Diagnose: Doppelbefund — Ursache: ungeklärt? Die kontroversen um den „demokratischen Frieden“

Ohne Zusammenfassung     

Globale Besteuerung und Demokratische Legitimität

The democratic state has been offering the conditions for legitimately levying taxes. Tax revenues have been securing the sovereign’s ability to act, policy aims pursued through taxation have been the outcome of a democratic process and the coercion backed institutions levying taxes have enjoyed the status of democratic legitimacy. But a twofold dynamic challenges this status quo. States are under pressure to address problems to which global taxation offers the most promising response. And phenomena like capital mobility impose constraints on the state’s ability to effectively use the policy instrument of taxation. Under what institutional arrangements could taxation be maintained as a justifiable instrument? And what should future institutional arrangements of public finance look like?     

Parteien, Vetospieler und der Wettbewerb um Wählerstimmen: Die Arbeitsmarkt-und Beschäftigungspolitik der Ära Kohl

The paper develops a model to explain the labour market and employment policies of the Christian-liberal coalition in Germany between 1982 and 1998. It takes partisan theory as its starting point, but expands it by taking into account the effects of party competition and veto players as well. For the first period of observation, the years 1982 to 1989/90, only moderate reforms can be observed. This can be explained by the fear of the coalition that more far-reaching reforms could exert negative effects on its electoral performance on the one hand, and by the strong influence of the labour union wing of the Christian democratic party on the respective policies on the other hand. During the first years after German unification the government could not implement far reaching partisan reforms either. This was due to the necessity of reacting to the external shock of the unification and the problems associated with it. Only during the last three years in office the coalition was able to push through more coherent reforms due to the huge problems on the labour marker which put the government’s re-election at risk. These reforms could be carried through because the CDU’s labour wing had lost its veto power and because the Bundesrat’s approval was not necessary.     

Reform,Demokratisierung, Stabilität oder Kollaps? Literaturbericht zur Entwicklung des chinesischen Herrschaftssystems

Politische Vierteljahresschrift - Der Literaturbericht gibt eine Übersicht über die internationale Debatte zur aktuellen innenpolitischen Entwicklung Chinas und zur möglichen...     

Die Eigendynamik zur Eindimensionalität des Parteienwettbewerbs: eine Simulationsstudie

While German ideological space is often characterized with two dimensions, empirical estimation demonstrates that party positions can be placed on a uni-dimensional scale. This seems to be inconsistent with conventional spatial models of party competition, since parties should, accordingly, exhaust the two-dimensional space to maximize their votes. This paper suggests an alternative spatial model which adjusts or removes some restrictive assumptions of the conventional models. Most importantly, the model suggested here allows parties to influence the salience and (non-)separability of both dimensions at voters’ decision processes. The simulation results demonstrate that the vote-maximizing parties can coordinate themselves in favor of inequality of the salience or non-separability of both dimensions. This, in turn, leads to a certain level of unidimensionality of party positions.     

Begrenzte Rationalität und regulatives Lernen in der EG: die Liberalisierung der Elektrizitätsversorgung

The article analyses the liberalization of the EC electricity supply industry. Confronting the intergovernmental approach, the case study is based on the premise that the member state executives act within the limits of a bounded rationality and do therefore not always represent clear and fixed interests in EU negotiations. Taking the examples of France and Germany, it shows that the national positions and preferences may change greatly during the course of the decision making process. While the French positional changes may be reasonably well explained by the intergovernmental approach, the German preference changes are attributed to effects of the EC institutions and negotiations. Institutional principles, policy-concepts and fairness criteria guide member state orientations and behavior and hinder the pursuit of unilateral advantages. Incremental negotiation techniques within the Council induce learning processes and cause reassessments of the domestic situations. Furthermore, the EC decisions may cause behavioral changes which clearly surpass their regulatory content even if they contain extensive flexibilisation mechanisms.     

Elektorale Responsivität als Kriterium zur Beurteilung des deutschen Bundestagswahlrechts

We argue that plurality systems strengthen the accountability of governments towards the electorate while proportional systems lead to a broad representation of voter interests in parliament and coalition governments. We demonstrate these effects in an analysis of all German federal elections from 1949 to 2017 using first-tier votes and directly elected deputies as reflecting the plurality segment and second-tier votes and the seat shares of parties as reflecting the proportional representation segment. We show that the percentages of directly elected deputies react more to differences in perceived party competences (party valences) than the percentages of all party deputies. Electoral system reforms should take into account the effects of both parts of the German electoral system.     

Staatskapazität und Verwaltungsreformen in hybriden und autoritären Regimen – am Beispiel der Steuerverwaltung in postsowjetischen Ländern

In order to enlarge state capacity, authoritarian regimes have undertaken considerable efforts to (re-)construct and modernize their administrations. Combining various research strands, this literature review links basic findings of research on authoritarian and hybrid regimes to those on administrative reforms in post-soviet countries. As tax administrations are essential for increasing state capacity, a particular focus is laid on these reforms. Drawing on the cases of Russia, Ukraine, and Kazachstan, the article reveals that stable, hegemonic authoritarian regimes seem to succeed better in increasing administrative efficiency and capability. While professionalizing their civil services, however, tax administrations can still be used to repress opponents. Hybrid regimes which are shaped by frequent government turnovers, by contrast, seem to avoid longsome efficiency-oriented reforms of their administrations.     

Clausewitz,Guerillakrieg und Terrorismus. Zur Aktualität einer missverstandenen Kriegstheorie

Politische Vierteljahresschrift - Carl von Clausewitz gilt als der Theoretiker des großen Krieges. Wir wollen zeigen, dass er auch ein innovativer Theoretiker des kleinen, asymmetrischen...     

Die Dimensionalität der Reichstage der Weimarer Republik von 1920 bis 1932

We analyse the dimensionality and the positioning of parliamentary party groups and single MPs in the parliament (“Reichstag”) of the Weimar Republic on the basis of all recorded votes between 1920 and 1932. On the basis of studies on the milieu-boundedness of German parties and theoretical accounts on the dimensionality of parliaments in general we develop hypotheses regarding the number and characteristics of dimensions that structured voting behaviour in the Weimar Reichstag. The expectations are tested with a full sample of recorded parliamentary votes. The results, which are based on item response models, show that two dimensions structured MP’s decision-making: this is, first, an economic left-right axis and, secondly, a pro vs. contra Weimar Republic dimension. Additionally, our results provide support for recent studies on intra-party conflict inside the German national conservatives.     

Mehr Normativität wagen: Ein Plädoyer für eine reflexive Grundhaltung in der politikwissenschaftlichen Lehre

This article argues for a more conscious reference to normativity in political science education. A greater reference to normativity should find its expression in a self-reflexive attitude which includes a disclosure of own normative assumptions, an examination of given postulates and knowledge and a recognition of the complexity of social relations. By looking at students, teachers and learning relations, we show how such a reflexive attitude can be implemented and facilitated in order to educate students who think and act critically.     

Zwischen Kultur, Rationalität und Neo-Pluralismus: Neuerscheinungen zum politischen System Japans

Ohne Zusammenfassung     

Deliberative Politik in transnationalen Räumen — Legitimation und Effektivität in der grenzüberschreitenden Umweltpolitik zwischen Kanada und USA

The article addresses new, horizontal and dialogue-oriented forms of political governance in transnational spaces. A normative-analytical model of deliberative governance will be developed to appraise the democratic potential of transnational structures and actions. The research is guided by the observation that the North American Great Lakes Regime reveals a high democratic-deliberative quality whereas international governance rather tends to de-democratization. This raises a challenging research question: To what extent does the deliberative governance of the Great Lakes Regime provide a model case, which allows drawing conclusions on institutional prerequisites and means how to “democratize” governance in similar issue areas.