Sozialer Wandel und politische Stabilität: politische Einstellungen von Arbeitnehmern in der Schweiz

Der Gegenstand dieser Studie ist die Entwicklung der individuellen und kollektiven Arbeitsbeziehungen in der Schweiz. Die Ausgangsfrage lautet, ob die Modernisierung der Arbeitswelt zu einer Erosion von deren bisherigen Institutionen geführt hat. Ich argumentiere, dass die Modernisierung der Arbeitsverhältnisse bislang noch keine Krise der herkömmlichen Institutionen nach sich zog; vielmehr sind die Herausforderungen des sozialen Wandels bislang gut gemeistert worden. Dafür gibt es mindestens zwei Gründe: Zum einen ist der Gewerkschaftsbewegung eine neue Klientel und Gruppe von Unterstützern zugewachsen, die in modifizierter Form die Kernideen der sozialdemokratischen Arbeiterbewegung übernommen hat. Zum zweiten werden die Institutionen der kollektiven Arbeitsbeziehungen weder durch die Individualisierung der Arbeitsbedingungen, noch durch die modernisierungsbedingte Auflösung der Arbeitsethik der Industriegesellschaft noch durch eine Strategie der Eliten gefährdet. Die Datenbasis der Untersuchung bildet der Schweizer Arbeitsmarktsurvey von 1998.     

Human capital and social capital in criminal networks: introduction to the special issue on the 7th Blankensee Colloquium

This essay and review on criminal network analysis provides an introduction to the special issue “Human Capital and Social Capital in Criminal Networks”. It traces the history of the application of network analysis in the study of organized crime since the early 1970s. It argues that while criminal network analysis has brought a new level of methodological rigor to the study of organized crime, a number of limitations have become apparent. These include the problem of missing data and the challenges encountered in adequately capturing latent structures, individual characteristics of network members and socio-ecological conditions.     

The interdisciplinary dimensions of the study of organized crime

This essay and review systematically charts the various influences from other areas of scientific research, including economy, psychology, and neurobiology, on the study of organized crime. Drawing on an analysis of American and international literature, metaphorical, and substantive references to other disciplines are highlighted on five levels of observation: the individual “organized criminal,” the activities these individuals are involved in, the associational patterns through which they are connected, the power structures that subordinate these individuals and collectives to common or particular interests, and the relations between these individuals, structures and activities on the one hand, and the legal spheres of society on the other. It is argued that a research program aiming at building up a cumulative body of knowledge is needed to overcome the shortcomings of the current eclectic use of concepts and theories from other disciplines.     

Development policy and international administrative relations: The aspect of education and training

Within the framework of administrative co-operation, transnational arrangements of education and training constitute a delicate activity. Many reverberations of colonial and early post-colonial times can still be felt in this domain. Nevertheless, the problems of transfer, be it doctrine, technical implementation or practical experience, are still very apparent and will probably continue. This article traces the progress of education and training through post-colonial history until the present, discusses the merits of the different approaches taken by the most active Western institutions and identifies the major experiences and lessons regarding the various problems of transfer. The debate concentrates on the specific activities and experiences of the most recent programmes offered by the Graduate School of Administrative Sciences in Speyer in co-operation with the public administration branch of the German Foundation for International Development.     

Swiss worlds of welfare

Are there different worlds of welfare in Swiss cantons, analogous to different national welfare state regimes? Are the welfare regimes made up of functionally related sub-regimes in the field of employment, education, taxation and social security, as argued in recent analyses of ‘varieties of capitalism’? And can the variations between such cantonal welfare regimes be explained by the same politico-institutional variables that account for the development of national welfare states? These are the guiding questions of this article. We find strong empirical evidence for large inter-cantonal variation in welfare state policies. The sub-regimes are not functionally connected, however. Their variation is related to different sets of variables, indicating a weak functional link between them. Developments and causal structures are specific to the various subregimes. In addition, it is socio-economic and not politicoinstitutional variables that have had the strongest imprint on the overall structure of cantonal welfare regimes.