Managerial incentives and access price regulation

Policy makers have identified the non-discrimination principle as a key instrument to regulate vertically integrated firms in control of upstream bottlenecks. It has been argued that the non-discrimination principle may create a level playing field, but at the expense of higher consumer prices. However, this rests on the assumption that the firms do not respond strategically to the regulation. We show that a non-discrimination requirement makes the vertically integrated firm behave more aggressively. Consequently, non-discrimination regulation rarely creates a level playing field. Neither does it necessarily increase end-user prices. Indeed, we show that end-user prices may fall.      

Denmark

European Journal of Political Research -     

Parteien und Bürgermeister in der Repräsentativen Demokratie. Kommunale Konkordanz- und Konkurrenzdemokratie im Vergleich

Analogous to Lehmbruch’s model, two ideal types of representative democracy may also be distinguished in respect of local politics. Proportional democracy is characterised by a low degree of party politisation of both parish councils and mayors. This holds for the nomination period, on the hustings, for the election and during government, and induces the dominance of the mayor in all periods. Local competitive democracy, however, may be described in terms of a less influential mayor in all phases and a high degree of party politisation. There is empirical evidence that patterns of proportional democracy prevail in Baden-Wuerttemberg, whereas North Rhine-Westphalian communities are dominated by actors’ constellations similar to the competitive democracy model. These differences can be explained by diverging communal laws, a lower degree of party organisation in Baden-Wuerttemberg, and a lower average population size in the southern communities. Legal conditions, the degree of party organisation and population size as independent variables can be subsumed into an index of proportional democracy, which may be helpful for a preliminary indexing of communities in other German Laender states.     

What have public affairs and advertising got in common?

The author argues that to be successful companies need to adopt a stakeholder view of how they interact with society—in short their communications need to be integrated. Rather than focusing purely on their consumer markets, advertisers should be aware of the impact of their messages on public opinion, pressure groups, politicians and others that make up the ‘political market’. Equally, public affairs practitioners should be more involved in the commercial activities of their colleagues in advertising and marketing. Integrated communications, in the author's view, is not only an operational necessity for companies, but a strategic imperative for sustainable success in a global world with differing local expectations. Copyright © 2002 Henry Stewart Publications.     

Die Zentralisierung der Staatstätigkeit in einer Referendumsdemokratie: Evidenz aus der Schweiz

Previous theoretical and empirical research has shown that policymakers have incentives to centralize government activities in order to weaken the competitive pressure of fiscal federalism. We argue that referendums reduce the possibilities for collusion among representatives and the ability of higher level policy-makers to attract additional responsibilities. Empirical results from panel data for Swiss cantons between 1980 to 1998 support this hypothesis. The centralization of government activity, measured by budgetary outcomes, is significantly reduced by a fiscal referendum. This holds in the case of public revenue and its components, but also for public expenditure, in particular public education spending.     

Local,National and Global Islam: Religious Guidance and European Muslim Public Opinion on Political Radicalism and Social Conservatism

The attacks on the Charlie Hebdo magazine and Kosher supermarket in Paris in January 2015, as well as the announcement of a ‘Caliphate’ by radical Islamists of the so-called ‘Islamic State in Iraq and Syria’ (ISIS) in 2014, reignited political and academic interest in the possible appeal of radical Islamism among young Muslims living in Western Europe. This analysis expands existing knowledge by adding a large-n, cross-national comparison to the small-n or single-case-study approaches dominating research on European Muslims over the last two decades. Moving beyond examination of the interaction between European governments and groups claiming to represent European Muslims, this analysis takes into account the individualisation of Muslim religious discourses, practices and identities. Binary logistic regression analyses challenge conventional wisdom which emphasises discrimination and rejection of Western foreign policies in the explanation of political radicalism. Instead, religious guidance and socio-economic status emerge as consistent correlates of political and social attitudes among West European Muslims. These findings not only add to a growing body of literature providing empirical evidence for the political impact of religious elites, they also have crucial policy implications for West European governments working to maintain national security and social cohesion.