EU) needs a rapid transition to a fully decarbonised power production system. Presumably, such a system will be largely based on renewables. So far, many EU countries have supported a shift towards renewables such as solar and wind power using support schemes, but the economic and political context is changing. Renewables are now cheaper than ever before and have become cost-competitive with conventional technologies. Therefore, European policymakers are striving to better integrate renewables into a competitive market and to increase the cost-effectiveness of the expansion of renewables. The first step was to replace previous fixed-price schemes with competitive auctions. In a second step, these auctions have become more technology-open. Finally, some governments may phase out any support for renewables and fully expose them to the competitive power market.
However, such policy changes may be at odds with the need to rapidly expand renewables and meet national targets due to market characteristics and investors’ risk perception. Without support, price risks are higher, and it may be difficult to meet an investor’s income expectations. Furthermore, policy changes across different countries could have unexpected effects if power markets are interconnected and investors able to shift their investments. Finally, in multi-technology auctions, technologies may dominate, which can be a risk for long-term power system reliability. Therefore, in my thesis, I explore the effects of phasing out support policies for renewables, of coordinating these phase-outs across countries, and of using multi-technology designs. I expand the public policy literature about investment behaviour and policy design as well as policy change and coordination, and I further develop an agent-based model.
The main questions of my thesis are what the cost and deployment effects of gradually exposing renewables to market forces would be and how coordination between countries affects investors’ decisions and market prices.. In my three contributions to the academic literature, I use different methods and come to the following results. In the first contribution, I use a conjoint analysis and market simulation to evaluate the effects of phasing out support or reintroducing feed-in tariffs from the perspective of investors. I find that a phase-out leads to investment shifts, either to other still-supported technologies or to other countries that continue to offer support. I conclude that the coordination of policy changes avoids such shifts.. In the second contribution, I integrate the empirically-derived preferences from the first contribution in to an agent-based power system model of two countries to simulate the effects of ending auctions for renewables. I find that this slows the energy transition, and that cross-border effects are relevant. Consequently, continued support is necessary to meet the national renewables targets. In the third contribution, I analyse the outcome of past multi-technology auctions using descriptive statistics, regression analysis as well as case study comparisons. I find that the outcomes are skewed towards single technologies. This cannot be explained by individual design elements of the auctions, but rather results from context-specific and country-specific characteristics. Based on this, I discuss potential implications for long-term power system reliability.
The main conclusions of my thesis are that a complete phase-out of renewables support would slow down the energy transition and thus jeopardize climate targets, and that multi-technology auctions may pose a risk for some countries, especially those that cannot regulate an unbalanced power plant portfolio in the long term. If policymakers decide to continue supporting renewables, they may consider adopting technology-specific auctions to better steer their portfolio. In contrast, if policymakers still want to phase out support, they should coordinate these policy changes with other countries. Otherwise, overall transition costs can be higher, because investment decisions shift to still-supported but more expensive technologies.
The contribution explores how an understanding of neoliberal subjectification in socio-economic education can serve to counteract the trend marketisation of democracy. Drawing on Foucault’s lectures on biopolitics and Brown’s current analysis of neoliberalism, it lays out a sociological explanation that treats the idea of homo economicus as a structuring element of our society and outlines the threat this poses to the liberal democratic order. The second part of the contribution outlines – through immanent critique – an ideology-critical analytical competence that uses key problems to illuminate socially critical perspectives on social reality. The objective is to challenge some of the foundations of social order (Salomon, D. Kritische politische Bildung. Ein Versuch. In B. Widmaier & Overwien, B. (Hrsg.), Was heißt heute kritische politische Bildung? (S. 232–239). Wochenschau, 2013) in pursuit of the ultimate objective of an educated and assertive citizenry.
The digitization has permeated almost all aspects of an individual’s life. In the work context as well as in the private sphere, one readily encounters and relies on Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs), such as Social Networking Sites (SNS), smartphones and so forth. By communicating with as well as obtaining information via such technologies, ICTs engage one’s mind as interaction happens. This interaction of ICTs and the human mind form the focal topic of this thesis. Within this thesis, the human mind is represented on behalf of a facilitated model comprising a perceptual, a cognitive and a motor subsystem. ICTs represent an external stimulus, which triggers the human mind's perceptual subsystem, the cognitive subsystem and eventually leads to a motoric response via the motor subsystem. The external stimulus causing this event chain is within this thesis an ICT. The digital environment and related ICTs are high attention environments offering large and easily accessible amounts of information. Not surprisingly, issues may arise, when the human mind deals with ICTs. Thus, the interplay between ICTs and the human mind entails downsides. This thesis investigates these downsides and in addition the ICT-based factors that cause these downsides. More specifically, the thesis investigates these two aspects as research questions in the context of SNSs as well as other ICTs (such as smartphones, e-learning etc.). Addressing the research questions, 8 articles are submitted within this thesis which address the topic with different methodologies, including quantitative, qualitative, mixed methods as well as systematic literature reviews. Article 1 investigates factors that lead to SNS fatigue and discontinuance intentions in a mixed-methods design. Article 2 explores if certain factors encountered on a newsfeed hamper sensemaking. Article 3 proposes a study design to explore the link between disorderly perceptions of a SNSs newsfeed and gender stereotype activations. Article 4 considers the interplay between users and algorithms via the newsfeed interface and the implications for relevance perceptions. Article 5 explores information acquisition, hampering factors and verification strategies of social media users. Article 6 systematically reviews addiction scales of various ICTs. Article 7 investigates click behavior in e-learning contexts and how this is linked to cultural and personality traits. Finally, article 8 offers a comprehensive overview of the antecedents and consequences of children’s smartphone usage. Within the specific context of SNSs, the thesis suggests that the cognitive tolls imposed on users’ minds cause adverse effects, such as impaired sensemaking, fatigue, stereotype activation as well as intentions to discontinue the service. Other ICTs lead to addiction, and i.e., smartphones evidence to cause cognitive impairments in children. Factors on the ICT side that promote these adverse effects are linked to specific features, such as the newsfeed for SNSs and entail overload or perceptions of disorder. The thesis adds theoretically to the understanding of downsides that arise from the interplay between human minds and ICTs. Especially, the context of SNSs is spotlighted and insights add to the growing body of literature on experiences and perceptions. For instance, one study’s result suggests that considering information organization is as important as merely decreasing overload perceptions from the users in countering adverse effects of SNS usage. Practically, the thesis emphasizes the importance of mindful interaction with ICTs. Future research is welcome to build on the exploratory investigations and may draw an even more holistic picture to enhance the interaction between ICTs and the human mind.
Over the past decades, the traditional profile of the German administrative system has significantly been reshaped and remoulded through reforms and transformations. Manifold modernization efforts have been undertaken to adjust administrative structures and procedures to increasing challenges and pressures. In this chapter, the attempt is made to outline major institutional reform paths in Germany from Weberian bureaucracy to most recent reforms towards a digital transformation of public administration. We will show to what extent the German administrative system has moved away from the classical Weberian bureaucracy to a hybrid system where elements of the ‘old’ model and new reform paradigms such as the NPM and digital government are hybridized, labelled the Neo Weberian State. The question will be addressed as to what extent this shift has taken shape and which hurdles and path-dependencies can be identified to explain partial persistence and continuity over time.
SNS Democracy Council 2023
(2023)
Transboundary problems such as climate change, military conflicts, trade barriers, and refugee flows require increased collaboration across borders. This is to a large extent possible using existing international organizations. In such a case, however, they need to be considerably strengthened – while current trends take us in the opposite direction, according to the researchers in the SNS Democracy Council 2023.
Enacted in 2009, the National Policy on Climate Change (PNMC) is a milestone in the institutionalisation of climate action in Brazil. It sets greenhouse gas (GHG) emission reduction targets and a set of principles and directives that are intended to lay the foundations for a cross-sectoral and multilevel climate policy in the country. However, after more than a decade since its establishment, the PNMC has experienced several obstacles related to its governance, such as coordination, planning and implementation issues. All of these issues pose threats to the effectiveness of GHG mitigation actions in the country.
By looking at the intragovernmental and intergovernmental relationships that have taken place during the lifetime of the PNMC and its sectoral plans on agriculture (the Sectoral Plan for Mitigation and Adaptation to Climate Change for the Consolidation of a Low-Carbon Economy in Agriculture [ABC Plan]), transport and urban mobility (the Sectoral Plan for Transportation and Urban Mobility for Mitigation and Adaption of Climate Change [PSTM]), this exploratory qualitative research investigates the Brazilian climate change governance guided by the following relevant questions: how are climate policy arrangements organised and coordinated among governmental actors to mitigate GHG emissions in Brazil? What might be the reasons behind how such arrangements are established? What are the predominant governance gaps of the different GHG mitigation actions examined? Why do these governance gaps occur?
Theoretically grounded in the literature on multilevel governance and coordination of public policies, this study employs a novel analytical framework that aims to identify and discuss the occurrence of four types of governance gaps (i.e. politics, institutions and processes, resources and information) in the three GHG mitigation actions (cases) examined (i.e. the PNMC, ABC Plan and PSTM). The research results are twofold. First, they reveal that Brazil has struggled to organise and coordinate governmental actors from different policy constituencies and different levels of government in the implementation of the GHG mitigation actions examined. Moreover, climate policymaking has mostly been influenced by the Ministry of Environment (MMA) overlooking the multilevel and cross-sectoral approaches required for a country’s climate policy to mitigate and adapt to climate change, especially if it is considered an economy-wide Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC), as the Brazilian one is.
Second, the study identifies a greater manifestation of gaps in politics (e.g. lack of political will in supporting climate action), institutions and processes (e.g. failures in the design of institutions and policy instruments, coordination and monitoring flaws, and difficulties in building climate federalism) in all cases studied. It also identifies that there have been important advances in the production of data and information for decision-making and, to a lesser extent, in the allocation of technical and financial resources in the cases studied; however, it is necessary to highlight the limitation of these improvements due to turf wars, a low willingness to share information among federal government players, a reduced volume of financial resources and an unequal distribution of capacities among the federal ministries and among the three levels of government.
A relevant finding is that these gaps tend to be explained by a combination of general and sectoral set aspects. Regarding the general aspects, which are common to all cases examined, the following can be mentioned: i) unbalanced policy capabilities existing among the different levels of government, ii) a limited (bureaucratic) practice to produce a positive coordination mode within cross-sectoral policies, iii) the socioeconomic inequalities that affect the way different governments and economic sectors perceive the climate issue (selective perception) and iv) the reduced dialogue between national and subnational governments on the climate agenda (poor climate federalism). The following sectoral aspects can be mentioned: i) the presence of path dependencies that make the adoption of transformative actions harder and ii) the absence of perceived co-benefits that the climate agenda can bring to each economic sector (e.g. reputational gains, climate protection and access to climate financial markets).
By addressing the theoretical and practical implications of the results, this research provides key insights to tackle the governance gaps identified and to help Brazil pave the way to achieving its NDCs and net-zero targets. At the theoretical level, this research and the current country’s GHG emissions profile suggest that the Brazilian climate policy is embedded in a cross-sectoral and multilevel arena, which requires the effective involvement of different levels of political and bureaucratic powers and the consideration of the country’s socioeconomic differences. Thus, the research argues that future improvements of the Brazilian climate policy and its governance setting must frame climate policy as an economic development agenda, the ramifications of which go beyond the environmental sector. An initial consequence of this new perspective may be a shift in the political and technical leadership from the MMA to the institutions of the centre of government (Executive Office of the President of Brazil) and those in charge of the country’s economic policy (Ministry of Economy). This change could provide greater capacity for coordination, integration and enforcement as well as for addressing certain expected gaps (e.g. financial and technical resources). It could also lead to greater political prioritisation of the agenda at the highest levels of government. Moreover, this shift of the institutional locus could contribute to greater harmonisation between domestic development priorities and international climate politics. Finally, the research also suggests that this approach would reduce bureaucratic elitism currently in place due to climate policy being managed by Brazilian governmental institutions, which is still a theme of a few ministries and a reason for the occurrence of turf wars.
This article responds to critical reflections on my Beyond Presidentialism and Parliamentarism by Sarah Birch, Kevin J. Elliott, Claudia Landwehr and James L. Wilson. It discusses how different types of representative democracy, especially different forms of government (presidential, parliamentary or hybrid), can be justified. It clarifies, among other things, the distinction between procedural and process equality, the strengths of semi-parliamentary government, the potential instability of constitutional designs, and the difference that theories can make in actual processes of constitutional reform.
International law is constantly navigating the tension between preserving the status quo and adapting to new exigencies. But when and how do such adaptation processes give way to a more profound transformation, if not a crisis of international law? To address the question of how attacks on the international legal order are changing the value orientation of international law, this book brings together scholars of international law and international relations. By combining theoretical and methodological analyses with individual case studies, this book offers readers conceptualizations and tools to systematically examine value change and explore the drivers and mechanisms of these processes. These case studies scrutinize value change in the foundational norms of the post-1945 order and in norms representing the rise of the international legal order post-1990. They cover diverse issues: the prohibition of torture, the protection of women’s rights, the prohibition of the use of force, the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons, sustainability norms, and accountability for core international crimes. The challenges to each norm, the reactions by norm defenders, and the fate of each norm are also studied. Combined, the analyses show that while a few norms have remained surprisingly robust, several are changing, either in substance or in legal or social validity. The book concludes by integrating the conceptual and empirical insights from this interdisciplinary exchange to assess and explain the ambiguous nature of value change in international law beyond the extremes of mere progress or decline.
The study of subnational and local government systems and reforms has become an increasingly salient topic in comparative public administration. In many European countries, policy implementation, the execution of public tasks and the delivery of services to citizens are largely carried out by local governments, which, at the same time, have been subjected to multiple reforms and sometimes comprehensive institutional re-organizations. This chapter discusses analytical key concepts and outcomes of the comparative study of local governments and local government reforms. It outlines frameworks and analytical tools to capture the variety of institutional settings and developments at the local level of government. It provides an introduction into crucial comparative dimensions, such as functional, territorial and political profiles of local governments, and analyses current reform approaches and outcomes based on recent empirical findings. Finally, the chapter addresses salient issues to be taken up in future comparative studies about local government.
Within the context of United Nations (UN) environmental institutions, it has become apparent that intergovernmental responses alone have been insufficient for dealing with pressing transboundary environmental problems. Diverging economic and political interests, as well as broader changes in power dynamics and norms within global (environmental) governance, have resulted in negotiation and implementation efforts by UN member states becoming stuck in institutional gridlock and inertia. These developments have sparked a renewed debate among scholars and practitioners about an imminent crisis of multilateralism, accompanied by calls for reforming UN environmental institutions. However, with the rise of transnational actors and institutions, states are not the only relevant actors in global environmental governance. In fact, the fragmented architectures of different policy domains are populated by a hybrid mix of state and non-state actors, as well as intergovernmental and transnational institutions. Therefore, coping with the complex challenges posed by severe and ecologically interdependent transboundary environmental problems requires global cooperation and careful management from actors beyond national governments.
This thesis investigates the interactions of three intergovernmental UN treaty secretariats in global environmental governance. These are the secretariats of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, the Convention on Biological Diversity, and the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification. While previous research has acknowledged the increasing autonomy and influence of treaty secretariats in global policy-making, little attention has been paid to their strategic interactions with non-state actors, such as non-governmental organizations, civil society actors, businesses, and transnational institutions and networks, or their coordination with other UN agencies. Through qualitative case-study research, this thesis explores the means and mechanisms of these interactions and investigates their consequences for enhancing the effectiveness and coherence of institutional responses to underlying and interdependent environmental issues.
Following a new institutionalist ontology, the conceptual and theoretical framework of this study draws on global governance research, regime theory, and scholarship on international bureaucracies. From an actor-centered perspective on institutional interplay, the thesis employs concepts such as orchestration and interplay management to assess the interactions of and among treaty secretariats. The research methodology involves structured, focused comparison, and process-tracing techniques to analyze empirical data from diverse sources, including official documents, various secondary materials, semi-structured interviews with secretariat staff and policymakers, and observations at intergovernmental conferences.
The main findings of this research demonstrate that secretariats employ tailored orchestration styles to manage or bypass national governments, thereby raising global ambition levels for addressing transboundary environmental problems. Additionally, they engage in joint interplay management to facilitate information sharing, strategize activities, and mobilize relevant actors, thereby improving coherence across UN environmental institutions. Treaty secretariats play a substantial role in influencing discourses and knowledge exchange with a wide range of actors. However, they face barriers, such as limited resources, mandates, varying leadership priorities, and degrees of politicization within institutional processes, which may hinder their impact. Nevertheless, the secretariats, together with non-state actors, have made progress in advancing norm-building processes, integrated policy-making, capacity building, and implementation efforts within and across framework conventions. Moreover, they utilize innovative means of coordination with actors beyond national governments, such as data-driven governance, to provide policy-relevant information for achieving overarching governance targets.
Importantly, this research highlights the growing interactions between treaty secretariats and non-state actors, which not only shape policy outcomes but also have broader implications for the polity and politics of international institutions. The findings offer opportunities for rethinking collective agency and actor dynamics within UN entities, addressing gaps in institutionalist theory concerning the interaction of actors in inter-institutional spaces. Furthermore, the study addresses emerging challenges and trends in global environmental governance that are pertinent to future policy-making. These include reflections for the debate on reforming international institutions, the role of emerging powers in a changing international world order, and the convergence of public and private authority through new alliance-building and a division of labor between international bureaucracies and non-state actors in global environmental governance.
Review symposium
(2023)
Steffen Ganghof’s Beyond Presidentialism and Parliamentarism: Democratic Design and the Separation of Powers (Oxford University Press, 2021) posits that “in a democracy, a constitutional separation of powers between the executive and the assembly may be desirable, but the constitutional concentration of executive power in a single human being is not” (Ganghof, 2021). To consider, examine and theorise about this, Ganghof urges engagement with semi-parliamentarism. As explained by Ganghof, legislative power is shared between two democratically legitimate sections of parliament in a semi-parliamentary system, but only one of those sections selects the government and can remove it in a no-confidence vote. Consequently, power is dispersed and not concentrated in the hands of any one person, which, Ganghof argues, can lead to an enhanced form of parliamentary democracy. In this book review symposium, George Tsebelis, Michael Thies, José Antonio Cheibub, Rosalind Dixon and Daniel Bogéa review Steffen Ganghof’s book and engage with the author about aspects of research design, case selection and theoretical argument. This symposium arose from an engaging and constructive discussion of the book at a seminar hosted by Texas A&M University in 2022. We thank Prof José Cheibub (Texas A&M) for organising that seminar and Dr Anna Fruhstorfer (University of Potsdam) for initiating this book review symposium.
Green recovery
(2023)
This chapter reviews how the European Union has fared in enabling a green recovery in the aftermath of the Covid-19 crisis, drawing comparisons to developments after the financial crisis. The chapter focuses on the European Commission and its evolving role in promoting decarbonisation efforts in its Member States, paying particular attention to its role in financing investments in low-carbon assets. It considers both the direct effects of green stimulus policies on decarbonisation in the EU and how these actions have shaped the capacities of the Commission as an actor in the field of climate and energy policy. The analysis reveals a significant expansion of the Commission’s role compared to the period following the financial crisis. EU-level measures have provided incentives for Member States to direct large volumes of financing towards investments in climate-friendly assets. Nevertheless, the ultimate impact will largely be shaped by implementation at the national level.
Recent debates in international relations increasingly focus on bureaucratic apparatuses of international organizations and highlight their role, influence, and autonomy in global public policy. In this contribution we follow the recent call made by Moloney and Rosenbloom in this journal to make use of “public administrative theory and empirically based knowledge in analyzing the behavior of international and regional organizations” and offer a systematic analysis of the inner structures of these administrative bodies. Changes in these structures can reflect both the (re-)assignment of responsibilities, competencies, and expertise, but also the (re)allocation of resources, staff, and corresponding signalling of priorities. Based on organizational charts, we study structural changes within 46 international bureaucracies in the UN system. Tracing formal changes to all internal units over two decades, this contribution provides the first longitudinal assessment of structural change at the international level. We demonstrate that the inner structures of international bureaucracies in the UN system became more fragmented over time but also experienced considerable volatility with periods of structural growth and retrenchment. The analysis also suggests that IO's political features yield stronger explanatory power for explaining these structural changes than bureaucratic determinants. We conclude that the politics of structural change in international bureaucracies is a missing piece in the current debate on international public administrations that complements existing research perspectives by reiterating the importance of the political context of international bureaucracies as actors in global governance.
In recent years, governments have increased their efforts to strengthen the citizen-orientation in policy design. They have established temporary arenas as well as permanent units inside the machinery of government to integrate citizens into policy formulation, leading to a “laboratorization” of central government organizations. We argue that the evolution and role of these units herald new dynamics in the importance of organizational reputation for executive politics. These actors deviate from the classic palette of organizational units inside the machinery of government and thus require their own reputation vis-à-vis various audiences within and outside their parent organization. Based on a comparative case study of two of these units inside the German federal bureaucracy, we show how ambiguous expectations of their audiences challenge their organizational reputation. Both units resolve these tensions by balancing their weaker professional and procedural reputation with a stronger performative and moral reputation. We conclude that government units aiming to improve citizen orientation in policy design may benefit from engaging with citizens as their external audience to compensate for a weaker reputation in the eyes of their audiences inside the government organization. Points for practitioners: many governments have introduced novel means to strengthen citizen-centered policy design, which has led to an emergence of novel units inside central government that differ from traditional bureaucratic structures and procedures ; this study analyzes how these new units may build their organizational reputation vis-à-vis internal and external actors in government policymaking. ; we show that such units assert themselves primarily based on their performative and moral reputation.
Worldwide, governments have introduced novel information and communication technologies (ICTs) for policy formulation and service delivery, radically changing the working environment of government employees. Following the debate on work stress and particularly on technostress, we argue that the use of ICTs triggers “digital overload” that decreases government employees’ job satisfaction via inhibiting their job autonomy. Contrary to prior research, we consider job autonomy as a consequence rather than a determinant of digital overload, because ICT-use accelerates work routines and interruptions and eventually diminishes employees’ freedom to decide how to work. Based on novel survey data from government employees in Germany, Italy, and Norway, our structural equation modeling (SEM) confirms a significant negative effect of digital overload on job autonomy. More importantly, job autonomy partially mediates the negative relationship between digital overload and job satisfaction, pointing to the importance of studying the micro-foundations of ICT-use in the public sector.
Conclusion
(2023)
Based on the previous findings in this book, Chapter 18 by Heike Krieger and Andrea Liese discusses the general dynamics of change or metamorphosis in the international legal order. They discern a mixed picture of an international order between metamorphosis—that is, a more fundamental transformation—of international law, norm change, turbulences, and robustness. They explain drivers of change and highlight factors such as national interests during the war on terror, changing long-term foreign policy beliefs, and the rise in populism and autocracy, before discussing the most common strategies the actors involved use. Other relevant factors include changes in the political environment, such as shocks and power shifts or the ambiguous role of fragmentation. Moreover, they identify factors that make legal norms robust, including the vital role of norm defenders and legal and institutional structures as stabilizing elements. Krieger and Liese conclude by cautioning that if the attacks on the international order continue at the current frequency and magnitude, a metamorphosis of international law will likely be unstoppable.
There is a growing recognition that international organizations (IOs) formulate and adopt policy in a wide range of areas. IOs have emerged as key venues for states seeking joint solutions to contemporary challenges such as climate change or COVID-19, and to establish frameworks to bolster trade, development, security, and more. In this capacity, IOs produce both extraordinary and routine policy output with a multitude of purposes, ranging from policies of historic significance like admitting new members to the more mundane tasks of administering IO staff. This article introduces the Intergovernmental Policy Output Dataset (IPOD), which covers close to 37,000 individual policy acts of 13 multi-issue IOs in the 1980–2015 period. The dataset fills a gap in the growing body of literature on the comparative study of IOs, providing researchers with a fine-grained perspective on the structure of IO policy output and data for comparisons across time, policy areas, and organizations. This article describes the construction and coverage of the dataset and identifies key temporal and cross-sectional patterns revealed by the data. In a concise illustration of the dataset’s utility, we apply models of punctuated equilibria in a comparative study of the relationship between institutional features and broad policy agenda dynamics. Overall, the Intergovernmental Policy Output Dataset offers a unique resource for researchers to analyze IO policy output in a granular manner and to explore questions of responsiveness, performance, and legitimacy of IOs.
When are international organizations (IOs) responsive to the policy problems that motivated their establishment? While it is a conventional assumption that IOs exist to address transnational challenges, the question of whether and when IO policy-making is responsive to shifts in underlying problems has not been systematically explored. This study investigates the responsiveness of IOs from a large-n, comparative approach. Theoretically, we develop three alternative models of IO responsiveness, emphasizing severeness, dependence, and power differentials. Empirically, we focus on the domain of security, examining the responsiveness of eight multi-issue IOs to armed conflict between 1980 and 2015, using a novel and expansive dataset on IO policy decisions. Our findings suggest, first, that IOs are responsive to security problems and, second, that responsiveness is not primarily driven by dependence or power differentials but by problem severity. An in-depth study of the responsiveness of the UN Security Council using more granular data confirms these findings. As the first comparative study of whether and when IO policy adapts to problem severity, the article has implications for debates about IO responsiveness, performance, and legitimacy.
The limitations and possibilities of the state in solving societal problems are perennial issues in the political and policy sciences and increasingly so in studies of environmental politics. With the aim of better understanding the role of the state in addressing environmental degradation through policy making, this article investigates the nexus between the environmental policy outputs and the environmental performance. Drawing on three theoretical perspectives on the state and market nexus in the environmental dilemma, we identify five distinct pathways. We then examine the extent to which these pathways are manifested in the real world. Our empirical investigation covers up to 37 countries for the period 1970–2010. While we see no global pattern of linkages between policy outputs and performance, our exploratory analysis finds evidence of policy effects, which suggest that the state can, under certain circumstances, improve the environment through policy making.
Introduction
(2023)
Can a metamorphosis of international law be identified while it is still underway? In Chapter 1, the Introduction, Krieger and Liese set the stage for the interdisciplinary assessment of the effects of the current crisis of the international legal order. They offer fundamental common values as a reference point and yardstick to systematically evaluate and analyse normative changes in international law. After explaining the benefits of interdisciplinary exchange and clarifying the basic concepts from the respective disciplinary perspectives, they develop the book’s conceptual framework for assessing and explaining value change in the international legal order. The Introduction also elaborates on the book’s research design and case selection and summarizes the aims and key contributions of each conceptual and empirical chapter.
East and South
(2022)
"What is 'Europe' in academic discourse? While Europe tends to be used as shorthand, often interchangeable with the 'West', neither the 'West' nor 'Europe' are homogeneous spaces. Though postcolonial studies have long been debunking Eurocentrism in its multiple guises, there is still work to do in fully comprehending how its imaginations and discursive legacies conceive the figure of Europe, as not all who live on European soil are understood as equally 'European'. This volume explores this immediate need to rethink the axis of postcolonial cultural productions, to disarticulate Eurocentrism, to recognise Europe as a more diverse, plural and fluid space, to draw forward cultural exchanges and dialogues within the Global South. Through analyses of literary texts from East-Central Europe and beyond, this volume sheds light on alternative literary cartographies - the multiplicity of Europes and being European which exist both as they are viewed from the different geographies of the global South, and within the continent itself. Covering a wide spatial and temporal terrain in postcolonial and European cultural productions, this volume will be of great interest to scholars and researchers of literature and literary criticism, cultural studies, post-colonial studies, Global South studies and European studies"
Moving mountains?
(2022)
Transitional Justice
(2022)
This publication deals with the topic of transitional justice. In six case studies, the authors link theoretical and practical implications in order to develop some innovative approaches. Their proposals might help to deal more effectively with the transition of societies, legal orders and political systems.
Young academics from various backgrounds provide fresh insights and demonstrate the relevance of the topic. The chapters analyse transitions and conflicts in Sierra Leone, Argentina, Nicaragua, Nepal, and South Sudan as well as Germany’s colonial genocide in Namibia. Thus, the book provides the reader with new insights and contributes to the ongoing debate about transitional justice.
What does homophily do?
(2022)
Understanding the consequences of homophily, which is among the most widely observed social phenomena, is important, with implications for management theory and practice. Therefore, we review management research on the consequences of homophily. As these consequences have been studied at the individual, dyad, team, organizational, and macro levels, we structure our review accordingly. We highlight findings that are consistent and contradictory, as well as those that point to boundary conditions or moderators. In conducting our review, we also derive implications for management research from insights gained by research in other disciplines on this topic. We raise specific issues and opportunities for future research at each level, and conclude with a discussion of broader future research directions, both empirical and conceptual, that apply across levels. We hope that our review will open new vistas in research on this important topic.
Why do exercises in collaborative governance often witness more impasse than advantage? This cumulative dissertation undertakes a micro-level analysis of collaborative governance to tackle this research puzzle. It situates micropolitics at the very center of analysis: a wide range of activities, interventions, and tactics used by actors – be they conveners, facilitators, or participants – to shape the collaborative exercise. It is by focusing on these daily minutiae, and on the consequences that they bring along, the study argues, that we can better understand why and how collaboration can become stuck or unproductive. To do so, the foundational part of this dissertation (Article 1) uses power as a sensitizing concept to investigate the micro-dynamics that shape collaboration. It develops an analytical approach to advance the study of collaborative governance at the empirical level under a power-sensitive and process-oriented perspective. The subsequent articles follow the dissertation's red thread of investigating the micropolitics of collaborative governance by showing facilitation artefacts' interrelatedness and contribution to the potential success or failure of collaborative arrangements (Article 2); and by examining the specialized knowledge, skills and practices mobilized when designing a collaborative process (Article 3). The work is based on an abductive research approach, tacking back and forth between empirical data and theory, and offers a repertoire of concepts – from analytical terms (designed and emerging interaction orders, flows of power, arenas for power), to facilitation practices (scripting, situating, and supervising) and types of knowledge (process expertise) – to illustrate and study the detailed and constant work (and rework) that surrounds collaborative arrangements. These concepts sharpen the way researchers can look at, observe, and understand collaborative processes at a micro level. The thesis thereby elucidates the subtleties of power, which may be overlooked if we focus only on outcomes rather than the processes that engender them, and supports efforts to identify potential sources of impasse.
This paper examines the function that cross-cultural competence (3C) has for NATO in a military context while focusing on two member states and their armed forces: the United States and Germany. Three dimensions were established to analyze 3C internally and externally: dimension A, dealing with 3C within the military organization; dimension B, focusing on 3C in a coalition environment/multicultural NATO contingent, for example while on a mission/training exercise abroad; and dimension C, covering 3C and NATO missions abroad with regard to interaction with the local population.
When developing the research design, the cultural studies-based theory of hegemony constructed by Antonio Gramsci was applied to a comprehensive document analysis of 3C coursework and regulations as well as official documents in order to establish a typification for cross-cultural competence.
As the result, 3C could be categorized as Type I – Ethical 3C, Type II – Hegemonic 3C, and Type III – Dominant 3C. Attributes were assigned according to each type. To validate the established typification, qualitative surveys were conducted with NATO (ACT), the U.S. Armed Forces (USCENTCOM), and the German Armed Forces (BMVg). These interviews validated the typification and revealed a varied approach to 3C in the established dimensions. It became evident that dimensions A and B indicated a prevalence of Type III, which greatly impacts the work atmosphere and effectiveness for NATO (ACT). In contrast, dimension C revealed the use of postcolonial mechanisms by NATO forces, such as applying one’s value systems to other cultures and having the appearance of an occupying force when 3C is not applied (Type I-II). In general, the function of each 3C type in the various dimensions could be determined.
In addition, a comparative study of the document analysis and the qualitative surveys resulted in a canon for culture-general skills. Regarding the determined lack of coherence in 3C correlating with a demonstrably negative impact on effectiveness and efficiency as well as interoperability, a NATO standard in the form of a standardization agreement (STANAG) was suggested based on the aforementioned findings, with a focus on: empathy, cross-cultural awareness, communication skills (including active listening), flexibility and adaptability, and interest. Moreover, tolerance of ambiguity and teachability, patience, observation skills, and perspective-taking could be considered significant. Suspending judgment and respect are also relevant skills here.
At the same time, the document analysis also revealed a lack of coherency and consistency in 3C education and interorganizational alignment. In particular, the documents examined for the U.S. Forces indicated divergent approaches. Furthermore, the interview analysis disclosed a large discrepancy in part between doctrine and actual implementation with regard to the NATO Forces.
Classical liberal democratic theory has provided crucial ideas for a still dominant and hegemonic discourse that rests on ideological conceptions of freedom, equality, peacefulness, inclusive democratic participation, and tolerance. While this may have held some truth for citizens in Western liberal-capitalist societies, such liberal ideals have never been realized in colonial, postcolonial and settler colonial contexts. Liberal democracies are not simply forms of rule in domestic national contexts but also geo-political actors. As such, they have been the drivers of processes of global oppression, colonizing and occupying countries and people, appropriating indigenous land, annihilating people with eliminatory politics right up to genocides. There can be no doubt that the West – with its civilizational Judeo-Christian idea and divine mission ‘to subdue the world’ – has destroyed other civilizations, countries, trading systems, and traditional ways of life and is responsible for the death of hundreds of millions of human beings in the course of colonizing the world from its Empires of trade through colonialism to settler colonialism and today’s politics of regime change. The book discusses the settler colonial regime that Israel has established in Palestine while still claiming to be a democracy. It discusses the failures of liberal democracy to overcome the structural and racist inequalities in post-Apartheid South Africa, and it presents hopeful outlooks on new ideas and forms of democracy in social movements in the MENA region.
Contesting citizenship
(2022)
Democracy and citizenship are conceptually and empirically contested. Against the backdrop of recent and current profound transformations in and of democratic societies, this volume presents and discusses acute contestations, within and beyond national borders and boundaries. Democracy’s crucial relationships, between state and citizenry as well as amongst citizens, are rearranged and re-ordered in various spheres and arenas, impacting on core democratic principles such as accountability, legitimacy, participation and trust. This volume addresses these refigurations by bringing together empirical analyses and conceptual considerations regarding the access to and exclusion from citizenship rights in the face of migration regulation and institutional transformation, and the role of violence in maintaining or undermining social order. With its critical reflection on the consequences and repercussions of such processes for citizens’ everyday lives and for the meaning of citizenship altogether, this book transgresses disciplinary boundaries and puts into dialogue the perspectives of political theory and sociology.
Introduction
(2022)
Several global governance initiatives launched in recent years have explicitly sought to integrate concern for gender equality and gendered harms into efforts to counter terrorism and violent extremism (CT/CVE). As a result, commitments to gender-sensitivity and gender equality in international and regional CT/CVE initiatives, in national action plans, and at the level of civil society programming, have become a common aspect of the multilevel governance of terrorism and violent extremism. In light of these developments, aspects of our own research have turned in the past years to explore how concerns about gender are being incorporated in the governance of (counter-)terrorism and violent extremism, and how this development has affected (gendered) practices and power relations in counterterrorism policymaking and implementation. We were inspired by the growing literature on gender and CT/CVE, and critical scholarship on terrorism and political violence, to bring together a collection of new research addressing these questions.
In countries with long-standing agency traditions, the creation of new agencies rarely comes as a large-scale reform but rather as one structural choice of many possible, most notably a ministerial division. In order to make sense of these choices, the article discusses the role of political design-focusing on the role of political motivations, such as ideological turnover, replacement risks and ideological stands toward administrative efficiency-and organizational dynamics-focusing on the role of administrative legacies and existing organizational palettes. The article utilizes data on organizational creations in the Norwegian central state between 1947 and 2019, in order to explore how political design and organizational dynamics help us understand the creation of agencies relative to ministry divisions over time. We find that political motives matter a great deal for the structural choices made by consecutive Norwegian governments, but that structural path dependencies may also be at play.
The question of whether the monitoring bodies have competence concerning reservations is at the centre of the discussion of reservations to human rights treaties that has occupied many international legal scholars over the last few decades. The Istanbul Convention’s treaty monitoring body, GREVIO, is the only human rights treaty monitoring body with a direct competence concerning reservations. However, as practice to date shows, it does not make much use of this power. This is a big disappointment considering all the efforts of other bodies in the past and the doctrinal positions of various scholars. The main aims of this article are threefold to: present GREVIO’s practice to date concerning reservations, provide a brief historical overview of how other human rights treaty bodies have approached their role concerning reservations, and finally, attempt to explain why GREVIO has abandoned a more proactive position on reservations.
Mediating power?
(2022)
The selection of the executive heads of international organisations represents a key decision in the politics of international organisations. However, we know little about what dynamics influence this selection. The article focuses on the nationality of selected executive heads. It argues that institutional design impacts the factors that influence leadership selection by shaping the costs and benefits of attaining the position for member states’ nationals. The argument is tested with novel data on the nationality of individuals in charge of 69 international organisation bureaucracies between 1970 and 2017. Two findings stand out: first, powerful countries are more able to secure positions in international organisations in which executive heads are voted in by majority voting. Second, less consistent evidence implies that powerful countries secure more positions when bureaucracies are authoritative. The findings have implications for debates on international cooperation by illustrating how power and institutions interact in the selection of international organisation executive heads.
Fighting ISIS in Syria
(2022)
This paper analyses the Operation Euphrates Shield (OES) al-Bab battle and presents the lessons learned. OES started with a mixed force of Free Syrian Army, Turkish special forces and armoured units. During the operation, the aims and the force structure gradually changed, yet not the command structure. When OES aimed to capture al-Bab, ISIS employed conventional active defence strategy. The OES commander's insistence on employing special forces increased own casualties and al-Bab was seized only after resorting to a conventional urban attack. OES presents tactical and operational lessons for the militaries on structure and execution of operations against an irregular adversary employing conventional means.
Administrative reforms refer to conscious decisions about institution building and institutional change that are taken at the end of political processes and can be conceived as the attempt by politico-administrative actors to change the institutional order (polity) within which they make and implement decisions. In this paper we proceed from the assumption that the role of politics, the constellation of political actors and arenas vary according to the scope and objectives of administrative reforms. Depending on whether they refer to changes between organizational units/levels/sectors ('external institutional policy') or to an internal reorganization ('internal institutional policy'), different actor strategies, patterns of conflict and power constellations can be expected. As external administrative reforms are aimed at changing functional and/or territorial jurisdictions and thus always involve external actors, larger resistance, heavier political conflicts and generally more politicization are likely to occur than in the case of internal administrative reforms. Yet, for internal reforms, too, actor coalitions which support or block institutional changes, promotors, leaders, and moderators have revealed to shape processes and outcomes. Against this background, this chapter examines the influence of politics on various types of administrative reforms making a distinction between external and internal institutional policies. We analyse the role of politico-administrative actors, their strategies and influence on the formulation, trajectories and outcomes of administrative reforms. Our major focus will be on reforms in the multi-level system on the one hand and on (Post-) NPM reforms on the other as two major international trends. Drawing on reform experiences in different European countries, the chapter will reveal to what extent actors' interests and influences have triggered and shaped administrative reforms and which difference these have made for the reform outcome.
To date, there has been little research on how advocacy coalitions influence the dynamic relationships between norms. Addressing norm collisions as a particular type of norm dynamics, we ask if and how advocacy coalitions and the constellations between them bring such norm collisions to the fore. Norm collisions surface in situations in which actors claim that two or more norms are incompatible with each other, promoting different, even opposing, behavioural choices. We examine the effect of advocacy coalition constellations (ACC) on the activation and varying evolution of norm collisions in three issue areas: international drug control, human trafficking, and child labour. These areas have a legally codified prohibitive regime in common. At the same time, they differ with regard to the specific ACC present. Exploiting this variation, we generate insights into how power asymmetries and other characteristics of ACC affect norm collisions across our three issue areas.
The European Union’s 2030 climate and energy package introduced fundamental changes compared to its 2020 predecessor. These changes included a stronger focus on the internal market and an increased emphasis on technology-neutral decarbonization while simultaneously de-emphasizing the renewables target. This article investigates whether changes in domestic policy strategies of leading member states in European climate policy preceded the observed changes in EU policy. Disaggregating strategic change into changes in different elements (goals, objectives, instrumental logic), allows us to go beyond analyzing the relative prioritization of different goals, and to analyze how policy requirements for reaching those goals were dynamically redefined over time. To this end, we introduce a new method, which based on insights from social network analysis, enables us to systematically trace those strategic chances. We find that shifts in national strategies of the investigated member states preceded the shift in EU policy. In particular, countries reframed their understanding of supply security, and pushed for the internal electricity market also as a security measure to balance fluctuating renewables. Hence, the increasing focus on markets and market integration in the European 2030 package echoed the increasingly central role of the internal market for electricity supply security in national strategies. These findings also highlight that countries dynamically redefined their goals relative to the different phases of the energy transition.
This thesis is analyzing multiple coordination challenges which arise with the digital transformation of public administration in federal systems, illustrated by four case studies in Germany. I make various observations within a multi-level system and provide an in-depth analysis. Theoretical explanations from both federalism research and neo-institutionalism are utilized to explain the findings of the empirical driven work. The four articles evince a holistic picture of the German case and elucidate its role as a digital government laggard. Their foci range from macro, over meso to micro level of public administration, differentiating between the governance and the tool dimension of digital government.
The first article shows how multi-level negotiations lead to expensive but eventually satisfying solutions for the involved actors, creating a subtle balance between centralization and decentralization. The second article identifies legal, technical, and organizational barriers for cross-organizational service provision, highlighting the importance of inter-organizational and inter-disciplinary exchange and both a common language and trust. Institutional change and its effects on the micro level, on citizens and the employees in local one-stop shops, mark the focus of the third article, bridging the gap between reforms and the administrative reality on the local level. The fourth article looks at the citizens’ perspective on digital government reforms, their expectations, use and satisfaction. In this vein, this thesis provides a detailed account of the importance of understanding the digital divide and therefore the necessity of reaching out to different recipients of digital government reforms. I draw conclusions from the factors identified as causes for Germany’s shortcomings for other federal systems where feasible and derive reform potential therefrom. This allows to gain a new perspective on digital government and its coordination challenges in federal contexts.
Strange New Worlds
(2022)
The Indo-Pacific is fast becoming the main arena for great power competition. After explaining the regional power hierarchy, the paper describes how the EU defines like-mindedness as an explicit partnership category in the Indo-Pacific and which of the countries qualify. Finally, the paper also examines the structural problems the EU faces when projecting power into a faraway region such as this one. The paper argues that for China’s rise to remain peaceful and in the absence of fully regional security arrangements, other Asian actors are increasingly looking for new regional structures that combine elements of cooperation, competition and containment vis-à-vis China - including a more pronounced EU role in the region.
Voting for Votes
(2022)
Scholars frequently expect parties to act strategically in parliament, hoping to affect their electoral fortunes. Voters assumingly assess parties by their activity and vote accordingly. However, the retrospective voting literature looks mostly at the government's outcomes, leaving the opposition understudied. We argue that, for opposition parties, legislative voting constitutes an effective vote-seeking activity as a signaling tool of their attitude toward the government. We suggest that conflictual voting behavior affects voters through two mechanisms: as a signal of opposition valence and as means of ideological differentiation from the government. We present both aggregate- and individual-level analyses, leveraging a dataset of 169 party observations from 10 democracies and linking it to the CSES survey data of 27,371 respondents. The findings provide support for the existence of both mechanisms. Parliamentary conflict on legislative votes has a general positive effect on opposition parties' electoral performance, conditional on systemic and party-specific factors.
The organisation of legislative chambers and the consequences of parliamentary procedures have been among the most prominent research questions in legislative studies. Even though democratic elections not only lead to the formation of a government but also result in an opposition, the literature has mostly neglected oppositions and their role in legislative chambers. This paper proposes to fill this gap by looking at the legislative organisation from the perspective of opposition players. The paper focuses on the potential influence of opposition players in the policy-making process and presents data on more than 50 legislative chambers. The paper shows considerable variance of the formal power granted to opposition players. Furthermore, the degree of institutionalisation of opposition rights is connected to electoral systems and not necessarily correlated with other institutional characteristics such as regime type or the size of legislative chambers.
Reputation and influence
(2022)
International public administrations (IPAs) are collective bodies within international organizations (IOs) made up of international civil servants that support the intergovernmental bodies and member states. Over the last decade, research on these bodies has “gained substantial momentum”. Comparative assessments of IPAs reputation among stakeholders are rare. The literature on the sociological legitimacy of IOs is most advanced in this respect. A comparative agenda on IPAs reputation for expertise or neutrality is still in its infancy. Research has shown that different stakeholders view the same IPA quite differently. Reputation is a crucial concept in political science and IR research and has been widely used to predict states’ future behavior, notably regarding cooperation and conflict. IPAs seem to vary substantially in their reputation for expertise among critical interlocutors. In financial policy, several prominent IPAs are seen as experts, including the European Central Bank and the IMF.
Majorities for minorities
(2022)
Does the process of making a constitution affect the expansiveness of rights protections in the constitution? In particular, is more participation in constitution-making processes better for minority rights protections? While the process of constitution making and its impact on various outcomes have received significant attention, little is known about the impact public participation or deliberation in this process has on the scope and content of minority rights. Using a wide variety of data to empirically assess the relationship between constitution-making processes and the protection of rights for minorities, we find a positive relationship between participatory drafting processes and the inclusion of minority protections in constitutions under some conditions. The article's findings have important implications for understanding political representation and lend support to core arguments about the role of the public in constitutional design.