(Neo-)evolutionäre Wahlverwandtschaften

Max Webers ambivalente Haltung gegenüber der Anwendung der Konzepte Selektion und Adaption auf die Untersuchung der kulturellen und sozialen Evolution ist leicht verständlich angesichts seiner Skepsis hinsichtlich der Reduzierbarkeit der Soziologie auf die Biologie und in Anbetracht seines Argwohns, dass sich die selektionstheoretischen Erklärungen bei genauem Hinsehen als wertegeladen oder zirkulär erweisen würden. Seine Bedenken lassen sich unter Zuhilfenahme von Entwicklungen in der Evolutionstheorie zerstreuen, die für ihn zu Lebzeiten nicht vorhersehbar waren, es jedoch möglich machen, die grundlegenden Vorstellungen seiner Religionssoziologie auf überzeugende Weise zu reformulieren. Dies macht es allerdings notwendig, seine Metapher der ?Wahlverwandtschaft“ zwischen religiösen Vorstellungen und dem Verhalten idealtypischer Akteure durch empirisch überprüfbare Hypothesen zu ersetzen, die die Anpassungsfähigkeit bestimmter religiöser Meme mit der Anpassungsfähigkeit bestimmter ökonomischer Praktiken in Verbindung bringen.     

Distributive justice and willingness to pay for municipality child care

With the aim of investigating factors affecting willingness to pay for municipality child care, a survey was undertaken in Sweden of 1840 parents living in five municipalities of different sizes. On the basis of the greed-efficiency-fairness hypothesis (Wilke, 1991) which is supported by results from experimental social dilemma research, it was hypothesized that perceived fairness of how the quality of child care is distributed (equal, proportional to need, or proportional to payment) as well as of method of payment (collectively by taxes or proportional to use by fees) would be important determinants of willingness to pay. Results showed that perceived fairness of how quality of child care is distributed played some role but that other factors had stronger effects. Perhaps also reflecting fairness considerations, willingness to pay by fees was on average higher than willingness to pay by taxes. Predicted from previous research, willingness to pay by taxes was furthermore found to increase with income and degree of use. However, willingness to pay by taxes showed an increase rather than the predicted decrease with municipality size.     

论行政规则在司法审查中的地位

行政规则可称为内部规范性文件 ,① 在行政执法实践中具有重要的地位。行政规则具有约束下级机关及其所属公务人员的效力 ,而行政机关基于行政服从的义务必须遵守行政规则 ,从而使得行政规则具有了间接影响行政相对人权利和义务的法律效果。因此 ,法院在对具体行政行为进行合法性审查时 ,不可忽视对行政规则的审查 ;对合法有效的行政规则应该在裁判书中适当地加以引用。     

Public Sector Reform Knowledge Production: Validation and Evidence as 'Agreement'

In this article I draw on public sector reform knowledge in the United States, New Zealand and Australia. I argue that we, as practitioners, do not need to immerse ourselves in academic debates about 'positivism' or 'post-positivism'. These are frameworks for examining knowledge capable of validation. Instead, we are now engaged in using diverse forms of knowledge to spread the word on what works and does not work to deliver outcomes. Such knowledge is not above reproach; it is not acceptable merely because it exists but nor is it unacceptable because it cannot be rigorously validated in a positivist way.