Here be monsters: a choreomaniac's companion to the danse macabre

Consider this a vade mecum: an invitation to “walk with me” through more or less uncanny terrains of worlds in the making in search, of(f) course, of monsters. The search will be delving into the areas of “creepypasta:” pieces of cursed prose and pictures that circulate online, waiting to contaminate and possess the next reader. Using a theoretical framework of posthuman and feminist theory, not least the work done by Jacques Derrida and Donna Haraway, this vade mecum asks what it might mean to engage ethically with that which is not supposed to exist, but which haunts us nonetheless. In other words: what does it mean to move, live and engage with spectres in digital times?     

Press coverage of lone-actor terrorism in the UK and Denmark: shaping the reactions of the public,affected communities and copycat attackers

Following 9/11, Al-Qaeda-orchestrated plots were considered the greatest threat to Western security and sparked the coalition’s war on terror. Close to a decade later, the post-9/11 threat landscape had shifted significantly, leading then CIA-director Leon Panetta to describe “the lone-wolf strategy” as the main threat to the United States. Subsequent lone-actor attacks across the West, including the cities of London, Nice, Berlin, Stockholm, Ottawa and Charleston, further entrenched perspectives of a transformed security landscape in the “after, after-9/11” world. The unique features of lone-actor terrorism, including the challenges of interdiction and potential of copycat attacks, mean that the media is likely to play a particularly important role in shaping the reactions of the public, affected communities and copycat attackers. This article presents findings from a content analysis of British and Danish newspaper reporting of lone-actor terrorism between January 2010 and February 2015. The study highlights that lone-actor terrorism is framed, with national variations, as a significant and increasing problem in both countries; that Islamist lone-actors are often represented as distinct from far-right lone-actors; and that some reporting, despite relatively limited amplification of specific terrorist messages, potentially aids lone-actors by detailing state vulnerabilities to attacks.     

End of the Lone Wolf: The Typology that Should Not Have Been

This research note argues that the “lone wolf” typology should be fundamentally reconsidered. Based on a three-year empirical research project, two key points are made to support this argument. First, the authors found that ties to online and offline radical milieus are critical to lone actors' adoption and maintenance of both the motive and capability to commit acts of terrorism. Second, in terms of pre-attack behaviors, the majority of lone actors are not the stealthy and highly capable terrorists the “lone wolf” moniker alludes to. These findings not only urge a reconsideration of the utility of the lone-wolf concept, they are also particularly relevant for counterterrorism professionals, whose conceptions of this threat may have closed off avenues for detection and interdiction that do, in fact, exist.     

The barely revealed preference behind road investment priorities

An attempt is made to reveal the preference of decision makers within the regional Norwegian public roads administration. The order of priority assigned to the respective, competing public road investment opportunities within the various counties (provinces) is studied by means of a rank order multinomial logit model. Explanatory variables used include cost, benefit, and a variety of attributes characterizing the individual investment projects. Although statistically significant, cost and benefit appear to be of only marginal importance for the priorities set. More weight is attached to cost than to benefit. Smaller projects are preferred to larger, given the benefit-cost ratio. In general, the models estimated are able to explain only a relatively small share of the priority setting made.     

Economic models as devices of policy change: Policy paradigms,paradigm shift,and performativity

Can the emergence of a new policy model be a catalyst for a paradigm shift in the overall interpretative framework of how economic policy is conducted within a society? This paper claims that models are understudied as devices used by actors to induce policy change. This paper explores the role of models in Danish economic policy, where, from the 1970s onwards, executive public servants in this area have exclusively been specialists in model design. To understand changes in economic policy, this paper starts with a discussion of whether the notion of paradigm shift is adequate. It then examines the extent to which the performativity approach can help identify macroscopic changes in policy from seemingly microscopic changes in policy models. The concept of performativity is explored as a means of thinking about the constitution of agency directed at policy change. The paper brings this concept into play by arguing that the “performative” embedding of models in institutions is an important aspect of how paradigm shifts unfold that the current literature has neglected.     

Norway and a major international crisis: Suez ‐ the very difficult case

This article reviews Norway's policy during the Suez crisis in 1956, how the policy was formed and how it can be explained. Emphasis is put on the decision‐making process and on the role of the powerful Norwegian Shipowners’ Association. It also discusses Norway's most important interests and considerations in policy formation, and how they were balanced. Norway's Suez policy is seen in connection with the close relations with Israel, which could be viewed as in conflict with the protection of Norway's NATO membership and vital economic interests, represented by the powerful shipowners. In the end, Norway's Suez policy is put in the context of the change in Norwegian foreign and security policy in general, a shift in emphasis from being Britain's close ally and friend to being under the protective umbrella of the US, the new superpower.     

Gubernatorial Midterm Slumps

This article studies gubernatorial midterm slumps in U.S. state legislative elections. We employ a regression discontinuity design, which allows us to rule out the hypothesis that the midterm slump simply reflects a type of “reversion to the mean” generated by simple partisan swings or the withdrawal of gubernatorial coattails or “anticipatory balancing.” Our results show that the party of the governor experiences an average seat‐share loss of about 3.5 percentage points. We also find evidence suggesting that a large share of the variation in gubernatorial midterm slumps can be accounted for by (1) crude partisan balancing and (2) referendums on state economic performance, with approximately equal weight given to each.     

Contracting Out Local Services: A Tale of Technical and Social Services

Governments face a fundamental choice between in‐house production and contracting out for the delivery of services to citizens. This article examines the importance of ideology, fiscal pressure, and size for contracting out in technical and social services. The analysis builds on a panel data set covering municipal spending on services in all 98 Danish municipalities. The authors find that contracting out is shaped by ideology in social services but not in technical services, which indicates that social services are the contemporary ideological battlefield of privatization. The analysis further reveals that economically prosperous municipalities are more likely to contract out social services, whereas contracting out of technical services is not influenced by economic affluence. Finally, larger municipalities contract out more in technical services but less in social services, demonstrating that the size effect is contingent on the transaction cost characteristics of the service.