A theory of democratisation through peace-building

Abstract

This contribution presents a theory of democratisation through peace-building. Peace-building is seen as an interactive process between external peace-builders and domestic elites; whether a post-war state develops into a democracy or not depends to a large extent on the outcome of the bargaining process between domestic elites and peace-builders. It is argued that domestic elites typically face many constraints which make adopting democratic reforms a risky and costly proposition. Also, peace-builders usually have much less leverage over domestic elites than one would expect given their resources and man-power. High adoption costs and low leverage explain the outcome of the interaction between peace-builders and domestic elites often results in a peace which is not democratic. The paper uses an analysis of 19 major peace-building missions for exemplifying the theory.     

The Dynamic Process Tracing Environment (DPTE) as a Tool for Studying Political Communication

The dynamic process tracing environment (DPTE) is a unique and flexible tool permitting researchers to study information search and decision making in various manners. This article describes the rationale behind the system, some history of how it has revolutionized the study of voter decision making in elections, and some of the principles of design within the system.     

Hochschulpolitik in mittel- und osteuropa: Konvergenz zu einem gemeinsamen Modell?

In contrast to many other areas, international and European influences on national higher education policies remained limited for a long time. This picture changed fundamentally in the late 1990s with the establishment of the so-called Bologna Process which has the objective of setting up a common European higher education area. So far, however, we have limited knowledge about the extent to which this development actually led to the convergence of national higher education policies. Are national policies moving towards a common model, or are domestic reforms rather characterized by the specific conditions given at the domestic level? In this article these questions are adressed with regard to Central and Eastern European countries which are characterized by different pre-communist and communist patterns of higher education policy.     

Arsonists Suffering From Schizophrenia—A Description in Comparison with Other Offenders with a Similar Diagnosis

This study aims to describe the small and distinct subgroup of arsonists diagnosed with schizophrenia, their motives, personal, and crime scene characteristics. While prior research identified significant differences to other criminals, firesetters in general, or mentally disordered offenders, there are no comparisons with other offender patients with schizophrenia so far. In a forensic institution in Switzerland, a group of 30 arsonists with schizophrenia spectrum disorder (SSD) was compared to 340 other offender patients with SSD using retrograde file analysis and multiple adapted Fisher´s exact tests. While symptoms of SSD were most defining of both groups, arsonists with SSD were more often single, unemployed, prescribed psychiatric medication at index offense, had a smaller variety of criminal motives, and acted out of anger or revenge in the context of a relationship. In conclusion, symptoms of SSD may be more defining and useful in guiding clinical practice than aspects specific to arsonists.     

Ideological Party Cohesion in Macro‐comparative Politics: The Nordic Social Democratic Parties from a Comparative Perspective

‘Party cohesion’ is a central concept in the analysis of agenda‐setting, veto players and coalition‐building as well as in the analysis of policy efficiency and party responsiveness. However, there is no indicator to measure party cohesion in a systematic manner over time and across parties. As a consequence, most established studies treat political parties as unitary actors although from an analytical point of view they should be considered collective actors. In order to overcome this deficiency, in this article a time‐variant and party‐specific index of party cohesion is developed which can be used in macro‐comparative statistical analysis. The concept of ‘ideological cohesion’ is developed along the Left–Right dimension. This index is applied in order to compare the party cohesion of Nordic social democratic parties (SDs) with their counterparts in 17 additional countries. The results show that the myth of the cohesion of Nordic SDs is only true for the golden age of the welfare state. Currently, most of the Nordic SDs actually have a lower party cohesion than their counterparts in many other countries.     

The overweight female body in Malaysian slimming advertisements: problem and solution

This study analyses image and text to investigate the way slimming advertising exploits women’s fear of being overweight to the extent that they feel obliged to do something about their own bodies. We show how Malaysian slimming advertisements construct certain types of female body which reinforce cultural stereotypes, namely the overweight body that exceeds culturally acceptable limits of desirable body size, and the desirable and attainable slim body with no excess fat. Three sample advertisements were selected from a Malaysian English newspaper and analysed using Jewitt and Oyama’s framework to identify the way images and text are used to give specific meanings relating to the female body. The images were examined in terms of representational, interactional and compositional meanings, and the analysis provides evidence of how the extremely overweight female body is pathologised, making it the focus of critical scrutiny. The advertisements use body images to illustrate the problem of being very overweight and the desirability of being slim, and the consumption of slimming services as a quick and easy solution to the problem.     

Undesired intimacy: German–Chinese couples in Germany (1900s–1940s)

ABSTRACT

The article deals with the consequences of the increasing presence of Chinese citizens in Germany since the end of the nineteenth century. Their presence also repeatedly led to marriages with German women, which challenged by the media, the public and state authorities in many ways. This articles focuses initially on the symbolic and institutional-administrative treatment of such marriages between the German Empire and National Socialism. It identifies a wealth of exclusion mechanisms in a highly regulative migration regime. The following sections interpret these developments in light of the broader gender-political and transnational contexts.