Das Alter: adressiert, aktiviert, diskriminiert

In the last years, ageing – or rather active ageing – has become a highly popular issue. In contrast to the disputed activation in labor market policies, the activation of old age seems to be a win-win-situation that benefits everyone. However, embedded in two highly topical debates – demographic change and activation-based welfare state reform – the conditions of the popularization of active ageing remain a blank within the German discussion. This concerns the specifics of old age activation as well as the power-related implications and the normalizing and standardizing consequences of this re-negotiation of old age. It is the aim of this article to discuss these blanks theoretically, paying reference to Anglo-Saxon gerontology, to works on active society and to gender theory on sameness and difference.     

Limited but Evolving: The Political Economy of Social Protections in Nepal

Nepal’s awakening to growing social protection needs occurred only lately with most policies introduced in the 1990s. While comparable by Asian and particularly South Asian standards, these protections are limited and inconsistent. This article takes stock of social protection policies in Nepal with particular emphasis on the extent of coverage relative to needs. It explores the political economy, demand and political contexts to explain why social protections have developed the way they have in Nepal’s modern history. The understanding of Nepal’s struggle with this globally contested issue also helps draw parallels to other low-income countries.     

Market Social Democracy: The Transformation of the SPD up to 2007

The article analyses the changes within German social democracy up to the passing of the SPD's new party programme in 2007. It argues that social democracy has transformed itself from Keynesian into ‘market social democracy’. The comparison takes place by means of a policy analysis in the fields of labour and social, as well as financial, policies. Furthermore, the policy comparison facilitates an analysis of the rationality of the political economy on which these policies are based. It demonstrates that market social democracy represents a reconfiguration of the relationship between the market, the state and the individual, one that renews the social realm with elements of economic liberalism. This process is also reflected in the new party programme, which now includes basic assumptions of German ordoliberalism.     

“Corporatism With Adjectives”? Conceptualizing Civil Society Incorporation and Indigenous Participation in Latin America

Ethnodevelopment is a relatively new type of participatory policy that targets the poverty of marginalized ethnic groups with a focus on identity and self‐management. While observers have recognized the empirical significance of this new paradigm, little has been done to conceptualize ethnodevelopment. This article argues that national‐level ethnodevelopment implementation is a form of corporatism. Examining ethnodevelopment institutions in Ecuador, it shows that the state has structured, subsidized, and partially controlled the indigenous sector through ethnodevelopment policies and agencies. However, certain components of classical corporatism, such as monopolies of representation, do not characterize this paradigm. This article therefore classifies ethnodevelopment as a diminished subtype of corporatism. It challenges corporatism's long association with a particular historical period in the region and finds that Latin American states and social groups have called on historical institutional repertoires in responding to the newly salient ethnic cleavage in the region.     

New Labour and the politics of depoliticisation

A number of commentators in the 1980s sought to explain the character of the Thatcher administration. By contrast, relatively little work has been produced that seeks to analyse the principles and governing strategies of the Blair government. Focusing primarily on economic management, this article offers a characterisation of statecraft under Blair in terms of the politics of depoliticisation. In summary, it argues that the Blair government has fused aspects of traditional economic management with new initiatives to create a powerful tool of governing organised on the basis of the principle of depoliticisation. Depoliticisation as a governing strategy is the process of placing at one remove the political character of decision-making. State managers retain arm's-length control over crucial economic and social processes whilst simultaneously benefiting from the distancing effects of depoliticisation. As a form of politics it seeks to change market expectations regarding the effectiveness and credibility of policy-making in addition to shielding the government from the consequences of unpopular policies.     

Youth welfare policy in Turkey in comparative perspective: a case of ‘Denied Youth Citizenship’

This article explores the main characteristics of social and economic policies for young people in Turkey. Inspired by Tom Chevalier’s typology of youth welfare citizenship designed for Western European countries, the article situates Turkey’s youth welfare citizenship model within a comparative perspective and contributes to the extension of Chevalier’s typology to a non-Western European country context. Relying upon the systematic analysis of findings of a nationwide survey on young people that was conducted in 2013, comparative youth statistics, official youth statistics, public expenditures data and existing policy frameworks, the article suggests that Turkey fits well with the denied youth citizenship type in Chevalier’s typology. Two conclusions are drawn with respect to Turkey’s youth welfare citizenship model. First, with respect to the social citizenship dimension, the article finds that social and youth policy structure in Turkey has a familialization effect on young people’s access to income. In terms of economic citizenship, the article suggests that Turkey implements a selective strategy that results in unequal distribution of labour market skills among young people.     

Ubuntu as public policy in South Africa: A conceptual framework

ABSTRACT

Beginning with an overview of the origin and core elements of ubuntu, this article focuses on the idea that the analytic process required to illustrate how a social theory and a political ideal can be extracted and developed out of their constitutive elements has not been given the rigorous attention it deserves. Without such rigour it is extremely difficult to recommend a coherent conceptual framework for political action. It then suggests guidelines for policy development and implementation, confident that nuanced variations in the various understandings of ubuntu are not so fundamental as to prevent trend-data analysis and generalisation.     

Debating Economic Democracy in South Korea: The Costs of Commensurability

ABSTRACT:

In the 2012 Korean presidential election, both liberal and conservative parties fought their campaigns on the slogan of “economic democratization,” marking a strong departure from past presidential elections and the growth-first policies of the then-incumbent conservative administration. Both parties pledged to tackle growing social polarization and the concentration of economic power by reforming the corporate governance of Korea's large, family-led conglomerates (chaebol), to the degree that chaebol reform itself became synonymous with economic democratization. This focus led to a series of heated exchanges among liberal-left reformers about the vision of economic democratization being promoted, with one camp favoring the creation of a “fair market” through the restructuring of the chaebol and another promoting the protection of the chaebol’s management rights over their affiliates as a desirable strategy for the creation of a Korean welfare state. This essay examines the long-standing tensions between these two liberal-left perspectives and argues that the capital-centric and market-based visions these camps promoted risk confining intellectual debate over the meaning of economic democracy within boundaries that serve dominant political interests.     

The Response to Terrorism as a Threat to Liberal Democracy

When dealing with terrorism as a threat to liberal democracy, it is a common assumption that it is the terrorists — who by definition refuse the rules of the liberal democratic "game"— who pose the greatest threat to the underlying principles and freedoms that are enshrined in this form of political life. However, in instances where the state fails to ensure that its response to terrorism is limited, well-defined and controlled, it is likely that institutionalised counter-terrorist policies will pose an even greater threat to the political and civil traditions that are central to the liberal democratic way of life. This paper demonstrates the potential danger by examining three cases when counter-terrorist policies initiated by (supposedly) liberal democratic entities came dangerously close to transplanting subversive terror from "below" with institutionalised, bureaucratised terror from "above": the "strategy of tension" initiated in Italy between 1969 and 1974; the Spanish "dirty war" against ETA between 1983 and 1987; and the abandonment of democratic rule in Peru between 1992 and 1996. The paper concludes that ultimately the effectiveness of the liberal democratic state's response to terrorism depends on its acceptability. It is therefore paramount that any solution which is initiated is made with due regard to the long term impact that it will have on the wider process of liberal democratic life.     

Vladimir Putin's Vision of Russia as a Normal Great Power

A specialist on Russian foreign policy analyzes Putin's international strategy. The author draws on the writings of Russia's foreign policy decisionmakers, as well as on the commentary of Russian and Western analysts, to identify Putin's vision and compare it with that of recent leaders. Three elements of Putin's policies are examined: state concentration, cooperation with the West, and Russia's projection of influence in the former Soviet region. The question of Western responses to Putin's strategy is also addressed.     

Does Federalism Matter for Biopolicies? Switzerland in Comparative Perspective

This article analyses how federalism matters for the policy‐designing process and the resulting policies in the field of Assisted Reproductive Technology through the comparison of four countries, Switzerland, Germany, Belgium and Canada. It reconstructs from an actor‐centred perspective how federalism interacts with other country and policy‐field specific characteristics and empirically assesses how this interaction influenced the final policies. By focusing on Assisted Reproductive Technology, the article examines the potential influence of federalism on public policies beyond the standard discussion of the comparative political economy of federalism.     

Facsimile edition of CCAS newsletter,no. 1 (May 1968)

Abstract

We have heard a great deal about the greening of the World Bank. The Bank now has an Environmental Department, its projects go through an environmental impact assessment, and it even finances “green” projects through the Global Environment Facility. However, the financing of nature's destruction and people's destitution and disempowerment continues unabated. It is not enough to look at projects directly funded by the World Bank to see the social and ecological disruption that it has caused over the past half a century and still continues to create. The impact of the World Bank is increasingly being felt through structural and sector adjustment loans that influence the macropolicies of entire countries. These loans have much wider influence because they make the World Bank's destructive policies more diffused and more invisible than its projects. The third and deeper level of the World Bank's responsibility in rupturing the social and environmental fabric of survival emerges from the paradigms it diffuses throughout the world through its research, publications, and advice. The social and ecological impact of the World Bank therefore needs to be assessed on the basis of its interventions at all three levels—projects, policies, and paradigms.     

Limits to temporary protection: non-camp Syrian refugees in İzmir,Turkey

This article investigates the situation of non-camp Syrian refugees living in ?zmir with a focus on socio-economic prospects and challenges concerning their survival and integration on the one hand and social acceptance by the host Turkish society on the other. The data were generated by semi-structured interviews conducted between February and April 2014 with non-camp Syrian refugees and Turkish citizens living in ?zmir. The empirical research intends to contribute to the literature through insights on the socio-economic conditions of non-camp Syrians, their level of integration to Turkish society, difficulties and challenges encountered and the perception of Turkish citizens about the rising Syrian population in Turkey. It argues that Turkey’s open-border and ‘temporary protection’ policies are approaching their limits with the increasing number of new arrivals and the concomitant difficulties faced in integrating into Turkish society. The paper suggests that there is an urgent need to create a ‘rights-based approach’ with a long-term integration policy and presents policy recommendations which aim to extend and secure the rights of Syrians through socio-economic adjustments without jeopardizing their social acceptance from and peaceful co-existence with Turkish citizens.     

Will China’s Rise Be Peaceful? A Social Psychological Perspective

This article looks at Chinese foreign policy through the lens of Social Identity Theory (SIT). It aims to show how that approach can give us new insight into a whole series of issues relating to the rise of China. It also tries to show, more generally, how SIT can serve as a useful tool for understanding international politics. In substantive terms, the main claim here is that China has consistently pursued a social creativity strategy (one of the three standard SIT strategies) from the Deng Xiaoping era until the present. The article argues that the concepts of respect and disrespect can provide us with a useful framework for better understanding the conditions for an outbreak of a conflict given a social creativity strategy; it then examines the Taiwan Strait Crisis of 1995–1996 as a plausibility probe. All this supports the basic conclusion that overall China’s rise would be more peaceful than threatening.     

Etat,violence politique et interactions

In this article, we look at the issue of convergence in social policymaking within EU member-states. Proponents of the convergence thesis argue that since European welfare states are facing similar socioeconomic challenges, they are likely to develop common response strategies. Our analysis, based on a survey carried out among policymakers, looks at political debates on the future of social protection in four EU member states. The main focus is on the different institutional structures which characterise European welfare states, and on their impact on political debates in terms of coalition formation. The analysis shows that the influence of socio-economic change on political debates is important, but that it is significantly mediated by the different institutional arrangements which distinguish European welfare states. We conclude that the presence of common socio-economic problems does not necessarily imply a convergence in policy-making.     

UNESCO’s Tangled Web of Preservation: Community,Heritage and Development in China

In the past two decades the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) has broadened its focus on heritage from tangible sites to intangible cultural practices. It has also, according to supporters, advocated for the inclusion of local residents at heritage sites in management plans, emphasised the need to promote and protect human rights, and sought to balance preservation and conservation with what it terms “social and economic” needs. This article examines these claims via a case study on world heritage in China. It is suggested that UNESCO’s embrace of community involvement in heritage management is underpinned by a reliance on two fictive categories: an “international community” that agrees on heritage policies and a fictive homogeneous “local community” assumed to share the institutional values of UNESCO. This in turn reflects assumptions found at the centre of UNESCO’s cosmopolitan project going back to its establishment in 1948.     

Policy Change and the Politics of Expertise: Economic Ideas and Immigration Control Reforms in Switzerland

This article analyses the varying influence across time of the “epistemic community“ of free‐market economists on immigration policy making in Switzerland. To this end, a framework for the analysis of the impact of economic expertise is provided, and then used in an historical analysis comparing the 1960s with the 1990s. Whereas this influence can be considered to have been weak in the 1960s, it gained significantly in importance in the 1990s, when a period of economic unrest seriously challenged previous immigration policies. It is argued that economic experts played an important role in framing the reforms undertaken during this latter period, notably by providing a “credible causal story“ about the links between the existing immigration policy and the social problems which arose in the country in the 1990s. As compared to the 1960s, economic expertise in the 1990s enjoyed more credibility, more political support and took full advantage of a more uncertain social and economic context.     

Reflecting on Social Movement Unionism in Hong Kong: The Case of the Dockworkers’ Strike in 2013

By analysing the 2013 Hong Kong dockworkers’ strike, this article explores how workers, precariously situated in the world’s freest economy, fight for decent wages with the support of civil society. It is argued that the trade union movement in Hong Kong, a Special Administration Region of the People’s Republic of China, is a typical example of social movement unionism. It suggests that the rise of social movement unionism in Hong Kong was a practical strategy of social activists to support labour rights under the specific context of vulnerable structural power, weak institutional power, failed political unionism and a vibrant civil society. Social movement unionism has a “double-edged sword” effect on workers’ power: on the one hand, it has the potential to create societal power and strengthen associational power; on the other hand, it may compromise workers’ militancy and the possibility of stronger workplace bargaining power during workers’ struggle.     

The neoliberal state and the penalization of misery

The strategy adopted by the neoliberal state to maintain social order and safeguard private property in a context of economic deregulation and social precariousness has destroyed the welfare state and aggravated poverty, depriving the masses of any form of social protection while subjecting them to repression. The reinforcement of the repressive state apparatus is associated with the social instability provoked by the lack of social policies, the degradation of living conditions for the great majority of the population, and the amplification of income and property inequalities both in the so-called capitalist periphery and in the richest industrialized countries. The penalization of misery is revealed as a new expression of class domination.     

Economic Constraints and Strategic Choices: The Case of the Frente Amplio of Uruguay’s First Year in Office

The article analyses the economic constraints and strategic choices that shaped the economic policies of the Frente Amplio of Uruguay’s first year in office. It argues that the economic strategy of the Frente Amplio’s administration can be described as the adoption, completion and correction of the incomplete free market reforms enacted by previous right of centre administrations and that this strategy can be explained as the product of two interrelated factors: first, a pragmatic compromise between partially conflicting visions of economic development; and, second, a political strategy that has sought to consider the demands of the different socio‐political constituencies which make up the coalition.