Flexible Integration,EMU and Relative Voting Power in the EU

This paper studies the implications offlexible integration in the European Union. Itanalyses the voting power of member states in theCouncil of Ministers when differently sized subgroupsof the EU are set up. European Monetary Union isreferred to as the most important example of flexibleintegration. The Banzhaf-Index is calculated to studythe distribution of voting power in the decisionmaking process according to the stability and growthpact. The results show considerable fluctuations,especially for smaller countries, in relative votingpower, the latter being defined as the relationbetween voting power and relative voting weight.     

Gender trouble on the German soccer field: can the growth of women’s soccer challenge hegemonic masculinity?

Soccer in Germany represents a social sphere for the expression of masculinity and features significant ideological battles over gender roles. This paper discusses whether the growth of women’s soccer can challenge the prevailing hegemonic masculinity in an area that represents an important economic aspect of consumer culture and social identity. Does women’s soccer have the potential to subvert existing gender norms and challenge dominant understandings of gender? While women’s soccer has seen some important areas of growth in Germany, there are reasons to remain sceptical about the subversive potential of women’s soccer. This article argues that the unholy trinity of the sports-media-business alliance is the root cause for the limitations women’s soccer faces in challenging hegemonic masculinity. This sports-media-business alliance has served as the structural framework that has shaped societal discourses about women’s soccer in Germany. This paper discusses three of those discourses: the evolution of the macro-historical discourse over the societal role of women’s soccer in post-World War II Germany; the discourse comparing men’s and women’s soccer and asserting the superiority of men’s soccer; and the discourse on the role of femininity in women’s soccer and the sexualization of the players.     

Taming the real estate boom in the EU: Pathways to macroprudential (in)action

In the fallout of the 2008 crisis, macroprudential policy has been installed as the policy remedy against future financial instability, a primary focus being developments in the real estate sector. With house prices consistently rising in the EU since 2014, causing alarm among macroprudential supervisory bodies, a core question of EU regulatory governance is how far macroprudential bodies have been capable of bringing about countercyclical actions against the build-up of such vulnerabilities. This paper investigates this question using a novel dataset of macroprudential intensity coded for the 17 EU countries that experienced real estate vulnerabilities post-euro crisis. Specifically, it asks which configuration of conditions account for the (in)capacity of countries to impose stringent countercyclical regulations against housing booms? Using fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis technics coupled with qualitative analysis of country cases using expert interviews, we find that the absence of political salience of homeownership and the political independence of macroprudential authorities to be crucial conditions that jointly explain countercyclical macroprudential activity. These findings, which show two pathways to action have implications for the capacity of the EU to prevent future crises and future reform of the EU prudential framework.     

Gelungene Integration in den Arbeitsmarkt?

This article discusses the social-structural dynamics of the biographies of transnationally mobile Europeans on the basis of 27 interviews, conducted in 2002–2003, with people of Italian, French, British, Danish, and Polish origin living in Berlin. In comparing different forms of mobility and taking into particular consideration the vocational aspects of the Europeans interviewed, this study reveals several characteristic types of transnational mobility within Europe. It does not only reveal the biographies of the elite or lower class Europeans, as these types have already been derived from the new transnational or classical migration research; it also unravels the biographies of a variety of transnational middle class Europeans. Furthermore, our study shows, that the availability of cultural and social capital is the determining factor for integration. These findings are an interesting extension to the sociological understanding of migration in the 21st century.     

Migration past and present: changing patterns in Kyrgyzstan

Internal and international labour migration is a main livelihood strategy for many people in rural areas of Kyrgyzstan. It is estimated that approximately one-third of the employable population of Kyrgyzstan is working abroad. However, current labour migration phenomena are not exceptional since Central Asia's history has always been characterized by the movement of people, including external and internal, forced and voluntary, legal and illegal, permanent and temporary, ethnically or economically motivated migration. This article gives an overview of the historical and present migration processes with a special focus on three village communities in rural Kyrgyzstan. It deals with the opportunities and difficulties with which labour migrants and their non-migrating family members are confronted today. The results are based on extensive field work in Kyrgyzstan.     

Experimental tests for the validation of active numerical human models

The development of numerical human models is a topic of current interdisciplinary research. In the field of automotive safety these models can be applied for the optimization of protection systems. In forensic research human models can be used for the investigation of injury mechanisms and for the prediction and reproduction of injury patterns. However, up to now human models have been validated on the basis of PMHS tests without considering the effects of muscle activity. This paper shows two experimental volunteer test set-ups for the generation of experimental validation data. In a pendulum set-up the influence of muscle activity on the human kinematics was investigated. A drop test set-up was developed for the analysis of the effects of muscle activity on impact response characteristics of muscle tissue. Experimental results, presented in this paper, can be used for the validation and optimization of active numerical human models.     

Public Administration, Science, and Risk Assessment: A Case Study of the U.K. Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy Crisis

The bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) outbreak in the United Kingdom is regarded as one of the worst public policy crises the British government has experienced during the postwar era. In material terms, it has led to the slaughter of 3.3 million cattle and estimated economic losses of £3.7 billion. In administrative terms, the crisis brought about the dissolution of the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food. This article examines the istitutional context in which decisions about the scientific evidence on BSE were made. The authors argue that a centralized system in which government agencies control science for government is inherently vulnerable to alliances of experts and interest groups that undermine the credible assessment of public health and safety risks. Specific societal conditions may encourage risk-opportunistic behavior among policy makers that is conducive to delays and inaction until such time as the evidence of a health risk becomes overwhelming.