The EU's security and defense policy (ESDP) and the challenges of civil–military coordination (CMCO): the case of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC)

Abstract

The article assesses the role of the EU in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and the ability of the EU to coordinate its different means and instruments with regard to the relationship between the European Commission and the Council. The article focuses on what is referred to as civil–military coordination (CMCO) in internal EU documents. The aim is to compare the four ESDP missions in DRC since 2003 with special regard to CMCO since the aim of the EU as a comprehensive security actor is to avoid artificial distinctions between military and civilian missions. Hence, the distinctiveness of ESDP derives precisely from its civil–military synergies, and a comparative perspective on CMCO could tell us more about how the EU has developed so as to become a comprehensive security actor in a country which is of importance for EU interests. The final part of the article assesses the impact on CMCO of the newly implemented Lisbon Treaty. A suitable institutional framework as devised for in the Treaty is essential so as to shape a framework that creates a timely as well as a comprehensive response to crises.     

Sexual Harassment in the Norwegian Theatre World

ABSTRACT

The aim of this article is to provide insight into the phenomenon of sexual harassment in the theatre world. A survey among Norwegian actors is presented showing that sexual harassment is much more prevalent in the theatre world than in Norwegian work life in general. Further, the article aims at understanding why the prevalence is as high as it is. Based on qualitative interviews, the article points out some risk factors that shed light on the high prevalence of sexual harassment. Lastly, the risk factors are related to charismatic authority as an important power base in the theatre world.     

The effect of being conflict non-avoidant: linking conflict framing and political participation

Abstract

The news media’s ability to mobilise citizens to participate politically by emphasising elite conflict in politics is not well understood. This article argues that citizens may gain knowledge when exposed to conflict news framing. It further theorises that whether they translate their knowledge into political participation is conditioned by their orientation towards conflict. Individuals who avoid conflict participate less frequently than individuals who do not. The proposed moderated mediation process was tested using a content analysis of news media coverage and a three-wave panel survey (n?=?2,061). Results show that the effect of exposure to conflict news framing on (changes in) political participation is positively mediated by knowledge. This mediation effect is moderated by conflict avoidance, where the effect is more positive among conflict non-avoiders than conflict avoiders. This study shows that understanding the news media’s mobilising effect on political participation requires attention to both news content and individual motivational factors.     

Tactical Voting and Party Preferences: A Test of Cognitive Dissonance Theory

Studying the development of stable political attitudes, political scientists have argued that repeated voting for a political party reinforces initial party preferences, in a seemingly mechanistic process of habit-formation. However, the empirical evidence is scarce and the theoretical framework underdeveloped. Does the act of voting for a party improve an individual’s evaluation of this party? If so, is this effect simply due to habit-formation, or a more complex psychological mechanism? Drawing on cognitive dissonance theory, we examine the act of voting as a choice inducing dissonance reduction. We go beyond existing research, by focusing on tactical voters—a group for which the notion of habitual reinforcement does not predict an effect. The analyses reveal a positive effect of the act of voting tactically on the preferences for the parties voted for and may thus call for a revision of the traditional understanding of the role of voting in shaping party preferences.     

Public employees and public sector reform implementation

Conventional wisdom says that reforms that aim at improving the productivity of the public sector face opposition from public sector employees, and for this reason, tend to be poorly implemented. These claims are not backed by much hard evidence. This paper seeks to fill some of that gap by investigating why an educational reform containing explicit accountability elements is poorly implemented across Norwegian municipalities about four years after the reform has passed the parliament. The empirical analyses provide evidence that municipalities with a large share of public employees are less likely to implement the reform. The relationship seems to be causal. A reduced-form approach is applied, which prevents conclusions about the mechanisms through which the public employees exercise their influence. However, some preliminary analyses indicate that school leaders hold more negative attitudes towards the reform in municipalities with a large share of public employees, potentially indicating that regulatory capture is an issue: school leaders tend to sympathize more strongly with teachers in such environments.     

Is trust the missing root of institutions, education, and development?

We report evidence that trust is the missing root relating education, institutions, and economic development. We observe that more trust both increases education and improves legal and bureaucratic institutions, which in turn spurs economic development. We substantiate this intuition with a series of regressions that provide evidence that trust determines both education and the quality of institutions, and that education and institutions in turn affect GDP per capita.     

How Pro‐social Motivation Affects Job Satisfaction: An International Analysis of Countries with Different Welfare State Regimes

Employees' pro‐social motivation has been shown to be positively related to job satisfaction, especially when the perceived usefulness of the job to society and other people is high. There is, however, a lack of analyses which include both public and private employees, and it has not yet been studied whether the relationships are robust across welfare state regimes. This study therefore examines the moderated relationship between pro‐social motivation and job satisfaction. Using data from the cross‐national 2005 ISSP survey (14 countries, N = 10,630), it confirms that the relationship between pro‐social motivation and job satisfaction is moderated by perceived usefulness of the job for society and other people. Usefulness again depends on the individual's employment sector (public versus private), and this public–private difference in perceived usefulness also varies between different welfare state regimes. This indicates that sector differences in how pro‐social motivation affects job satisfaction depends on the broader institutional context, and the article therefore contributes with important knowledge for the recruitment and retention of motivated and satisfied employees in a period of changing public–private responsibilities in the provision of welfare services.     

Outer Space Religion and the Overview Effect: A Critical Inquiry into a Classic of the Pro-Space Movement

The Overview Effect by Frank White (1987) aims at creating a “philosophy of space” for the American space program and the pro-space movement. As such, it has become something of a classic. It describes an evolutionary process set in motion by the first astronauts venturing into space and seeing Earth from an extraterrestrial perspective. According to White, this process is guided by universal forces and ultimately leads to the universe becoming intelligent and self-aware. However, The Overview Effect has not only found readers among space enthusiasts; it has also been cited in various literature, some of it academic and dealing with historical and societal aspects of spaceflight. This article examines White's overview thesis and demonstrates that it is fundamentally religious. Thus, evidence of the presence of religion in the American pro-space movement is presented, while at the same time the use of White's thesis in academic literature is put into question.     

The three worlds of post-communism: revisiting deep and proximate explanations

Since the upheavals of 1989–1991, the post-communist countries have embarked upon three distinct political trajectories: a path leading to democracy in the Western part of the setting, a path leading to autocracy in the Eastern part of the setting, and an intermediate path – both in geographical and political terms – leading to ‘defective’ democracy. This article seeks to explain the emergence of these three worlds of post-communism. Using typological theory as the principal methodological tool, we revisit Herbert Kitschelt's distinction between deep (structural) and proximate (actor-centred) explanations. The empirical results show that the post-communist setting is characterized by striking regularities in the form of clustering in the explanandum as well as the explanans. The orderings of referents on both the deep and the proximate attributes show a remarkable co-variation with the political pathways of post-communism – and with each other. The presence of such systematic empirical regularities lends support to two conclusions. First, both kinds of explanations elucidate the present variation in post-communist political regime types. Second, the variation on the deep factors largely explains the variation on the proximate factors. Kitschelt's general plea to dig deeper is thus supported, and the explanatory quest turns into a challenge of theoretical integration.