The roles of non-state actors in climate change governance: understanding agency through governance profiles

Globalization processes have rendered non-state actors an integral part of global governance. The body of literature that has examined non-state actor involvement in global governance has focused mainly on whether and how non-state actors can influence states. Less attention has been paid to the comparative advantages of non-state actors to answer questions about agency across categories of non-state actors, and more precisely what governance activities non-state actors are perceived to fulfil. Using unique survey material from two climate change conferences, we propose that different categories of non-state actors have distinct governance profiles. We further suggest that the different governance profiles are derived from particular power sources and that agency is a function of these profiles. The study thereby contributes to a strand in the literature focusing on the authority of non-state actors in climate governance and broadens the methodological toolkit for studying the “governors” of global governance.     

When revenues are not revenues: the influence of municipal governance on revenue recognition within Swedish municipal waste management

This paper explores the influence of municipal governance forms and structures on accounting compliance in municipal organisations. If municipal governance forms and structures influence accounting compliance, then understanding these relationships becomes important when discussing heterogeneous practice and efficient accounting regulation. The context and object of analysis is the practices of revenue recognition within the Swedish municipal solid waste management sector. Overall, this analysis identifies that financial accounting compliance is influenced by municipal governance forms and structures, and the results further highlight how financial accounting practices might diffuse through local intra-organisational processes. The results emphasise that municipal governance forms and structures are important factors when considering heterogeneous accounting practices in the municipal sector which complement the more conventional analysis of how external institutional, political and economic forces influence accounting choice and compliance.     

Entwicklungslinien der Politischen Theorie in Deutschland seit 1945

In this article we map out the development of German political theory since 1945 and locate it within the international context. For this purpose we track concepts which were central in shaping the scholarly controversies within the field. We distinguish between organizational concepts (democracy, state, power, system, institution), normative ideas (justice, common welfare, recognition) and new themes (gender, discourse, globalization). The resulting picture of the development of political theory replaces the common idea of three phases with a decisive break at the beginning of the 1980s.     

Explaining Quality Management in the Danish and Swedish Public Health Sectors: Unintended Learning and Deliberate Co-Optation

This article examines the development of diverse quality systems in the otherwise quite similar Danish and Swedish public health sectors. After decades of numerous piecemeal medical and managerial quality development programs in both countries, a nationwide mandatory accreditation system was introduced in the Danish health services in 2009. Nationwide quality indicator projects are also found in Sweden, but there has been political attempt to introduce a compulsory system. This article seeks to explain this difference. It argues, first, that resistance from the medical professions blocked the introduction of compulsory, nationwide quality systems in both countries for decades. Second, the implementation of the Danish accreditation system was triggered by a combination of unintended policy learning produced by local reforms in two counties and of the Ministry of Health’s carefully orchestrated policy process that served to co-opt critical voices in the medical profession.     

Global Macroeconomic Imbalances after the Crisis: From the Great Moderation to Secular Stagnation

After the global financial crisis, economists have been downbeat about the growth prospects of the capitalist world economy, leading many to argue that we have re-entered a period of “secular stagnation”. The phenomenon of secular stagnation is intrinsically connected to the evolution of global macroeconomic imbalances. During the pre-crisis era of the “Great Moderation”, the widening of global and European trade imbalances temporarily alleviated the problem of secular stagnation by forging a symbiotic yet unsustainable relationship between debt-financed consumption-led growth models in deficit countries and export-led growth models in surplus countries. The re-surfacing of secular stagnation and the asymmetric adjustment of these imbalances after the crisis can both be traced back to the domestic political constraints experienced by many advanced market economies in trying to revive their pre-crisis growth models.     

Constitutionalism and experimentalist governance

This comment explores how experimentalist governance is connected to wider constitutional questions and makes two claims. First, there are good reasons to believe that experimentalist governance can only flourish in a world where the precepts of liberal democratic constitutionalism have been widely accepted and institutionalized. Experimentalist governance is part and parcel of the world of liberal democratic constitutionalism. Second, it is not only governance in Europe that can be described in experimentalist terms. The concept is also useful to describe the dynamics of European constitutionalism.     

Reverse engineering--rapid prototyping of the skull in forensic trauma analysis

Rapid prototyping (RP) comprises a variety of automated manufacturing techniques such as selective laser sintering (SLS), stereolithography, and three-dimensional printing (3DP), which use virtual 3D data sets to fabricate solid forms in a layer-by-layer technique. Despite a growing demand for (virtual) reconstruction models in daily forensic casework, maceration of the skull is frequently assigned to ensure haptic evidence presentation in the courtroom. Owing to the progress in the field of forensic radiology, 3D data sets of relevant cases are usually available to the forensic expert. Here, we present a first application of RP in forensic medicine using computed tomography scans for the fabrication of an SLS skull model in a case of fatal hammer impacts to the head. The report is intended to show that this method fully respects the dignity of the deceased and is consistent with medical ethics but nevertheless provides an excellent 3D impression of anatomical structures and injuries.