Vergleichende Politikwissenschaft in Deutschland — Themen, Konjunkturen, Tendenzen, internationale Einordnung

The sub-discipline of Comparative Politics is characterized by a specific subject-matter, the systematic analysis of political systems and their sub-systems, and the application of specific comparative methods. This overview, therefore, deals with both new developments in comparative methodology and their epistemological foundations and recent substantive concerns and developments. Thereby, the strong linkages within the European and international context are also taken into account. It becomes apparent that increasing international tendencies of “globalization” and the internal dynamics of political systems interact in ways which lead to a blurring of the sub-disciplines of Comparative Politics and International Relations. These tendencies are, so far, not adequately dealt with, neither theoretically nor methodologically. On the whole, this review of German Comparative Politics as a very active and, by now, quantitatively dominating sub-discipline concludes with a moderately positive assessment. In this respect, some personal views of the author, who has been involved in these developments for more than forty years now, are probably inevitable.     

Besprechungen

Ohne Zusammenfassung     

The national impact of European Union regulatory policy: Three Europeanization mechanisms

Abstract. While much has been written about the impact of European Union (EU) regulatory policy, most of the scholarly work is concerned with developments at the European level. Only recently have attempts been made to fill this gap. Although there is a growing number of studies explicitly concerned with the Europeanization of domestic institutions, we still lack consistent and systematic concepts to account for the varying patterns of institutional adjustment across countries and policy sectors. The aim of this article is to provide a more comprehensive framework for explaining the domestic impact of European policy making. We make an analytical distinction between three mechanisms of Europeanization – institutional compliance, changing domestic opportunity structures, and framing domestic beliefs and expectations – each of which requires a distinctive approach in order to explain its domestic impact. We argue that it is the particular type of Europeanization mechanism involved rather than the policy area itself that is the most important factor to be considered when investigating the domestic impact of varying European policies.     

Fatalities after injuries by wild animals

The article summarises three fatalities after attacks by wild animals. The first case describes a 90-year-old woman who died as a result of pneumonia after a bear fell on her and caused multiple chest fractures. The second case deals with a 76-year-old woman who was hit in the middle face by the hoof of a camel and, thereafter, died of myocardial infarction. The third case describes a 27-year-old biologist who died from severe blunt trauma after an attack of a wild living elephant. The article gives a summary of typical injury patterns of selected wild animals and outlines potential reasons of death as a result of the injuries.     

The influence of personality on violent victimization – a study on police officers

The current study aims to examine the influence of police officer characteristics, civilian characteristics, and possible interactions between both on violent victimization of police officers. Based on literature distinguishing between ‘provocative’ and ‘submissive’ victims, focus is given on effects of police officers’ personality in terms of the five-factor model plus risk-taking. Patrol police officers (n?=?1813) from Lower Saxony, Germany, completed a paper-and-pencil survey including personality assessments as well as questions about their last three police encounters. Binary logistic multilevel regression analyses demonstrate that police officers with higher scores on neuroticism and openness to experience were more likely to be violently attacked. Furthermore, agreeableness reduced police officers’ risk of violent victimization, while risk-taking and neuroticism increased their risk when confronted with a violent civilian. The study indicates that personality and especially traits that are assumed to provoke potential perpetrators were linked with violent victimization. It further stresses the need to include perpetrator attributes in victim studies in order to identify relevant interaction effects between both parties.     

Measuring interrogative suggestibility in children: Reliability and validity of the bonn test of statement suggestibility

Abstract

The present paper describes three studies that examined false confessions in the laboratory. Studies 1 (N=56) and 2 (N=9) relied on the by now classic computer crash paradigm introduced by Kassin and Kiechel (Psychological Science, 7, 125–128, 1996). Study 3 (N=12) employed a novel paradigm in which undergraduate participants were falsely accused of exam fraud. Our data indicate that false confessions do occur, even when conditions become more ecologically valid. Furthermore, we explored whether individual differences in compliance, suggestibility, fantasy proneness, dissociation, and cognitive failures are related to false confessions. Of these, only fantasy proneness was associated with false confessions.