Science Parks,talent attraction and stakeholder involvement: an international study

The Journal of Technology Transfer - One aspect of Science Parks development that has come into focus is the attraction of talent, which could include attracting specific expertise, making it...     

Shame and Guilt and its Relation to Direct and Indirect Experience of Trauma in Adolescence,a Brief Report

Exposure to different kinds of traumatic events is common among adolescents. This brief report study examined whether shame proneness and guilt proneness were associated with direct and indirect experience of potentially traumatic events (PTEs). We investigated the relationship between gender, PTEs, shame, and guilt among adolescents (n?=?314, age?=?15–20 years). We hypothesized that shame proneness and guilt proneness would be associated with direct experience of interpersonal and sexual PTEs, that both direct and indirect experience of potentially traumatic sexual event/s would correlate with female gender, and that potentially traumatic direct and indirect interpersonal event/s would correlate with male gender. Shame was positively associated with having experienced direct sexual trauma and with female gender. Girls had more often experienced potentially traumatic direct sexual events and boys had more often experienced potentially traumatic direct interpersonal events. Indirect experiences of traumatic events were not related to either gender or shame. We conclude that the relation between shame, PTEs, and gender is complex with both types of traumas and gender interact with shame. This study found that shame and direct experience of sexual traumatic events were associated among adolescent girls. Gender and what type of traumatic events adolescents’ direct experience is most likely related but not gender and what type of indirect experienced trauma.

     

Controlling Corruption in the Public Sector

Much of the literature on political corruption is based on indices such as the ones presented by Transparency International, but the reliability and validity of these indices are questionable. The main alternative approach – qualitative case studies – often lacks a theoretical framework allowing for systematic empirical analysis. To remedy this shortcoming, this article places qualitative case studies into the framework of principal-agent theory. The cases comprise two Swedish county councils (regional governments), both of which reorganised their administrations in similar ways in the 1990s. One experienced corruption scandals, but the other did not. In comparing them, the article links the propensity for corruption to institutional design – in particular, the mechanisms of delegation and control.     

The Limits of a Commitment? Public Responses to Asylum Policy in Sweden over Time

It is hardly an exaggeration to claim that one of the most turbulent political areas in recent years has been asylum policy, which has disclosed a rapidly increasing inflow of asylum seekers, and, in many countries, has been followed by fierce media discussion and political controversies. In Sweden, this development has been heated as the Swedish self‐image is one of providing generous policies, which is also reflected in terms of strong refugee policy. The article uses this example to explore assumptions about public responsiveness in previous policy feedback literature and to examine the link between citizens' attitudes towards immigration and changes in asylum policy output, measured as asylums granted, over time in the period 1990–2015. It focuses especially on the link through which citizens become aware of policy output, operationalized as media visualization, and find that including media reveals a suppressed relationship between policy output and public attitudes. The relationship is negative and thus confirms the assumptions of the thermostatic models. Second, the article shows that feedback is mediated by political orientation: People defining themselves politically as right‐oriented respond with negative feedback when the number of granted asylums increases, while left‐oriented people do not change their attitudes. Based on these findings it is concluded, first, that analyses of democratic responsiveness need to incorporate a clear measure of the link by which exogenous factors become visible. Second, the importance needs to be stressed of considering important cleavages in the population in order to display responsiveness processes fairly.     

Electoral Rules,Labor Market Coordination and Macroeconomic Performance

Two distinct literatures have studied the macroeconomic effects of electoral systems and of labor market structures, respectively. Results include a positive association between proportional representation (PR) electoral systems and growth, but also between PR and inflation, as well as negative or hump‐shaped relationships between labor market coordination and the ‘misery variables’, unemployment and inflation. However, these results could be biased; particular electoral system and labor market features co‐vary systematically, and extant studies have typically not taken this into account. Effects attributed to PR systems could really stem from labor market coordination, and vice versa. In this article the relationships with macroeconomic outcomes for both electoral systems and labor market structures are re‐evaluated by modelling them jointly. Employing data from more than 30 democracies, with time‐series from the period 1960–2010, some robust and some non‐robust associations are identified. First, PR systems are, indeed, associated with higher growth rates, but not with higher inflation. Regarding labor market coordination, robust curvilinear relationships with unemployment and inflation are identified; intermediate levels of coordination correspond with worse macroeconomic performance – albeit not lower growth – even when accounting for electoral system features.     

Citizens in the Making: The Inclusion of Racialized Subjects in Labour Market Projects in Sweden

This article analyzes the formation of citizenship in today's multi‐ethnic Sweden in light of the inclusion of ‘people with foreign background’. Particular focus is put on how ethnicity and migration renders visible existing citizenship ideals, defined in terms of similarity and difference on the basis of ethno‐cultural background. The formation of citizenship is analyzed in the case of labour market projects targeting racialized migrants. The point of departure is an understanding of citizenship as an ongoing process of citizen formation, highlighting the formation of citizens as rights‐bearing subjects, belonging to the societal community – in contrast to those not bearing these rights and not belonging to the societal community. The analysis illustrates how norms of Swedish‐ness condition the membership in the Swedish societal community, forming a particular kind of racialized citizenship, including certain subjects, under certain conditions, while excluding others. One conclusion is that in addition to the formal dimensions of citizenship, the ability and willingness to adapt to norms of Swedish‐ness is essential for accessing and using social rights – that is, for becoming employable and included on the labour market. In the projects analyzed, racialized migrants have the duty of becoming employable by embracing certain values – the good, working citizen, the free, independent individual, able to make choices – all constituted as being part of an ideal Swedish citizenship.     

Explaining Informal Policy-Making Patterns in the Eurozone Crisis: Decentralized Bargaining and the Theory of EU Institutions

ABSTRACT

During the Eurozone crisis, the so-called ‘Merkozy duumvirate’ emerged as an informal, but highly visible EU policy-making pattern. This article asks why such forms of decentralized bargaining emerge and what this implies for the theory of EU institutions. According to an approach based on negotiation theory, the article argues that Merkozy is a strategic tool used by Germany to realize its preferences on EU crisis management. Based on an incomplete contracts theory of EU institutions, instead, the article analyses Merkozy as an informal institution created by France and Germany to avoid being discriminated by supranational institutions. Both approaches are employed to assess Merkozy’s role in the decision-making process leading to the adoption of the Fiscal Compact.     

“We really don’t want to move,but...”: identity and strategy in the internationalisation of industrial R&;D

In Norway, as in many other high-cost OECD countries in a geographical and cultural periphery, policy-makers seem to have given up attempts at attracting large numbers of foreign R&D investments. Instead, a major focus of innovation policies is to help companies internationalise yet with an aim to maintain or even increase their level of R&D and other innovation activities nationally. Based on case studies of eight Norwegian companies and their motives for and experiences with internationalisation of R&D, this article questions this policy. From the perspective of the companies, many factors explain how, why and where they carry out their R&D activities.