Aktuelle Publikationen

In response to changing climatic conditions, people are increasingly likely to migrate. However, individual-level survey data reveal that people mainly state economic, social, or political reasons as the main drivers for their relocation decision–not environmental motives or climate change specifically. To shed light on this discrepancy, we distinguish between sudden-onset (e.g., floods and storms) and slow-onset (e.g., droughts and salinity) climatic changes and argue that the salience of environmental conditions in individuals’ migration decisions is shaped by the type of climate event experienced. Empirically, we combine individual-level surveys with geographic information on objective climatic changes in Vietnam and Kenya. The empirical evidence suggests that sudden-onset climate events make individuals more likely to link environmental conditions to their migration decision and, hence, to identify themselves as “environmental migrants.” Regression analyses support these results and are consistent with the view that slow-onset events tend to be linked with migration decisions that are more economically motivated.

Most states acknowledge the significance of Indigenous rights to rectify past injustices. Yet, on the domestic level, the realization of these rights depends on national policies. For democratic societies, questions about public opinion toward Indigenous policies are thus of great interest but remain largely unstudied. To what extent does the ethnic majority support policies conducive to Indigenous rights realization? And how different are the Indigenous population’s policy preferences? I use original experimental data from a vignette study to investigate these questions in the case of the Sámi people in Norway and Sweden. I hypothesize that groups’ attitudes are shaped by policies’ potential to alter the social status hierarchy between the majority and Indigenous populations. The results provide a nuanced picture. The ethnic majority shows significantly less support for policies facilitating Sámi linguistic, self-governance, and territorial rights. While the Sámi have, in general, more positive attitudes toward such policies, their support seems to be less pronounced than the majority’s resistance. Moreover, as attitudes are surprisingly similar when compared between Norway and Sweden, a country’s existing policy context does not appear to be crucial in the formation of these preferences.

The paper asks for the contribution of growth models for the explanation of public sector employment relations in Germany. The paper is subdivided into three parts. The first elaborates on long-term developments as well as forms of employment. The second part analyzes wage setting systems, that is, bilateral collective bargaining for employees and unilateral decision-making for civil servants. The third part compares the empirical outcomes of both sub-systems with the assumptions of growth models and distinguished explicitly various concepts of the state as corporate actor.

Political polarization is often understood in terms of extreme issue positions. But polarization can only emerge if issue positions are aligned into a single ideological spectrum, ranging from left/ liberal to right/conservative. It is unclear how a high-dimensional space of policy issues can organize itself into a single ideological spectrum and give rise to polarization. We explain this phenomenon using Weighted Balance Theory (WBT), which describes the interaction of issue positions and interpersonal affect. By implementing WBT into an agent-based opinion dynamics model, we generate a single ideological spectrum from an arbitrarily high dimensional issue space. Furthermore, we show that WBT outperforms other models in predicting respondents’ attitudes in 44 years worth of empirical data from the ANES survey. A calibrated version of our model can reproduce properties of empirically observed opinion distributions.

Objective: Providing country-level estimates for prevalence rates of Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD), COVID-19 exposure and food insecurity (FI) and assessing the role of persistent threats to survival—exemplified by exposure to COVID-19 and FI—for the mental health crisis in Africa.

Methods: Original phone-based survey data from Mozambique, Sierra Leone, Tanzania and Uganda (12 consecutive cross-sections in 2021; n = 23,943) were analyzed to estimate prevalence rates of GAD. Logistic regression models and mediation analysis using structural equation models identify risk and protective factors.

Results: The overall prevalence of GAD in 2021 was 23.3%; 40.2% in Mozambique, 17.0% in Sierra Leone, 18.0% in Tanzania, and 19.1% in Uganda. Both COVID-19 exposure (OR_adj. 1.4; CI 1.3–1.6) and FI (OR_adj 3.2; CI 2.7–3.8) are independent and significant predictors of GAD. Thus, the impact of FI on GAD was considerably stronger than that of COVID-19 exposure.

Conclusion: Persistent threats to survival play a substantial role for mental health, specifically GAD. High anxiety prevalence in the population requires programs to reduce violence and enhance social support. Even during a pandemic, addressing FI as a key driver of GAD should be prioritized by policymakers.

Spoken administrative language is a critical element in the relationship between citizens and the state, especially when it comes to face-to-face interactions between officials and citizens during the delivery of public services. But preceding work offers little insights on the verbal features of street-level bureaucracy. Drawing on communication studies, we argue that administrative language differs along both a relational and an informational linguistic component. To test the consequentiality of this theory, we design a factorial survey experiment with a representative sample of 1,402 German citizens. Participants evaluated audio recordings of a hypothetical service encounter where we systematically varied the language used by the official and the service decision, measuring participants’ service satisfaction as the main outcome. Based on regression analysis, we find that relational elements of administrative language improve citizen satisfaction, independent of the service outcome, but that the effect does not hold for the informational component. These findings emphasize the importance of relational communication in citizen-state interactions, which tends to be neglected in public administration theory and practice.

This article analyses the role of institutional misfit in why member states customise European Union (EU) renewable energy (RE) policies when implementing them. Institutional misfit theory posits that member states only adjust to EU policies when the adaptation pressure remains moderate and national actors’ policy preferences align. Conversely, this article tests the argument that member states manage institutional misfit by adjusting – customising – EU policies, that is, through vertical EU policy change rather than domestic change. Using Qualitative Comparative Analysis, the article compares the customisation of EU Directive 2009/28/EC in Austria, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Sweden and the United Kingdom. Surprisingly, results suggest that institutional misfit is not a necessary condition for customised implementation. Instead, when high institutional fit meets high salience, member states may issue substantively more ambitious policies than the EU requires. Conversely, when high institutional fit meets low salience, member states have no impetus to customise EU rules.

Purpose
Globally, many children are exposed to violent discipline in multiple settings. Interventions to prevent violent discipline are therefore highly needed. In the present study, the feasibility of the intervention Interaction Competencies with Children – for Parents (ICC-P), an additional module of a school-based intervention for teachers, was tested. The intervention aims to prevent violent discipline by changing attitudes towards such method and fostering supportive adult-child interaction through non-violent interaction skills.

Methods
In total, 164 parents (Mage= 39.55, range = 24 70, 72.3% female) from four public secondary schools in Tanzania participated in a four-day training conducted by six trainers (Mage= 44.67, range = 40–47, 50% female). Using a One-Group Pre-Post design, we measured the feasibility and preliminary effectiveness of the intervention qualitatively and quantitatively. Parents were assessed via self-administered questionnaires before and six weeks after the intervention. Trainers rated the implementation of every workshop session.

Results
Based on descriptive statistics and Classical Content Analysis, implementing trainers and participants rated ICC-P as feasible. Participants indicated a high need for such interventions and showed high acceptance. They were able to integrate core aspects of the intervention in their daily interactions with children. Using t-tests, ICC-P proved to be preliminarily effective; parents reported applying less violent discipline and holding more critical attitudes about such measures after the intervention.

Conclusion
ICC-P is feasible intervention that showed initial signs of effectiveness. We recommend combining the parents’ training module with the teachers’ module to prevent violence in multiple settings.

This paper studies the determinants of support for future generations, using novel survey data for the case of Germany. I find significant, but not overwhelming support for prioritizing the needs of future generations vs. the acute needs of present-day citizens. Moreover, individual-level and contextual factors matter too. High-income and highly educated citizens are on average more supportive of the needs of future generations, the elderly and women less so. Left-wing supporters are equally more supportive of future generations, especially supporters of the Greens and those subscribing to ‘green-alternative-liberal’ values. Supporters of the right-wing populist AfD are most strongly opposed. General political trust boosts support for future generations, and economically thriving local economies are associated with higher levels of support for future generations as well.

The relationship between the state and traditional governance institutions (TGI) in contemporary politics has recently received increased scholarly attention. Traditional leaders play important roles in elections, public goods provision or conflict resolution in Sub-Saharan Africa. We analyse under what conditions cooperation or conflict emerge between the state and TGI. We contribute to the understanding of state-traditional relations by studying how governments interact simultaneously with varying TGI of different ethnic groups. We compare state-TGI relations for eight traditional polities in Kenya, Namibia, Tanzania, and Uganda, based on extensive fieldwork and interviews with state and traditional authorities, experts and constituents. We study three factors shaping state relations with different TGI: (1) the significance of TGI – both social and organisational – in each country and ethnic group; (2) the institutional similarity of TGI and state; and (3) the integration of TGI – both legal and political. Our analysis shows TGI with social significance and functional organisations challenge the state more frequently. Constitutional ambiguity fosters conflict between TGI and state. For our cases, relations are less conflictive in countries with more democratic governments. The same governments and TGI often simultaneously engage in cooperative and conflictive relations, highlighting that governments rarely pursue uniform policies with all TGI.

Does technological change fuel political disruption? Drawing on fine-grained labor market data from Germany, this paper examines how technological change affects regional electorates. We first show that the well-known decline in manufacturing and routine jobs in regions with higher robot adoption or investment in information and communication technology (ICT) was more than compensated by parallel employment growth in the service sector and cognitive non-routine occupations. This change in the regional composition of the workforce has important political implications: Workers trained for these new sectors typically hold progressive political values and support progressive pro-system parties. Overall, this composition effect dominates the politically perilous direct effect of automation-induced substitution. As a result, technology-adopting regions are unlikely to turn into populist-authoritarian strongholds.

Were European public reactions to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in line with the external threat hypothesis? Accordingly, the invasion should have increased the perception of threat from Russia’s territorial ambitions and support for collective defence. We review survey data from a diverse sample of ten European countries, collected before and after the event, showing that this was indeed the case. Threat perceptions and attitudes toward various aspects of collective defence – the general principle, readiness to defend other European nations, and NATO – increased fairly consistently across countries, and the association between perceptions and attitudes also increased. Findings regarding (changes in) attitudes towards defence efforts of the European Union were more ambiguous. We discuss the implications of these findings for the future of collective defence in Europe and the resilience of European societies more broadly.

This exploratory analysis investigates self-reported work practices that managers consider to be crucial for driving smart city transformation. We build upon the literature on institutional work and highlight different institutional work types. Using interviews, we show that smart city managers use a combination of institutional work that includes (a) creation (e.g., introducing new ideas, technologies, methods, and policies), (b) maintenance (which involves preserving certain aspects of existing institutional arrangements that are deemed valuable), and (c) disruption (such as by challenging entrenched institutional arrangements). The results provide deep insights into how smart city managers express their roles and responsibilities in smart city transformation. We discuss implications for theory and practice and conclude with avenues for future research.

Trade and foreign direct investment (FDI) relations between developing and developed countries can lead to ratcheting-up of labor standards. Past research, however, has relegated developing countries to a passive role in the global economy while simultaneously largely ignoring variation between developed countries’ degree of protection of labor rights. In this study, we consider FDI by developing countries into Europe and how it can lead to labor upgrading. We argue that the obligations to upgrade implied by Europe’s regulatory environment will pressure developing country firms with strategic asset-seeking FDI to upgrade their practices which can subsequently diffuse in their home countries. We tease out this specific mechanism from others through a comparative research design juxtaposing FDI into high standard social Europe and the relatively low standard United States for a panel of 122 developing countries in the period 2001–2010. Our analysis compares how FDI into each location affects both collective and individual labor rights, finding that FDI into “Social Europe" leads to the improvement of labor standards, particularly trade union rights and substantive rights relating to working conditions, while there is no such upgrading effect for FDI into the United States. These findings are robust to multiple specifications, including an innovative application of the measurement strategy in studies on trading-/investing-up effects. This research helps us to understand two underappreciated facets of this latest phase of globalization: the rise of developing countries as agents of global integration and how regulatory disparities between potential economic partners can affect labor upgrading in those same developing countries. Any weakening of the European social model should consider its external consequences.

The paper deals with the European Company (SE), the first supranational company form. The focal question is its impact on the development of transnational employment relations. We show that only a minority of SEs has set up SE Works Councils and we discuss the reasons for this non-compliance. Board-level employee representation (BLER), the other form of voice, is even less common. We compare both concepts and reveal that the SE’s contribution to the development of transnational employment relations remains limited. By placing the SE in a broader perspective, we conclude that it fits the general pattern of limited progress towards ‘Europeanization’.

Personal relations and networks have long been argued to dominate African politics. Since personal power is difficult to measure, much of the literature has remained either anecdotal or has used ethnicity to approximate power distributions. This article is proposing a social network approach to the analysis of personal power in legislatures and cabinets in three cases: Ghana, Togo and Gabon. We combine survey data on parliamentary discussion networks with a new data set on cabinet appointments. We find that power accumulation in one institution correlates with power accumulation in the other in all three countries, irrespective of the level of democracy: individuals build up a unique power base to advance their careers. We also find differences between the modes of power accumulation and elite integration across our cases. Our findings could stimulate new debates on personal power, regime survival and elite reproduction across different regimes.

Economic inequality constitutes a defining challenge of our time and it remains puzzling why rising levels of inequality have not led to more redistribution. In this article a novel individual-level perspective is taken, with a focus on how much legislators and citizens agree on questions of redistribution and inequality, and what causes these mismatches. The study compares legislators’ views to a representative citizen sample in Switzerland. The results show considerable disagreement between the groups with legislators being more sceptical towards redistribution and seeing inequality as fairer outcome. The mismatch is only partially explained by legislators’ higher social status. Ideology plays a fundamental role as more polarisation according to ideological lines is found among elites and their attitudes are also more rooted in their ideology. In sum, the findings point to some underexplored angles of the puzzle of why not more redistribution has been observed and thus offer a valuable addition to the existing literature.