Geld als „absolutes Mittel“

Folgt man den immer zahlreicheren kritischen Stimmen, so kann der heutige Stand nicht nur der soziologischen, sondern auch der ökonomischen Geldtheorie nicht befriedigen. Im folgenden Beitrag wird daher für eine erneute Auseinandersetzung mit Simmel als einem Autor plädiert, dessen Denken noch nicht durch die heute etablierte akademische Arbeitsteilung zwischen Wirtschaftswissenschaften und Soziologie bestimmt war. Im Mittelpunkt der Simmel’schen Analyse steht die Auffassung des Geldes als ?absolutes Mittel“. Gezeigt wird, dass diese Auffassung der in der heutigen Wirtschaftssoziologie gepflegten funktionalistischen Interpretation des Geldes diametral widerspricht. Zugleich erlaubt sie es, viele der in der heutigen Individualisierungs- und Modernisierungstheorien breit diskutierten gesellschaftlichen Phänomene in einer neuen und analytisch schärferen Weise zu erfassen. Simmeis Geldtheorie lässt sich darüber hinaus für eine gegenwartsbezogene Analyse wirtschaftlicher Wachstums- und Innovationsprozesse fruchtbar machen.     

Getting Out of Debt: Garnishment of Wage in Whose Interest?

Garnishment of wage as a way for creditors to enforce payment by unwilling or insolvent debtors, while very common in Germany and Switzerland, is not very successful. Based on a dynamic model of debtor behaviour, this paper explores two alternatives of reform. One is to reduce the rate of garnishment, which at present amounts to 100 percent of the wage income exceeding a defined subsistence level, thus probably destroying incentives to work. According to model simulations, reducing the rate of garnishment is likely to result in an increase of labour supply but a decrease of garnishment revenue per period. Second, the introduction of a debt release as it exists in the United States would have an ambiguous effect on labour supply. While providing debtors with a fresh start, it would result a partial loss for creditors. A Pareto improvement thus does not seem to be possible. When taxpayers as an involved third party are taken into account, however, a potential Pareto improvement appears attainable through debt release.     

Literatur

Ohne Zusammenfassung     

Path Dependencies in European Integration: A Constructive Response to German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer

There is no doubt about the political necessity of the Eastern enlargement of the European Union and corresponding reforms of its political institutions. By contrast, the shape and content of these reforms is a subject that is highly contested between the member states. In this context, when the German Foreign Minister, Joschka Fischer, presented his vision of future development for Europe his ideas were refreshingly welcome. However, Fischer's ideas imply, in many respects, a turning away from hitherto accepted paths to European integration. The main claim we want to make in this paper is that, against the backdrop of this breach with the present European-level institutional system, the chance that the Fischer initiatives could come to political fruition must be viewed with scepticism. On the basis of this finding, which rests essentially upon a historical-institutionalist analysis, we develop an alternative concept for a European constitution.     

Personality and Ability Effects on Reactions to Argumentative Unfairness

The study focusses on the relationship of personality and reactions to unfair argumentative contributions. Unfair contributions were embedded in four argumentative episodes and presented in written, auditory, and role-play mode. Each participant's cognitions, emotions, and verbal responses were assessed and aggregated across the four episodes. Although no differences in evoked cognitive, emotional, and verbal responses arose between the different presentation modes, the identification of unfair contributions and the verbal responses' collaboration depended on the participants' cognitive abilities and personality traits. Implications for theory and practice of social justice research are discussed.     

The impact of online media on stakeholder engagement and the governance of corporations

Online tools such as social media provide new opportunities for citizens and stakeholder groups to be informed, identify common interests, express and share opinions and demands, organize, and coordinate interventions. Therefore, the Internet could be expected to increase stakeholder engagement in corporate affairs and facilitate good governance. In order to provide an overview of current findings on the impact of online media on governance and stakeholder engagement, we conduct a systematic literature review. Our analysis reveals five topical categories of inquiry. We analyze studies from the field of business participation and find a strong bias towards consumer engagement and marketing issues. Only few studies are found to critically explore the effect of online media on power and value distribution between corporations and stakeholders. We then turn to the more established field of political and civic participation in order to further analyze antecedents, forms, and outcomes of online engagement in civic affairs, and derive a framework for future research. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Industriesoziologie als Wirklichkeitswissenschaft

Berliner Journal für Soziologie - Seit den 1990er Jahren häufen sich in der Industriesoziologie die mit Konzepten wie ?Wissensarbeit“, ?Netzwerkgesellschaft“,...     

Crimes Against Minds: On Mental Manipulations, Harms and a Human Right to Mental Self-Determination

The neurosciences not only challenge assumptions about the mind’s place in the natural world but also urge us to reconsider its role in the normative world. Based on mind-brain dualism, the law affords only one-sided protection: it systematically protects bodies and brains, but only fragmentarily minds and mental states. The fundamental question, in what ways people may legitimately change mental states of others, is largely unexplored in legal thinking. With novel technologies to both intervene into minds and detect mental activity, the law should, we suggest, introduce stand alone protection for the inner sphere of persons. We shall address some metaphysical questions concerning physical and mental harm and demonstrate gaps in current doctrines, especially in regard to manipulative interferences with decision-making processes. We then outline some reasons for the law to recognize a human right to mental liberty and propose elements of a novel criminal offence proscribing severe interventions into other minds.     

Das Wasserentnahmeentgelt – Eine aktuelle rechtliche Bestandsaufnahme als Grundlage für die Diskussion über die Eignung des Wassercents als Finanzierungsinstrument zum Schutz von Grundwasservorkommen vor klimawandelbedingten Beeinträchtigungen

Natur und Recht - Angesichts der infolge des Klimawandels in den letzten Jahren in Deutschland vermehrt auftretenden Dürre- und Starkregenereignisse gewinnt das Wasserentnahmeentgelt in der...     

How governments strategically time welfare state reform legislation: empirical evidence from five European countries

Abstract

Building on studies on the political business cycle, the literature on welfare state retrenchment has argued that governments which cut the welfare state try to avoid blame by implementing painful measures in the beginning of the mandate and expanding benefits as elections approach. In contrast to this linear relationship, this article argues that governments often feel pressured to fulfil (mostly expansionary) campaign promises during the first months in office. Consequently, cutting right away is not what should be expected. Instead, a more nuanced, U-shaped timing trajectory is probable with a period in the beginning characterised by both cuts and fulfilment of expansionary pledges, followed by a period of cutbacks, and finally an expansive phase towards the end of a mandate. This argument is tested on our new original dataset of legislative changes in five European countries – Britain, Denmark, Finland, France and Germany – during the last four decades.