2011命运之年?——德国社民党的危与机

社民竞今年不得不摒弃在五竞格局中继续作为全民党存在的想法,但无论是党的领导层,还是社民党自身,目前均未承认这一点.这对社民党是不利的,因为它尚未在德国政党格局中找到自己的定位.然而,社民党仍有着良好的机遇,因为没有一个政党像社民党那样拥有可以与所有政党组成联盟的优势,这将强化它在政党谱系中的地位,扩展它的权力选择,而能...     

Democracy in crisis? The declining support for national democracy in European countries, 2007–2011

The Great Recession that started in 2007/2008 has been the worst economic downturn since the crisis of the 1930s in Europe. It led to a major sovereign debt crisis, which is arguably the biggest challenge for the European Union (EU) and its common currency. Not since the 1950s have advanced democracies experienced such a dramatic external imposition of austerity and structural reform policies through inter‐ or supranational organisations such as the EU and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) or as implicitly requested by international financial markets. Did this massive interference with the room for maneuver of parliaments and governments in many countries erode support for national democracy in the crisis since 2007? Did citizens realise that their national democratic institutions were no longer able to effectively decide on major economic and social policies, on economic and welfare state institutions? And did they react by concluding that this constrained democracy no longer merited further support? These are the questions guiding this article, which compares 26 EU countries in 2007–2011 and re‐analyses 78 national surveys. Aggregate data from these surveys is analysed in a time‐series cross‐section design to examine changes in democratic support at the country level. The hypotheses also are tested at the individual level by estimating a series of cross‐classified multilevel logistic regression models. Support for national democracy – operationalised as satisfaction with the way democracy works and as trust in parliament – declined dramatically during the crisis. This was caused both by international organisations and markets interfering with national democratic procedures and by the deteriorating situation of the national economy as perceived by individual citizens.     

Scanning for patterns of relationship: analyzing kinship and marriage networks with Puck 2.0

The article presents the software Puck (Program for the use and computation of kinship data), a computer tool for the in-depth analysis of kinship networks. Its core feature consists in identifying, counting and classifying matrimonial circuit structures (resulting from marriages between kin or affines). Such matrimonial censuses make it possible to explore in a rigorous fashion one of the most central questions in kinship studies: the relationship between particular marriage choices and the patterning of the global kinship network that emerges from them. At the same time, Puck constitutes a general tool for the management, treatment and exploratory analysis of genealogical datasets, including non-genealogical relations and random simulations. Puck has been designed to meet two complementary expectations: the identification of the recurrent, cross-cultural organizational properties of kinship networks, and the ability to situate particular actors within social processes involving both genealogical and non-genealogical factors. This article presents the theoretical foundations and main functions of Puck, using concrete examples drawn from a genealogical dataset of upper-class Parisian Jewish banking dynasties present in Paris during the nineteenth century.     

Rebuilding public administration in the New German Länder: Transfer and differentiation

The rebuilding of public administration in the new German Länder can be described as a process of increasing differentiation. The new states share the common legacy of ‘democratic centralism’ and face similar reform challenges; but the analysis of the establishment of state administrations, local government reform and personnel policy reveals important differences amongst the states. West‐East institutional transfer plays a decisive role in creating effective institutions of governance in the East. However, it does not imply the imposition of a uniform West German ‘model'; rather, institutional transfer encourages administrative differentiation.     

Rohstoffgewinnung im Spannungsfeld des Bodendenkmalschutzes – dargelegt am Beispiel Nordrhein-Westfalens

Zusammenfassung Die Umweltvertr?glichkeitsprüfung (UVP) soll sicherstellen, dass bei bestimmten Vorhaben die Auswirkungen auf die Umwelt, unter anderem auf Kulturgüter, nach einheitlichen Grunds?tzen zur wirksamen Umweltvorsorge frühzeitig und umfassend ermittelt, beschrieben und bewertet werden, damit das Ergebnis so früh wie m?glich bei allen beh?rdlichen Entscheidungen über die Zul?ssigkeit des Vorhabens berücksichtigt wird (1 UVPG). Die UVP ist unselbstst?ndiger Teil beh?rdlicher Zulassungsverfahren (2 UVPG). Sie ersetzt weder fehlende Umweltstandards, noch modifiziert sie das materielle Recht. Der Umfang der vom Tr?ger des Vorhabens vorzulegenden Unterlagen (Umweltvertr?glichkeitsstudie – UVS –) richtet sich nach der materiell-rechtlichen Entscheidungserheblichkeit der Umweltauswirkungen (6 Abs. 1 UVPG). Die UVP ist nicht als ein Suchverfahren konzipiert. Die notwendige Durchführung einer UVP verpflichtet weder den Vorhabenstr?ger noch die Beh?rde dazu, Umweltauswirkungen zu ermitteln, auf die es rechtlich nicht ankommt oder die sich der Erfassung mit den herk?mmlichen Erkenntnismitteln entziehen.