Learning from Difference: The New Architecture of Experimentalist Governance in the EU

Abstract:  This article argues that current widespread characterisations of EU governance as multi-level and networked overlook the emergent architecture of the EU's public rule making. In this architecture, framework goals (such as full employment, social inclusion, 'good water status', a unified energy grid) and measures for gauging their achievement are established by joint action of the Member States and EU institutions. Lower-level units (such as national ministries or regulatory authorities and the actors with whom they collaborate) are given the freedom to advance these ends as they see fit. But in return for this autonomy, they must report regularly on their performance and participate in a peer review in which their results are compared with those pursuing other means to the same general ends. Finally, the framework goals, performance measures, and decision-making procedures themselves are periodically revised by the actors, including new participants whose views come to be seen as indispensable to full and fair deliberation. Although this architecture cannot be read off from either Treaty provisions or textbook accounts of the formal competences of EU institutions, the article traces its emergence and diffusion across a wide range of policy domains, including telecommunications, energy, drug authorisation, occupational health and safety, employment promotion, social inclusion, pensions, health care, environmental protection, food safety, maritime safety, financial services, competition policy, state aid, anti-discrimination policy and fundamental rights.     

Collective Memory from a Psychological Perspective

The study of collective memory has burgeoned in the last 20 years, so much so that one can even detect a growing resistance to what some view as the imperialistic march of memory studies across the social sciences (e.g., Berliner 2005; Fabian 1999). Yet despite its clear advance, one area that has remained on the sidelines is psychology. On the one hand, this disinterest is surprising, since memory is of central concern to psychologists. On the other hand, the relative absence of the study of collective memory within the discipline of psychology seems to suit both psychology and other disciplines of the social sciences, for reasons that will be made clear. This paper explores how psychology might step from the sidelines and contribute meaningfully to discussions of collective memory. It reviews aspects of the small literature on the psychology of collective memory and connects this work to the larger scholarly community’s interest in collective memory. The first three authors contributed equally to this paper. The order in which they are listed reflects the throw of a die.     

Similarities between terrorist networks in antiquity and present-day cyberterrorist networks

This paper analyzes the similarities between terrorist networks in Antiquity and cyberterrorist networks today. By establishing comparisons between networks from two classes of terrorists whose actions were recorded 2,000 years apart, this paper adds substance to the understanding of the superiority of networks to archetypical organizational structures (i.e., with a hierarchically-based order). By identifying three major factors, many analogies can be drawn, based on empirical statements found throughout this analysis, between cyberterrorist networks in this day and age and terrorist networks in Antiquity. Those factors are (1) similar patterns of communication, (2) similar connections and kinship webs, and (3) similar obstacles.     

Untangling the Causal Effects of Sex on Judging

We explore the role of sex in judging by addressing two questions of long‐standing interest to political scientists: whether and in what ways male and female judges decide cases distinctly—“individual effects”—and whether and in what ways serving with a female judge causes males to behave differently—“panel effects.” While we attend to the dominant theoretical accounts of why we might expect to observe either or both effects, we do not use the predominant statistical tools to assess them. Instead, we deploy a more appropriate methodology: semiparametric matching, which follows from a formal framework for causal inference. Applying matching methods to 13 areas of law, we observe consistent gender effects in only one—sex discrimination. For these disputes, the probability of a judge deciding in favor of the party alleging discrimination decreases by about 10 percentage points when the judge is a male. Likewise, when a woman serves on a panel with men, the men are significantly more likely to rule in favor of the rights litigant. These results are consistent with an informational account of gendered judging and are inconsistent with several others.     

Spouse Abuse and Child Abuse by Army Soldiers

This study analyzed data collected by the U.S. Army’s Family Advocacy Program, the group primarily responsible for family violence prevention, identification, evaluation, treatment, and follow-up on Army installations. Patterns of spouse abuse and child abuse perpetrated within a five year period (2000–2004) were examined in a sample of 10,864 Army Soldiers who were substantiated for family violence offenses. Three groups of family violence offenders were compared: (1) those who perpetrated spouse offenses only; (2) those who perpetrated child offenses only; and (3) those who perpetrated both spouse and child offenses. Results showed that the majority of substantiated family violence offenders were spouse offenders who had not committed child abuse (61%), followed by child offenders who had not committed spouse abuse (27%), and finally those who committed both spouse and child offenses (12%). The three groups of family violence offenders differed in terms of the types of abuse they perpetrated (neglect of children, emotional abuse, physical abuse, and sexual abuse), their experiences of being a spouse abuse victim, and sociodemographic characteristics. Twelve percent of all spouse abusers committed multiple spouse abuse incidents, and 10% of all child abusers committed multiple child abuse incidents.     

Kooperative Politikberatung. Ein neues Beziehungsgeflecht zwischen Politik und Politikberatung?

The institutional and societal framework of policy-advice-giving is changing and so are the worlds of political consultants and policy experts in Germany and other advanced democracies. While there are several new developments which are challenging established forms of policy-advice and political consulting, the present article focuses its attention on the impact of new governance structures on policy advice and political consulting. The main argument of the article is that when government becomes governance and the number of actors and venues involved in the decision-making process increase, a new cooperative and discursive mode of policy-advice giving complements or sometimes even replaces more established forms of policy-advice-giving. We review the evolution of the debate about the role of policy-advice-giving from different perspectives, and particularly explore possible consequences of the changing nature of the state as well as of newly emerging modes of cooperative policy-advice and political consulting — both for empirical as well as conceptual research in the field. Through this, we attempt to generate a debate on the future direction of different modes of policy-advice and political consulting within a changing framework of governance structures in advanced democracies.     

Web 2.0, wikis, and the IP Community

Legal context: The emergence of new web-based programs being used in the fieldsof patent applications and IP legal information has opened upa range of new opportunities for IP-related legal processesand knowledge sharing. Key points: This article explains the background to Web 2.0 applicationsand explores the potential for the use of wikis in various areasof IP. It notes the limitations, as well as the possibilities,of wikis and explains how they work in practice. It outlinesthree recent examples of wikis in the IP world, explaining howthey work and the significance of their overall objectives. Practical significance: The adoption of this technology by official bodies suggestswider future use and the appearance of unofficial sites showsthat current developments have already reached a stage wheremany IP practitioners can begin to interact and share knowledgein a way that has not been considered previously. It is conceivablethat developments in this area will be rapid and it is in theinterests of users to familiarize themselves with the use ofthis new ‘social software’.