Family First

My decision to come to China was a pretty simple one:curiosity.I am originally from Holland,but have always been fascinated with China-this mysterious and rising oriental superpower.I bought books and movies on the country,wishing to satisfy my questions.On the contrary,it only inspired more.With China’s economy booming,many amazing career opportunities are currently open to foreigners like me.It was a very natural decision for me to come to explore the possibilities in China.Beijing brims with opportunities and ancient Chinese culture,which is the reason I have made it my home.     

Proximity and directional theory compared: Taking discriminant positions seriously in multi-party systems

This paper tackles the problem of comparison between proximity and directional voting in 27 European multi-party systems. This is a previously unaddressed aspect of European spatial issue voting. We focus on the spatial voting theories as predictors of vote intention, evaluating the extent of proximity and directional voting. We describe the influence of identical predictions on the comparison of these theories. Our multilevel analysis of the 2009 European Election Study data shows more empirical support for proximity voting than directional voting in the countries analyzed. It does this by clearly differentiating between those cases where it is possible to compare proximity and directional voting and where this is impossible. Nevertheless, the prevalence of proximity theory decreases in more polarized party-systems.     

Wie und wie stark beeinflussen moralische Argumente wirtschaftliches Handeln?

While the corporate social responsibility literature tends to argue that companies should behave socially responsibly, it neglects the empirical question under which conditions they do so. This article fills this research gap by showing under which conditions moral arguments influence companies. The paper uses a representative company survey to show that companies name moral arguments as a strong deterrent to the offshoring of production to low cost countries. In addition, companies are less likely to offshore production when they mention moral scruples against doing so. The article uses a case study to process-trace the mechanisms, by which moral arguments exert this influence. First, it shows how moral arguments influence what is defined as economically rational under uncertainty, thereby influencing economic strategies. Secondly, the article shows how moral arguments influence companies by destroying their social capital, and thirdly, it shows how moral arguments can destroy public legitimacy, again influencing economic behavior. The article proposes these three mechanisms as a general framework through which one can understand the influence of moral arguments on companies.