The organization of influence on the EC's common agriculturalpolicy: A network approach

The common agricultural policy of the EC with its market regulations is decided at EC level by a multilevel system of government, in which the Commission and the parliamentary parties of the European Parliament play the supranational role and the national ministries of agriculture act as parts of the intergovernmental system of the Council of Ministers. National interest groups have thereby three major access routes to the EC system, first through their national governments, or second indirectly, transmitted by their European peak organizations, or third directly to the supranational EC actors. The network approach is applied to study empirically the densities of access through these various routes. The links between actors in the agricultural policy domain are conceptualized as links for the exchange of resources, the most important resource of a policy domain being the final control of policy decisions. The political actors of the governance system originally hold full control of this valuable resource which they exchange for influence resources possessed by the interest groups, as public support or expert knowledge. Empirically, answers to the network questions depend on the type of resource and the viewpoint of the interviewed actors. An index is developed which indicates the resource flows between actors and the distribution of equilibrium control of policy decisions. It is shown that the national ministers of agriculture depend very much on the support and expertise of their national farmers' lobby, whereas the Commission relies more on contacts within the political sector itself. Multilevel systems need a lot of political coordination, so that the political actors within such systems, especially at the supranational level, seem to deal first of all with each other and not so much with the demand side of politics, compared to the national ministers of agriculture.     

Rethinking the partisan effects of higher turnout: So what's the question?

Controversy persists over the link between turnout and the likelihood of success of Democratic candidates (e.g., DeNardo, 1980, 1986; Zimmer, 1985; Tucker and Vedlitz, 1986; Piven and Cloward, 1988; Texeira, 1992; Radcliff, 1994, 1995; Erikson, 1995a, b). We argue that the authors in this debate have largely been talking past one another because of a failure to distinguish three quite different questions. The first question is: “Are low turnout voters more likely to vote Democratic than high turnout voters?” The second question is: “Should we expect that elections in which turnout is higher are ones in which we can expect Democrats to have done better?” The third question is the counterfactual: “If turnout were to have increased in some given election, would Democrats have done better?” We show the logical independence of the first two questions from one another and from the third, and argue that previous researchers have failed to recognize this logical independence – sometimes thinking they were answering question three when in fact they were answering either question one or question two. Reviewing previous research, we find that the answer to the first question once was YES but, for more recent elections at the presidential level, now appears to be NO, while, for congressional and legislative elections, the answer to the second question appears generally to be NO. However, the third question is essentially unanswerable absent an explicit model of why and how turnout can be expected to increase, and/or analyses of individual level panel data. Thus, the cross-sectional and pooled data analyses of previous research are of almost no value in addressing this third question.

     

Postmortem forensic toxicology of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors: a review of pharmacology and report of 168 cases

This paper reviews the complex pharmacology of the new class of antidepressant medications exhibiting selective inhibition of serotonin reuptake. The four selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) considered--fluoxetine, fluvoxamine, sertraline and paroxetine--can result in toxicity and death through contributing to serotonergic excess resulting in serotonin syndrome, inhibiting the metabolism of other centrally acting drugs, leading to accumulation of toxic concentrations, and exerting complex vasoactive effects on the vascular smooth muscle. This latter feature is of particular concern in patients with preexisting heart disease. An analytical method involving isolation of the drugs by liquid/liquid extraction at alkaline pH into n-butyl chloride, and analysis by gas chromatography/mass spectrometry (GC/MS) is described, together with some of its limitations. Toxicologic and cause and manner of death data were examined in 60 deaths involving fluoxetine, 5 involving fluvoxamine, 75 involving sertraline, and 28 involving paroxetine. Deaths involving drug toxicity were generally a result of ingestion of multiple drugs, and in only a small number of the cases was death attributed principally to the SSRI involved. The potential for drug interactions between members of this class of drugs is discussed as well as their metabolites and a variety of other therapeutic and abused drugs which can contribute to their toxicity. In the absence of other risk factors, the lowest concentrations determined to have resulted in death were 0.63 mg/L for fluoxetine, 0.4 mg/L for paroxetine, and 1.5 mg/L for sertraline. We had insufficient data to make even this crude assessment for fluvoxamine. Drug-induced elevation of serotonin concentrations may be a significant risk factor for patients with atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (ASCVD). Other factors including preexisting disease and the presence of other drugs and their pharmacology need to be carefully considered before determining the appropriate cause and manner of death in these cases.     

Volkserziehung oder Institutionenreform? Ein Kommentar zu Werner Patzelts Bürgerschelte in der PVS 4/1998

Zusammenfassung Der Beitrag greift Patzelts These eines „latenten Verfassungskonflikts“ zwischen Bürgern und Politikern auf. Patzelts Auffassung, derzufolge die Demokratievorstellungen der Bürger falsch und korrekturbedürftig seien, stelle ich drei Thesen entgegen. Erstens sind die Demokratievorstellungen von Politikern und Bürgern nicht einfach falsch oder richtig; vielmehr zeichnen sie sich durch Gegens?tze aus, die sich aus den unterschiedlichen Rollenperspektiven von Politikanbietern und Politikabnehmern ergeben. Zweitens sind diese Gegens?tze nicht durch Erziehung, sondern nur durch Anreizver?nderungen — und das hei?t: durch institutionelle Reformen — zu überbrücken. Gefragt ist ein Anreizsystem, das den Rollentausch zwischen Bürgern und Politikern erm?glicht und damit deren wechselseitige Lernbereitschaft erh?ht. Als meine dritte These lege ich dar, dass die Ausstattung des Souver?ns mit Sachstimmrechten genau diesen Rollentausch erm?glicht und deshalb geeignet ist, das institutionelle Anreizsystem in der geforderten Weise zu rejustieren.

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zu: Werner Patzelt, 1998: Ein latenter Verfassungskonflikt? Die Deutschen und ihr parlamentarisches Regierungssystem, in: Politische Vierteljahresschrift 39 (4), 725–757.     

Environmental Transformation of the State: the USA, Norway, Germany and the UK

Modern states underwent two major transformations that produced first, the liberal capitalist state and second, the welfare state. Each was accompanied by the migration of a previously confrontational movement into the core of the state. In the creation of the liberal capitalist state, the bourgeoisie could harmonize with the state's emerging interest in economic growth. In the creation of the welfare state, the organized working class could harmonize with the state's emerging interest in legitimating the political economy by curbing capitalism's instability and inequality. We show that environmental conservation could now emerge as a core state interest, growing out of these established economic and legitimation imperatives. This examination is grounded in a comparative historical study of four countries: the USA, Norway, Germany, and the UK, each of which exemplifies a particular kind of interest representation. We show why the USA was an environmental pioneer around 1970, why it was then eclipsed by Norway, and why Germany now leads in addressing environmental concerns.     

China’s Multidimensional Environmental Issues a Fundamental Challenge for China’s Future Development – a Critical Assessment

China’s environmental degeneration carries fundamental political, economic and social implications for its future development and its international reputation. The complexity of the challenge is underlined by the variety of environmental issues China is confronted with. Among them we can identify water shortage, desertification, industrial and urban air pollution, acid rain, and extreme weather patterns. China is already a major polluter and its growth focus as well as the rapid urbanization process we can observe will further increase the pressure on the environment. China’s ability or inability of formulating an environmental friendly development strategy is of critical importance for its future development.     

Korrespondenz

Ende der Stiefkindeigenschaft mit dem Tod des leiblichen Elternteils?     

Zusammenhang von Abbruchkosten mit der Erzielung von Einkünften

Betreffen Abbruchkosten Liegenschaftsteile, die der Einnahmenerzielung dienen (hier: Aufstellung von Werbetafeln) und Liegenschaftsteile, bei denen ein Zusammenhang mit der Einnahmenerzielung nicht erkennbar ist, k?nnen die Abbruchkosten sowie die VSt nur aliquot Berücksichtigung finden.