Horizontalföderalismus und Schweizer Demokratie

Der Beitrag analysiert den zunehmenden Horizontalföderalismus im politischen Mehrebenensystem der Schweiz und fragt nach den Gefahren und Chancen für die Weiterentwicklung der Schweizer Demokratie. Die Evaluierung erfolgt auf der Basis der komplexen Demokratietheorie von Fritz Scharpf, ergänzt um die konstitutiven Perspektiven einer reflexiven Demokratietheorie. Insgesamt wird deutlich, dass der Horizontalföderalismus vor allem aus einer liberalen Position innerhalb einer Output‐ orientierten Demokratietheorie als problematisch angesehen werden muss, da die kantonale Exekutive gegenüber der Legislative gestärkt wird. Der Aufsatz betont aber die Chancen für die schweizerische Demokratie, da der Horizontalföderalismus grosse Ähnlichkeiten mit den Entscheidungsfindungsprozessen auf internationaler Ebene besitzt. Er liefert damit der Schweiz ein Übungsfeld, um ihr traditionell sehr introvertiertes Verständnis von demokratischer Selbstbestimmung zu überwinden und anzuerkennen, dass in einer interdependenten und mobilen Welt die “Einbeziehung des (externen) Anderen” ein Bestandteil einer legitimen demokratischen Ordnung darstellt.     

The Case for Congressional Budgeting

William Howard Taft and Frederick A. Cleveland’s vision of executive budgeting clashes with the unique status of the U.S. Congress among the world’s legislatures, and its proponents may exaggerate the potential for presidents to act as fiscal guardians. This article advocates more congressional budgeting by reinstituting effective fiscal rules and strengthening the role of the budget committees. These mechanisms would enhance fiscal discipline and aid consolidation.     

Dual citizenship and theories of democracy

Dual/multiple citizenship has become a widespread phenomenon in many parts of the world. This acceptance or tolerance of overlapping memberships in political communities represents an important element in the ongoing readjustment of the relationship between citizens and political communities in democratic systems. This article has two goals and parts. First, it evaluates dual citizenship from the perspective of five normative theories of democracy. Liberal and republican as well as multicultural and deliberative understandings of democracy deliver a broad spectrum of arguments in favour of dual citizenship. Only communitarians fear that dual citizenship endangers national democracies. Nevertheless, empirical evidence and national policies largely contradict these fears. The second part of the article reverses the perspective and shows that most theories of democracy do not only legitimate and facilitate the acceptance of dual citizenship – the phenomenon of multiple citizenships induces innovation in democratic theory in turn. A second look at the relationship between dual citizenship and theories of democracy reveals that dual citizenship stimulates refinements, expansions and reconceptualisations of these theories for a transnationalising world.     

Writing Human Rights History—And Social Science Encounters

This review essay on Aryeh Neier's The International Human Rights Movement: A History (Princeton University Press, 2012) discusses Neier's central themes: the origins and maturation of the movement and its effects, including the expansion of human rights and humanitarian law, enhanced criminal accountability for human rights crimes, and the appearance of criminal tribunals, culminating in the International Criminal Court. An overview is interspersed by imaginary conversations between Neier and scholars who speak to his themes, especially legal scholar Jenny Martinez, political scientists Margaret Keck and Kathryn Sikkink, historians Devin Pendas and Tomaz Jardim, and sociologists John Hagan, Daniel Levy, Natan Sznaider, Joachim Savelsberg, and Ryan D. King. Linking a practitioner's account with scholarly analyses yields some benefits of “Pasteur's Quadrant.”     

Countering Hybrid Eco-threats to Global Security Under International Law: The Need for an Comprehensive Legal Approach

Threats to environmental security (‘eco-threats’) face not only shortcomings of environmental protection during hostilities under the Law of Armed Conflict. Considering the new ‘Hybrid Threat’ concept, which had recently been discussed by NATO, the authors recognise from the perspective of International Law the need for adopting a comprehensive legal approach towards such threats. The International Environmental Law, the International Humanitarian Law and the Customary International Law show some shortcomings to tackle the new challenge. In the focus is the rule of law, in particular the principle of proportionality, which can play a role when countering such threats and legal rules can have a positive effect on the international community’s ability to act.     

The Impact of Drinking Water Quality and Sanitation on Child Health: Evidence from Rural Ethiopia

This paper examines the association between stored drinking water quality and sanitation on diarrhoea incidence among under-five children in Ethiopia. Using primary household survey data and microbiological water quality testing for Escherichia coli, our results show that uncontaminated stored drinking water and safe child stool disposal are associated with decreased child diarrhoea incidences of 18 and 20 percentage points, respectively. In contrast, neighbourhood concentration of pit latrine shows an increased incidence of child diarrhoea of 16 percentage points. To protect rural children from the risk of contracting diarrhoea, improving household drinking water quality and changing people’s behaviour towards safe sanitation practices is needed.     

Technology transfer model for Austrian higher education institutions

The aim of this paper is to present the findings of a PhD research (Heinzl 2007, Unpublished PhD Thesis) conducted on the Universities of Applied Sciences in Austria. Four of the models that emerge from this research are: Generic Technology Transfer Model (Sect. 5.1); Idiosyncrasies Model for the Austrian Universities of Applied Sciences (Sect. 5.2); Idiosyncrasies-Technology Transfer Effects Model (Sect. 5.3); Idiosyncrasies-Technology Transfer Cumulated Effects Model (Sect. 5.3). The primary and secondary research methods employed for this study are: literature survey, focus groups, participant observation, and interviews. The findings of the research contribute to a conceptual design of a technology transfer system which aims to enhance the higher education institutions’ technology transfer performance.     

Dimensions of Punitiveness in Germany

Over the last few years, international criminology has increasingly focussed parts of its research on whether there has been a rise in punitiveness in certain nations, and, if so, to what extent it is linked to social developments. In particular, the spread of globalisation corresponding fears and worries have been introduced into the discussion as possible influencing factors. Analyses often refer to the situation of the USA or Great Britain. The situation in continental Europe, however, is obviously a different one. In this contribution especially the situation in Germany will be described. The differentiated levels of punitiveness include attitudes in the population, legislation, sentencing, and enforcement of sentences. As concerns the attitudes within the population the results are partially contradictory, which particularly is due to the blurry concept and the different operationalisations of punitiveness. Overall the results of surveys show a tendency of slightly rising harshness for the population’s attitudes. On the level of legislation the criminal laws have in parts become harsher over the last decades. More statutory definitions of offences have been established, while comparable measures of decriminalisation have fallen away. Here a more distinct development towards punitiveness becomes evident. Case law, especially in the field of sentencing, also tends to become tighter. Eventually, for certain groups of criminals like sex and violent offenders a tendency towards a declination of early releases can be found. Today, these offender groups have to serve a larger proportion of their sentence than they had to in the 1970s. Overall these results in Germany indicate a slight rise of punitiveness that is most distinctly seen in the area of legislation. As to the attitudes to punishment within the population the data hardly suffice to claim a rise in punitiveness.     

Introduction: Global Processes, National Institutions, Local Bricolage: Shaping Law in an Era of Globalization

The articles by Carruthers and Halliday and by Hagan, Levi, and Ferrales in the present issue of Law and Social Inquiry provide a wonderful opportunity to carry out a brief reflection on the broader field of research on globalization and law. As the discussant and organizer/chair, respectively, of a panel on "Law between Globalization and National Institutions," from which these two articles emerged, we use the following pages to: (1) show how both articles exemplify, in two different ways, what we call the "process turn" in globalization research, (2) identify four theoretical themes these articles speak to, relating them to the broader literature, and (3) draw some lessons for future law and society scholarship in an age of globalization. ¹