Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Unemployment – Europe – Comparative studies'

Within the literature devoted to the study of political parties, scholars have recently directed more attention towards intraparty dynamics. The ‘party as a unitary actor’ assumption seems to have withered away in the last decades. The party is increasingly viewed as a heterogeneous entity, in which dissenting attitudes are frequent. Yet the causes of intraparty dissensions remain quite obscure. This dissertation aims at providing a better understanding of the causes of dissent within parties, especially within parliamentary party groups.

Intraparty conflicts, dissent or ‘voice’ phenomena have been studied through different literatures that have developed independently from each other: studies dealing with party factionalism, social-psychological and economic theories of organizations (e.g. Hirschman’s trilogy of exit, voice and loyalty), and legislative studies dealing with parliamentary party voting unity. The dissertation attempts to (re)conciliate these separate literatures, and shows how legislative studies, factionalism literature and theories of organizations can help to rethink the concept of dissent, and to grasp why parliamentarians are more or less likely to dissent from their party line.

The dissertation defines dissent in the parliamentary party as a two-dimensional concept, and operationalizes it as the MP’s frequency of disagreement with her/his party and the MP’s attitude of (non)loyalty in case of such disagreement. At the theoretical level, the dissertation draws on several theoretical approaches –institutional, rational and sociological– and formulates a broad set of hypotheses linking system-, party- and individual-level factors to these two dimensions of dissent. At the empirical level, the dissertation analyzes the causes of dissent within parliamentary parties in a comparative perspective. The analysis examines parliamentarians’ attitudes across 15 European national parliaments and tests the hypotheses formulated in the theoretical part by using the PARTIREP MP Survey dataset.

The results first show that, while European parliamentary parties are usually viewed as united blocks in terms of voting behavior, looking at MPs’ attitudes provides a more nuanced picture: European parliamentary parties show important variations in their MPs’ frequency of disagreement and attitudes of non-loyalty. Among the factors that explain these variations, both institutional (electoral rules, state structure, effective number of parties, intraparty organization) and sociological (gender, age, socialization, ideological preferences) factors need to be considered. In addition, the research shows that the two dimensions of dissent, though they are connected by a sequential relationship, should be studied distinctly, as different factors affect them respectively. The frequency of disagreement is best explained by the MP’s gender and previous elected office at a lower level than the national one, by the ideological distance between the MP and her/his party’s position in interaction with the party ‘family’, and by intraparty organizational factors (candidate selection procedures and EPO-PPO power balance). Non-loyalty depends more on the institutional structure (multilevel vs. unitary state, ENP) and on the candidate-centeredness of the electoral system; but is also affected by individual-level factors (age and length of incumbency) and by the party ‘family’. On the whole, by contrast to what is usually argued, ‘the party’ matters’ in determining the level of intraparty cohesion: the impact of intraparty organizational structure and party ideology or family is determinant, but more research is definitely needed in order to disentangle the ‘organizational’ vs. the ‘ideological’ effects.

Doctorat en Sciences politiques et sociales
info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished

This quantitative paper explores the mean value between selected countries with the ambition to compare the different regions and to understand the conditions in which populist parties grow. The main question that runs through this paper is “How does the potential populist support vary between different regions in Europe?”. This was done by drawing a framework based on the theory of the four D’s of Distrust, Destruction, Deprivation and De-alignment. The selected countries were divided in a similar order from the comparative study of 2015 conducted by Kriesi and Pappas. A survey from 2014 provided the necessary variables in order to measure the mean value of each category and summed up together in order to measure the “pool of potential populist voters”. The paper concludes that the regional and theoretic framework is validated judging upon the mean numbers in each country.

In this thesis, we explore the relationship between absorptive capacity and alliances, and their influence on firms’ competitive advantage in the US and European biopharmaceutical sectors. The study undertaken in this thesis is based on data from a large-scale international survey of over 2,500 biopharmaceutical firms in the US, the UK, Germany, France and Ireland. The thesis advanced a conceptual framework, which integrated the multi-dimensions of absorptive capacity, exploration-exploitation alliances, and competitive advantage, into a biopharmaceutical firm’s new product development process. The proposed framework is then tested in the empirical analysis, using truncated models to estimate firms’ sales growth, with zero-inflated negative binominal models capturing the number of alliances in which firms engage, and aspects of realised absorptive capacity analysed by ordinal probit models. The empirical results suggest that both skill-based and exploitation-based absorptive capacity play crucial roles in shaping firms’ competitive advantage, while neither exploratory nor exploitation alliances contribute to the improvement in firms’ competitive position. In terms of the interaction between firms’ absorptive capacity and alliance behaviour, the results suggest that engagement with exploratory alliances depends more strongly on firms’ assimilation capability (skills levels and continuity of R&D activities), while participation in exploitation alliances is more conditional on firms’ relevant knowledge monitoring capability. The results highlight the major differences between the determinants of firms’ alliance behaviour, and competitive advantage in the US and Europe – in the US firms’ skill levels prove more significant in determining firms’ engagement with exploratory alliances, whereas in Europe continuity of R&D proves more important. Correspondingly, while US firms’ engagement with exploitation alliances depends on market monitoring capability, that in Europe is more strongly linked to exploitation-based absorptive capacity. In respect of the determinants of firms’ competitive advantage – in Europe, market monitoring capability, engagement with exploitation alliances, and continuous R&D activities, prove more important, while in the US, it is firms’ market characteristics that matter most.

Western nations continue to face potential attacks from violent extremist organizations waging a campaign of violence in the name of political Islam. Though these attacks are traditionally labeled as originating from abroad, leaders of these extremist organizations are utilizing a new tactic of radicalizing native or naturalized citizens from within Western countries in an effort to bypass the massive defensive security apparatus Western governments have put in place since the September 11 attacks. These undistinguishable citizens turned radical jihadists, better known as homegrown terrorists, represent a clear and present danger to the security of the United States. In an effort to understand the problem, this paper seeks to identify patterns common amongst these individuals and addresses the question "How does a Muslim youth become radicalized into a homegrown terrorist?" This research will use a case study approach to identify patterns of radicalization in convicted homegrown terrorist and test the hypothesis that a failure of integration will cause some Western Muslim youth to radicalize and in some cases, commit violent crimes of terrorism.

Diese Dissertation, befasst sich mit Wechselwirkungen zwischen Weidevieh und Wildtieren und basiert auf der Hypothese, dass sich stark transformierte europäische Landschaften und weniger gestörte afrikanische Savannen gegenseitig als Referenz dienen können. Aufgrund von Parallelen in der Domestikationsgeschichte, fungieren europäische und afrikanische Hausrinder als theoretischer Rahmen. Die Daten wurden mittels Kamerafallen und Interviews in vier Fallstudien erhoben. Die Untersuchungsgebiete befinden sich in räumlicher Nähe zu Schutzgebieten in Deutschland (Nationalpark Unteres Odertal und Naturpark Westhavelland), Namibia (Etosha Nationalpark) und Tansania (Serengeti Nationalpark). Die Ergebnisse zeigen, dass bestimmte Praktiken des Weidemanagements in Deutschland Potential haben, die Nachhaltigkeit der Weidetierhaltung in Afrika zu erhöhen. In Afrika sind die Reaktionen der Wildtierzönosen auf verschiedene Weidesysteme stärker ausgeprägt als in Europa. Ein gemeinsames Phänomen in allen Fallstudien sind hohe Konflikte mit streng geschützten Wildarten. Die Ergebnisse deuten darauf hin, dass Agrobiodiversität nur erfolgreich geschützt werden kann, wenn Managementstrategien den Anforderungen der Landwirte gerecht werden. Es gibt Gemeinsamkeiten zwischen den Untersuchungsgebieten in Deutschland und privatem Farmland in Namibia. Sorgfältige Anpassungen an die standortspezifischen Bedingungen sind erforderlich wenn ein in Europa entwickeltes Weidesystem in Afrika praktiziert wird. Die Ergebnisse aus Tansania sind ein Indikator für die extreme Veränderung der Landschaft und ausgeprägte Mensch-Wildtier-Konflikte. Besonders dort, wo Rinder hohe kulturelle Bedeutung haben, ist es nötig, die Menschen für Nachhaltigkeit im Weidemanagement zu sensibilisieren. Traditionelle Praktiken des schwindenden Pastoralismus erscheinen vielversprechend um die Nachhaltigkeit der Weidehaltung auf kommunalem Land in Afrika zu erhöhen.
These comparative studies deal with the interactions between grazing cattle and wildlife. The thesis is based on the central hypothesis that strongly transformed European landscapes and less disturbed African savannas can provide each other a valuable reference. Due to parallels in the domestication history, European and African cattle function as theoretical framework of these studies. The data were collected via camera traps and interviews in four case studies. The study areas are in close vicinity to protected areas in Germany (Lower Oder Valley National Park and Westhavelland Nature Park), Namibia (Etosha National Park) and Tanzania (Serengeti National Park). The results show that certain practices of the pasture management in Germany have potential to increase the sustainability of livestock grazing in Africa. In Africa, the responses of the wildlife communities to different grazing systems are more pronounced than in Europe. A common phenomenon in all case studies is a high level of conflict with strictly protected wildlife species. The results suggest that agro-biodiversity can only be successfully protected if management strategies meet the requirements of farmers. There are several similarities between the study areas in Germany and private farmland in Namibia. Careful adaptation to the site-specific conditions is required when a grazing system developed in Europe is practiced in Africa. The results from Tanzania are an indicator of the extreme change in the landscape and pronounced human-wildlife conflicts. Especially where cattle are of high cultural value, it is necessary to sensitize people to sustainability in pasture management. Traditional practices of declining pastoralism appear promising to increase the sustainability of grazing on communal land in Africa.

The main problem of this thesis was the comparative analysis of the procedures in place in Sweden and Italy for the reception and support of LGBTI asylum seekers fleeing from war. The aim was to understand if the Swedish and Italian asylum and social systems are supporting and protecting the rights of LGBTI asylum seekers equally, also by uncovering how these procedures affect individuals. The method used to carry out this study was analysis of secondary documents. Queer and migration research, as well as reports, were used to provide a general framework to the issue, while country-specific data was sought in current domestic legislation and country reports carried out by local and international NGOs invested in LGBTI and migrants rights. The gathered information was examined from a descriptive, critical and constructive perspective, and placed within a prevailing comparative framework. Indeed, at the core of the study, lies a comparison between procedural differences in Sweden and Italy concerning the reception and protection of LGBTI asylum seekers who flee war. It was found that in Sweden and Italy people seeking refuge from war torn countries have much higher possibilities to be granted asylum than any other group of migrants. However, with regards to LGBTI asylum seekers from other countries, the social and asylum system of both are structurally violent in that the exclusion and discrimination against sexual minority refugees is the standard. In fact, LGBTI asylum seekers face similar challenges related to their intersectional identity in Sweden as well as Italy, although to different degrees: compared to Italy, Sweden has more standard procedures set in place that help queer asylees have a better experience. Nevertheless, neither systems hold up to the standard they should as consistent reports describe unlawful practices that violate humanitarian law and breach of Article 3 of the European Convention of Human Rights. Ultimately, LGBTI asylum seekers appear to have virtually no control over any aspect of their application or experience in the asylum and social system in Sweden as well as Italy. Therefore, rather than experiencing a newfound freedom, in entering the Italian and Swedish democratic spaces, these individuals simply experience a different kind of oppression.

Female labor force participation varies widely across regions and cultures, typically with more working women in developed than developing countries. Because there are significant differences between developed and developing countries that go beyond GDP, this paper examines the effects of certain development indicators on female workforce participation across these countries. Using models from past literature, I include indicators that cover personal and labor market characteristics. In this analysis, I find that education and unemployment rates continue to be significant determinants of female labor force participation in both developed and developing countries, with several key differences in the effect of various types of unemployment. Furthermore, my study supports the existence of an initial tradeoff between female labor force participation and development as the economic sectors within a country shift. These results provide valuable insights on these general trends across national borders and therefore are important for policy makers.

Bibliography: p. 191-205.
This dissertation seeks to determine how the socio-economic and political changes, following the 1989 revolutions in Central Europe, have found reflection and led to the emergence of interest groups in the education debate. It looks at the reforms initiated by the new ruling .power-elite in Poland, Hungary and Czechoslovakia. This reform process, embodying the value system of the new governments, has led, the dissertation seeks to show, directly to new and vibrant interest groups on the educational landscape. This study identifies the seven prominent interest groups - seeking to satisfy their own interests - which engage the government in the education policy making arena. This policy making arena, which I refer to as the "arena of power", is analysed through focussing on the relationship of power between the seven interest groups and the state. The Halasz (1986: 123) classification of interest groups in communist Hungary in 1986, forms the point of departure for my examination of post-1989 interest groups. Each chapter highlights the circumstances that influenced the development of interest groups and the extent of their participation in reforms. The dissertation concludes with a reclassification of post-1989 interest groups in Central Europe, in order to facilitate a better understanding of the dynamics of interest groups in the "arena of power".

As demographic and economic contexts have shifted, the need for pension systems to reform has increased. Often, however, these systems have proved difficult to change – especially in continental Europe. Despite this, Germany, by many considered particularly reform resistant, succeeded in reforming its pension system; while France, with its strong executive power, has not. As research has yet to find a consensus on what factors makes welfare retrenchment possible, this field requires more attention. Therefore, the aim of this thesis is to analyse the developments of the German and French pension systems, from 1990-2010, and to unearth what factors made successful reform possible in Germany while it failed in France. Using a comparative case study, all major pension reforms in the two countries during the time period, are analysed from four institutionalist perspectives. The results point to three main factors explaining Germany’s successful reform. Firstly, the shock brought on by the reunification of East and West Germany forced politicians to act. France on the other hand, experienced no such shock. Secondly, the subduing of the unions removed the main veto player against reform. In contrast, the French unions, whose political power lies in their ability to call for manifestations and shift public opinion, could not be outflanked. Lastly, the new liberal ideas that permeated German politics around the turn of the century provided a locus for change that was lacking in France. These results suggest the importance of external pressure, veto players and ideational factors to major welfare reform.

This thesis is rooted in the research tradition known as coalition politics, where governments, political parties and political institutions are the central focus. The main emphasis here is on government instability and the question of why governments in modern parliamentary democracies often come to an end before the next regular election. In five distinct but interrelated papers, the thesis explores the issue of early government termination and how it is affected by public support, economic developments and the functioning of the state apparatus. The studies included in this thesis generally take a quantitative approach and make use of a dataset that contains 640 governments in 29 European democracies. Their joint goal is to improve our understanding of when early termination happens by introducing and testing new explanatory factors as well as by improving how previously identified factors are modelled. The first paper focuses on Central and Eastern Europe. It shows that the stability of governments in that region is affected by slightly different factors than those that impact on governments in Western Europe. In particular, ideological factors and political institutions are found to be less important in Central and Eastern Europe while the formal power basis of the government and the country’s economic performance matter more. In the second paper, co-authored with Professor Torbjörn Bergman, the state is brought into government stability research. The paper shows that countries with a lower quality of governance and a less efficient public sector have less stable governments. This is mainly because government parties struggle to achieve their policy goals when the state apparatus is inefficient and corrupt. Paper 3, co-written with Associate Professor Johan Hellström, looks at how different types of governments respond to economic challenges. In particular, this paper demonstrates that the same changes in economic circumstances (e.g. increases in unemployment or inflation) have different effects on cabinet stability depending on which type of government is in charge. Single party governments are better equipped to deal with economic changes, because they are better positioned to devise new policy responses without having to compromise with other parties. Coalition governments, in contrast, become significantly more likely to terminate early when the economy takes a turn for the worse. Finally, over the course of two papers I first explore new techniques for analysing polling data and then use them to empirically test whether governments sometimes choose termination as a way to cope with bad poll numbers. Most of the existing techniques for pooling polls and forecasting elections were explicitly designed with two party systems in mind. In Paper 4, I test some of these techniques to determine their usefulness in complex, multiparty systems, and I develop some improvements that enable us to take advantage of more of the information in the data. In the final paper, I combine the two themes of polling and government stability by looking at how changes in government popularity affect the likelihood of premature dissolution. I find that governments, particularly single party governments, do, in fact, use terminations as a strategic response to changes in their popularity among the public. When support is high, governments tend to opportunistically call an early election, whereas they tend to abandon or reshuffle the government when support is low.

Active and engaged citizens are the backbone of a strong democracy and a vibrant civil society. Yet recent trends of low electoral turnout in Europe and decreasing levels of civic engagement have called into question the legitimacy of governments and the stability of democracy in the long term, particularly in Europe. Against the background of such developments this research sets out to provide a comparative study of civic engagement and analyse the variations in civic engagement between countries. The study is mainly based on the analysis of the European Social Survey 2002, covering 35,000 individuals from 19 European countries and applies advanced statistical modelling techniques including Multiple Correspondence Analysis MCA) and Multi-level modelling. Although there is a good deal of research examining civic engagement using individual level data or aggregate level data, very few studies have combined both approaches. This study addresses this gap and applies multi-level modelling to examine the relative importance of an individual’s socio-demographic characteristics and his/her country in determining levels and types of civic engagement. Thus, it has the advantage of identifying whether civic engagement is significantly affected by country characteristics or the converse, whether a person’s characteristics (age, education, social class etc.) are all that is needed in order to account for the variations in civic engagement. The innovative application of MCA to explore indicators of civic engagement has led to the identification of three dimensions of civic engagement; political activities, political consumerism and associational involvement. Moreover, by projecting all activities on a two-dimensional map it become evident that citizens who tend to carry out ‘individual’ types of political consumerism such as ‘buycotting’, boycotting and signing petitions are also more likely to be involved in New Social Movement organisations. These significant results shed new light on activities usually regarded as ‘individualistic’ type of activities and suggest viewing them in the context of a wider array of collective actions. Furthermore, in addition to the standard contextual measures such as economic development, welfare regime, income inequality, and levels of democracy, this study introduced two innovative policy measures. To consider the impact of government policies on levels of civic engagement measures of governments’ support of the voluntary sector and civic education at school (comparing the education policies of 19 European countries from 1945-2002) were developed. The results confirmed the importance of both individual level characteristics as well as country level characteristics in explaining civic engagement in Europe. However, differences between countries were reduced to a greater degree when contextual factors were introduced. Particularly the welfare state, showed the greatest effect. This implies that socio-economic conditions and in particular social policy and the degree to which it reproduces egalitarian structures determine to a great extent citizen involvement. In other words the results of this study suggest that the national context matters and that governments can and do shape the nature and levels of civic engagement.

La manière dont un jeune étudiant européen se déplace d'un pays à un autre dans le cadre du programme ERASMUS (European Community Action Scheme for the Mobility of University Students), tout dans l'esprit de découvrir ce continent divers, de partager sa culture avec d'autres et de faire fortifier son identité européenne est un enjeu social, économique et politique. La mobilité institutionnalisée a permis à beaucoup plus d'étudiants de partir à l'étranger qu'avant, que ça soit pour un semestre ou une année académique ou un stage de courte durée. Pourtant, la mobilité étudiante aujourd'hui est aussi devenue un atout économique pour la plupart des partis prenantes. En échangeant des étudiants comme s'ils étaient des commodités, les universités cherchent à accroitre leur notoriété, mettant en valeur leurs intérêts économiques avant l'accueil des étudiants étrangers. L'asymétrie des échanges entre les pays de l'Europe Occidentale et l'Europe de l'Est et Centrale pose aussi des problèmes. En outre, L'ECTS (European Crédit and Transfer System) et le Processus de Bologne ont changé la signification d'un séjour à l'étranger - écartant la diversité entre les institutions de l'enseignement supérieur. Dans cette thèse, je fais un bilan du programme ERASMUS. Par la suite, je fais des recommandations concernant l'impact social du programme - et comment faire en sorte que l'idée de partage culturelle reste au sein de sa philosophie.

The theme of this thesis is suicide mortality in its various aspects, seen from an international, European perspective. It questions the existence of social (structural) concomitants to suicide mortality and investigates attitudes towards and legislation concerning suicide, as well as some historical processes pertaining to their development. Paper 1 replicates an authoritative study of the "correlates of suicide" on a national level in European countries. It shows that the findings of this study do not hold 16 years later, and it presents some ideas as to why these changes have taken place. It is suggested that there are no simple social correlates to suicide on this level, and that suicide rates tend to vary according to, among other things, international cultural influences. Paper 2 investigates penal legislation relating to suicide in European countries. Three types of punishable action are found: 1) aiding suicide, 2) abetting suicide, and 3) driving somebody to suicide. A majority of European countries include some of these acts in their criminal laws. However, the laws vary very widely between countries, thereby constituting a notable exception to the common presumption of uniformity of law. The scope of the criminalization and the severity of the penalties for the crimes covary both with cultural attitudes towards suicide and with suicide rates. The results are interpreted as indicating the existence of a cultural-normative system, consisting of the cultural attitudes towards suicide, the laws regulating the actions relating to suicide and, perhaps, religion. It influences the occurrence of suicide, mainly by offering individuals cultural models of behavior. Paper 3 describes the process towards the decriminalization of suicide (in 1864) in Sweden, its causes and consequences. It is suggested that the law change took place because of a) the international ideological currents of the time (the heritage of the Enlightenment), b) the examples presented by other European countries, and c) the radical changes in people's behavior. The reform was long overdue, and thus did not have a direct effect on suicide mortality. The increase in Swedish suicide rates in the 19th century is seen as connected with certain aspects of the "modernization" process. Paper 4 addresses the prospects and problems connected with the ap-plication of Talcott Parsons's functionalist theory to suicide research, in particular when contrasting it with Durkheim's theory. It is found that the latter, despite its shortcomings, still dominates socially oriented suicide research. Parsons's theory is seen as implicating the cultural primacy of suicide mortality. Its general usability is, however, highly uncertain since many of its essential constituent parts are not well suited to the subject. A model for suicide rates, consisting of cultural (domestic and inter-national), political, social, diffusion and availability factors is presented. Taken together, the papers constitute a case for cultural (as opposed to socio-structural) research into suicide mortality. They question the repeated testing of structural variables in favor of creating cultural indicators. They suggest some new lines of research, and call for a consistently universal perspective on the problem of suicide and suicide mortality.

Härtill fyra uppsatser.

Norwegen und die Schweiz sind keine EU-Mitgliedstaaten, weil die Bevölkerungen die Integration mehrheitlich in Referenden ablehnte. Die enorme Mobilisierung und Emotionalisierung in den nationalen Integrationsdebatten kann weder durch ökonomische noch durch politische Umstände hinreichend erklärt werden, zumal die Eliten beider Länder mehrheitlich die Integration unterstützen. Die Hauptmobilisierungsressource von Euroskeptikern liegt vielmehr darin, tief verwurzelte nationale Selbst- und Fremdbilder zu reaktivieren. Diese Diskursanalyse beschreibt vergleichend, auf welche Art und Weise die größten euroskeptischen Akteure der Schweiz und Norwegens diesen Rückgriff auf das Nationale in Integrationsdebatten herstellen. Gefragt wird, wie die „Aktion für eine Unabhängige und Neutrale Schweiz“ (AUNS) und die eng mit ihr verbundene „Schweizerische Volkspartei“ (SVP) einerseits, und die norwegische Bewegung „Nein zur EU“ (norwegisch: Nei Til EU) andererseits, ihren Integrationswiderstand mittels nationaler Narrationen und Bildersprachen als sinnvoll darstellen. Hierzu werden umfangreiche euroskeptische Bild- und Textquellen referiert und gedeutet. Damit wird ein Beitrag zur Forschung über das Selbstverständnis, die Denkweise, die Rhetorik und das Tugendsystem anti-integratorischer Bewegungen geleistet. Denn Euroskeptiker verstehen sich primär als Verteidiger der guten nationalen Gemeinschaft. Diese Gemeinschaft und dessen Nationalstaat beschreiben sie als wärmer, natürlicher, näher, gerechter, effizienter, friedlicher und demokratischer als das integrierte Europa, welches als ferner, kalter, bürokratischer Superstaat EU dargestellt wird.
Norway and Switzerland are not member states of the EU, since the majority of the people rejected integration in several referenda. The emotionality and the enormous mobilisation in national debates on integration cannot sufficiently be explained by economic and political reasons, since the majority of the elites are supporting integration. Instead, the main resource of mobilisation for Eurosceptics lies in reactivating deeply rooted descriptions of national self and other. For carving out these collective images, this discourse-analysis compares how the major Eurosceptical actors of Switzerland, the “Action for an Independent and Neutral Switzerland” (AUNS) together with the tightly connected “Swiss People’s Party” (SVP), on one hand, and the Norwegian movement “No To EU” (NEI TIL EU), on the other hand, describe their actions as meaningful in their iconography and narrations. In doing so, the study refers to and interprets extensive material from Eurosceptical actors and contributes to the understanding of Eurosceptical self-perception, ways of thinking, rhetoric and virtue system. Here Eurosceptics perceive themselves mainly as defenders of the national community and its nation-state, which are regarded as warm, natural, close, justified, efficient, peaceful and democratic, while Europe is perceived as the cold, distant, bureaucratic superstate EU.

Defence date: 9 November 2007
Examining Board: Prof. Jaap Dronkers, European University Institute, Supervisor ; Prof. Gøsta Esping-Andersen, Pompeu Fabra University, External Co-Supervisor ; Prof. Andrea Ichino, University of Bologna ; Prof. Wout Ultee, Radboud University, Nijmegen
First made available online on 9 April 2018
Unemployment does not hit only individual workers, it affects their families as well. There has been increasing interest in household joblessness and the polarisation of work across households. The consequences of household joblessness on well-being can be dramatic. Jobless households have a high risk of poverty and household joblessness can affect the long-term outcomes of adults and children living in such households. The objective of this dissertation is to contribute to the understanding of household joblessness in Europe by analysing couples in which both partners are simultaneously without work. Using data from the European Community Household Panel, I focus on three areas, which have received little attention in the literature.

Defence date: 9 November 2007
Examining board: Prof. Jaap Dronkers, European University Institute, Supervisor ; Prof. Gøsta Esping-Andersen, Pompeu Fabra University, External Co-Supervisor ; Prof. Andrea Ichino, University of Bologna ; Prof. Wout Ultee, Radboud University, Nijmegen
First made available online: 16 July 2021
A widespread theme pervades both political theory and the social sciences, in which participation in certain types of democratic institutions could create a more competent, active and public-spirited citizenry. While the school of democracy hypothesis has seen a recent renewal, little empirical research has been carried out in order to evaluate it rigorously. I tried to answer this crucial democratic question by leading an ethnographic study in three cases of municipal participatory budgeting in France, Italy and Spain. They indeed appeared as good training grounds for individuals, as they are empowered institutions that aim at including lay citizens in the discussion and production of local public policies. After almost two years of precise micro-sociological research, I saw people change, sometimes radically. Some, disappointed by their experience, became increasingly cynical about participatory democracy and politics in general. Many others however acquired new civic skills and competences, a wider knowledge of their environment and of the political system, and became increasingly involved in associations, social movements and political parties. Some even became professional and were integrated in municipal electoral teams. Participatory democracy has therefore the potential to empower citizens and create new local elites - be they critical ones, re-boosting civil society, or institutionalised ones, regenerating representative government. Some specific factors appeared crucial in the pattern of self-change I observed. Firstly, the biographical availability and previous political experiences of actors had a decisive impact. Secondly, self-change required mastering the discursive rules of competent behaviour of the institution - what I call their grammatical rules - to be integrated and thus experience intensive participation. Mastering the norms of good behaviour in public - learned through trial and error, and from sanctions and rewards mechanisms, i.e. from the power of the emotions felt in public and especially under the eyes of unknown strangers - people had then the chance to see their personal and political trajectories more radically affected. The individual impact of the involvement in participatory democracy institutions seems therefore to be both the increased civic competence of actors, but also the exclusion of the unskilled and incompetent citizens. The process of self-change can therefore appear as both fostering emancipation and exclusion.

Defence date: 10 September 2004
Examining board: Prof. Jens Alber (Wissenschaftszentrum für Sozialforschung, Berlin) ; Prof. Stefano Bartolini (EUI, Supervisor) ; Prof. Colin Crouch (EUI) ; Prof. Peter Flora (University of Mannheim)
PDF of thesis uploaded from the Library digitised archive of EUI PhD theses completed between 2013 and 2017

Defence date: 24 September 2001
Examining board: Prof. Joaquín Abellán (Universidad Complutense de Madrid) ; Prof. Christian Joppke (EUI - supervisor) ; Prof. Stephen Mennell (University College Dublin) ; Prof. Gianfranco Poggi (EUI - co-supervisor)
First made available online on 8 January 2020
This thesis has two fundamental objectives. On the one hand, at the level of theoretical generalization, it aims to make a contribution to the study of collective identities, and more specifically, of national identities within the context of European integration. On the other, at the level of empirical investigation, it aims to compare how the collective ideals, memories, and sentiments of two national communities, Britain and Spain, have conditioned the diverse symbolic representations of ‘Europe* which have emerged over the course of time in the public spheres of these two particular case-studies.

The Great Recession of 2007--09 was the worst global economic crisis since the Great Depression of the 1930s. The effects were felt across most of the developed world and Europe was no exception. In many European countries, austerity programmes were implemented in response to the recession, which were often deeply unpopular. Many governments lost power in the years following the recession, with sometimes strikingly harsh swings against them. One notable example was the Irish election of 2011, in which the incumbent Fianna Fáil was reduced from 71 to 20 seats, by far its worst result at any general election since independence in 1922. This is congruent with the theory of economic voting, according to which voters will remove from office governments that fail to deliver economic prosperity. Although there is an enormous empirical literature supporting this theory, almost all of this evidence pertains to the typical boom and bust cycle of individual countries and little is known about economic voting during a severe global recession. The Irish result could have been indicative of the usual economic vote, a bolstered economic vote due to the unusual scale and severity of the crisis, or of dissatisfaction with the government's handling of the crisis. This thesis investigates whether the usual economic vote in European countries was altered during the Great Recession. This thesis uses survey data from the 2004, 2009 and 2014 waves of the European Election Studies~(EES) to compare the economic vote in 25 European countries before, during and after the Great Recession. Multilevel methods are used to model voters' support for the parties they could vote for at general elections in their own countries. Using this method, the results show that the economic vote was weaker during the crisis than it was either before or after. In order to explain these results, I analyse which parties voters tended to prefer after the crisis and how attitudes towards the European Union evolved over time. The results find that there was a shift away from centrist and pro-European parties towards radical and Eurosceptic parties following the crisis. In addition, support for the EU fell over the same time period and voters were increasingly likely to hold the EU responsible for economic conditions. Given the timing of these shifts as well as the association between European institutions and austerity policies, these findings suggest that the austerity programmes implemented in the wake of the crisis may have been a stronger catalyst for economic voting in Europe than the Great Recession itself.

This dissertation deals with Futurist Eschatologies in Africa and Europe: Pannenberg, Moltmann, Mbiti and Kato. It therefore engages with intercultural hermeneutics and theologies of different contexts. It is set on the premise that Christianity as worldwide community of believers depends on the reasoning from different cultures and contexts. The dissertation engages with the four theologians individually at first and then brings their positions into a dialogue. The individual engagement serves the purpose of determining the context of each of the theologians. The context is found in the biographies of Kato, Moltmann, Mbiti and Pannenberg. Even though the four theologians are born within a timespan of eleven years their life circumstances differ greatly. But the dissertation also engages with context referring to the way Mbiti, Kato, Pannenberg and Moltmann relate their eschatologies to the rest of their theology and how they determine the importance of eschatology for life in time. The dissertation furthermore compares the writings of the four theologians. Therefore, special attention is given to Hermeneutics, the understanding of time and certain eschatological topics such as death, resurrection and judgement. Similarities and differences in different approaches of the four theologians are described and analysed. In conclusion, the dissertation stresses the importance of theological context. The term theological context refers to the correlation between different perspectives of theology. The dissertation opts for an eschatology that is founded solidly in Christology.
Thesis (M.Th.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2008.

This thesis examines factors that underscored higher education reforms in Central and Eastern Europe during the transition period from 1990 to 2005. The study explores higher education reforms in three national settings – Hungary, Romania and the Republic of Moldova, and presents a detailed analysis of the Moldovan case. Rooted in critical approaches to development, transition reforms and policy analysis in higher education, it addresses the new realities of global capitalism, inequitable distribution of power between the industrialized nations and the rest of the world, and the ways in which this power distribution impacts higher education systems in Central and Eastern Europe. Historical analyses, a qualitative cross-national analysis of HE systems in three nations, and interviews with Moldovan higher education policymakers provided rich data on higher education reforms in the region and selected nations. Higher education evolved from institutions serving very select elite in the Middle Ages to universities driving modernization in the 19th and the first half of the 20th century, and to diverse institutional types - universities, colleges, institutes - underscoring the massification of higher education after WWII. Policies pursued by Hungarian, Romanian and Moldovan leaders to expand higher education were informed by the national socio-economic, political and demographic contexts, the dominant global development agenda, and international institutional practices. The capacity of national leaders to carry out higher education reforms was limited by the colonial and post-colonial relationships that were established over centuries between each of these nations and stronger regional powers, such as the Habsburg, Ottoman and Russian Empires, the Soviet Union, and the European Union. Major regional powers had a significant role in the formation of nation states, educational institutions and higher education politics. At the same time, national elites used language and ethnic policies to shape social and higher education developments and build national identities. By bringing an international perspective to the analysis of reforms in Central and Eastern Europe, by focusing on Hungary, Romania and Moldova, and by drawing on critical theory and post-colonial studies, this research study contributes to the international scholarly discussion of higher education and development reforms, enriches methodological developments in the field of higher education, and advances the discourse of comparative higher education.

Erdbeben können bis heute nicht exakt vorhergesagt werden und treffen moderne Gesellschaften genauso unerwartet wie historische Zivilisationen. Sie stellen deshalb eine besondere Herausforderung für jede betroffene Gesellschaft dar. Zur Wiederherstellung der Normalität müssen die Erdstöße und ihre sozialen, wirtschaflichen und politischen Folgen mental und praktisch bewältigt werden. Die dazu ergriffenen Strategien unterschieden sich in verschiedenen Kulturkreisen und verschiedenen Epochen jedoch zum Teil erheblich voneinander. Die Dissertation untersucht mittels einer historischen Diskursanalyse die in griechischen, lateinischen und frühchinesischen Quellen aufgezeichneten Wahrnehmungen, Interpretationen und praktischen Maßnahmen zur Bewältigung von Erdbeben im antiken Mittelmeerraum und im frühen China. Die für die beiden Regionen gewonnenen Erkenntnisse werden anschließend vergleichend gegenübergestellt, um dadurch zum einen ein besseres Verständnis der frühen Kulturen im Mittelmeerraum und in Ostasien zu ermöglichen sowie zum anderen Anregungen für mögliche Strategien und Konzepte im Umgang mit gegenwärtigen und zukünftigen Naturkatastrophen bereitzustellen.:1 Einleitung: Relevanz des Themas und Aufbau der Arbeit 1.1 Aktualität des Themas: Erdbeben und ihr Einfluss auf die Gesellschaft 1.2 Problemstellung 1.3 Gestaltung des Vergleiches 1.4 Stand der Forschung 1.4.1 Für die historischen Erdbeben in Europa und im Mittelmeerraum 1.4.2 Für die historischen Erdbeben in China 1.4.3 Vergleichende Forschung zu historischen Erdbeben 2 Thematische und methodische Vorüberlegungen 2.1 Theoretischer Ansatz 2.2 Die physische Dimension der Erdbeben 2.2.1 Ursachen und Arten von Erdbeben 2.2.2 Erschütterungen des Bodens durch P- und S-Wellen 2.2.3 Klassifizierung von Erdbeben nach ihrer Stärke: die Skalen von Mercalli und Richter 2.2.4 Tsunamis 2.2.5 Seismische Zonen: Mittelmeerraum und chinesisches Festland 2.3 Die soziale Dimension der Erdbeben 2.3.1 Diskurs und historische Diskursanalyse 2.3.2 Erdbeben als Bestandteile des modernen Katastrophendiskurses 2.4 Methodisches Vorgehen 3 Der Erdbebendiskurs im antiken Mittelmeerraum 3.1 Quantitative Analyse des antiken europäischen Erdbebendiskurses 3.1.1 Griechische und lateinische Bezeichnungen für Erdbeben 3.1.2 Nennungen von Erdbeben 3.1.3 Welche (Arten von) Erdbeben wurden aufgezeichnet? 3.2 Qualitative Analyse des antiken Erdbebendiskurses im Mittelmeerraum 3.2.1 Die frühesten Beschreibungen von Erdbeben: Hesiod und Homer 3.2.2 Erdbeben als Folgen menschlichen Handelns 3.2.3 Erdbeben als Resultate natürlicher Prozesse 3.3 Schlussfolgerungen zum Erdbebendiskurs in den antiken europäischen Quellen 4 Der Erdbebendiskurs im frühen China 4.1 Quantitative Analyse des frühchinesischen Erdbebendiskurses 4.1.1 Frühchinesische Bezeichnungen für Erdbeben 4.1.2 Nennungen von Erdbeben 4.1.3 Welche (Arten von) Erdbeben wurden aufgezeichnet? 4.2 Qualitative Analyse des frühchinesischen Erdbebendiskurses 4.2.1 Die Anfänge des chinesischen Erdbebendiskurses: Erdbeben während der Sandai 4.2.2 Die Chunqiu-Tradition: 5 Erdbeben im Staate Lu 4.2.3 Fürst Jing von Qi und der große Wahrsager: Erdbeben als vorhersagbare Naturphänomene 4.3 Schlussfolgerungen zum Erdbebendiskurs in den frühchinesischen Quellen 5 Vergleich der Erdbebendiskurse im antiken Europa und im frühen China 5.1 Vergleichende quantitative Analyse der Erdbebendiskurse im antiken Europa und im Frühen China 5.1.1 Bezeichnungen für Erdbeben im antiken Mittelmeerraum und im frühen China 5.1.2 Nennungen von Erdbeben im antiken Mittelmeerraum und im frühen China 5.1.3 Welche (Arten von) Erdbeben wurden aufgezeichnet? 5.2 Vergleichende qualitative Analyse der Erdbebendiskurse im antiken Europa und im frühen China 5.2.1 Vergleich der Wahrnehmungen von Erdbeben im antiken Mittelmeerraum und im frühen China 5.2.2 Vergleich der Interpretationen von Erdbeben im antiken Mittelmeerraum und im frühen China 5.2.3 Vergleich der praktischen Bewältigung von Erdbeben im antiken Mittelmeerraum und im frühen China 6 Fazit
Even today, it is impossible to precisely predict earthquakes. That is why, just like in the distant past, earthquakes present a special challenge for any society that is struck by them. In order to return to normality, it is necessary to develop mental and practical ways of coping with the events and their effects. It can be observed that these strategies differ substantially between different cultures and different historical periods. This dissertation investigates the perceptions and interpretations of, as well as the practical measures of coping with earthquakes that are recorded in Greek, Latin and early Chinese sources by using the method of historical discourse analysis. Subsequently, the results obtained for both regions are compared in order to achieve both a better understanding of the early cultures in the Mediterranean and East Asia, and the formulation of strategies for coping with present and future natural extremes.:1 Einleitung: Relevanz des Themas und Aufbau der Arbeit 1.1 Aktualität des Themas: Erdbeben und ihr Einfluss auf die Gesellschaft 1.2 Problemstellung 1.3 Gestaltung des Vergleiches 1.4 Stand der Forschung 1.4.1 Für die historischen Erdbeben in Europa und im Mittelmeerraum 1.4.2 Für die historischen Erdbeben in China 1.4.3 Vergleichende Forschung zu historischen Erdbeben 2 Thematische und methodische Vorüberlegungen 2.1 Theoretischer Ansatz 2.2 Die physische Dimension der Erdbeben 2.2.1 Ursachen und Arten von Erdbeben 2.2.2 Erschütterungen des Bodens durch P- und S-Wellen 2.2.3 Klassifizierung von Erdbeben nach ihrer Stärke: die Skalen von Mercalli und Richter 2.2.4 Tsunamis 2.2.5 Seismische Zonen: Mittelmeerraum und chinesisches Festland 2.3 Die soziale Dimension der Erdbeben 2.3.1 Diskurs und historische Diskursanalyse 2.3.2 Erdbeben als Bestandteile des modernen Katastrophendiskurses 2.4 Methodisches Vorgehen 3 Der Erdbebendiskurs im antiken Mittelmeerraum 3.1 Quantitative Analyse des antiken europäischen Erdbebendiskurses 3.1.1 Griechische und lateinische Bezeichnungen für Erdbeben 3.1.2 Nennungen von Erdbeben 3.1.3 Welche (Arten von) Erdbeben wurden aufgezeichnet? 3.2 Qualitative Analyse des antiken Erdbebendiskurses im Mittelmeerraum 3.2.1 Die frühesten Beschreibungen von Erdbeben: Hesiod und Homer 3.2.2 Erdbeben als Folgen menschlichen Handelns 3.2.3 Erdbeben als Resultate natürlicher Prozesse 3.3 Schlussfolgerungen zum Erdbebendiskurs in den antiken europäischen Quellen 4 Der Erdbebendiskurs im frühen China 4.1 Quantitative Analyse des frühchinesischen Erdbebendiskurses 4.1.1 Frühchinesische Bezeichnungen für Erdbeben 4.1.2 Nennungen von Erdbeben 4.1.3 Welche (Arten von) Erdbeben wurden aufgezeichnet? 4.2 Qualitative Analyse des frühchinesischen Erdbebendiskurses 4.2.1 Die Anfänge des chinesischen Erdbebendiskurses: Erdbeben während der Sandai 4.2.2 Die Chunqiu-Tradition: 5 Erdbeben im Staate Lu 4.2.3 Fürst Jing von Qi und der große Wahrsager: Erdbeben als vorhersagbare Naturphänomene 4.3 Schlussfolgerungen zum Erdbebendiskurs in den frühchinesischen Quellen 5 Vergleich der Erdbebendiskurse im antiken Europa und im frühen China 5.1 Vergleichende quantitative Analyse der Erdbebendiskurse im antiken Europa und im Frühen China 5.1.1 Bezeichnungen für Erdbeben im antiken Mittelmeerraum und im frühen China 5.1.2 Nennungen von Erdbeben im antiken Mittelmeerraum und im frühen China 5.1.3 Welche (Arten von) Erdbeben wurden aufgezeichnet? 5.2 Vergleichende qualitative Analyse der Erdbebendiskurse im antiken Europa und im frühen China 5.2.1 Vergleich der Wahrnehmungen von Erdbeben im antiken Mittelmeerraum und im frühen China 5.2.2 Vergleich der Interpretationen von Erdbeben im antiken Mittelmeerraum und im frühen China 5.2.3 Vergleich der praktischen Bewältigung von Erdbeben im antiken Mittelmeerraum und im frühen China 6 Fazit

This Dissertation explores the impact of the European Union's (EU) Cohesion Policy (and its structural and investment funds) on the transnationalization and subsequent transformation of state in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE). The Cohesion Policy is commonly known as a redistribution framework which transfers developmental aid from the West European core to the less developed periphery of South Europe and CEE through the EU budget. The dissertation explores the impact of this core-peripheral redistribution from a critical perspective in the Comparative Capitalism (CC) scholarship. More concretely, it focuses on the so-called Visegrád states - Czechia, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia - and their dependent market economies between the EU eastern enlargement in 2004 and the mid-2010s. This generates the first main contribution by bringing the EU structural funds into the CC debates on CEE which are mostly preoccupied with the impact of foreign direct investment (FDI) on the transnationalization of Visegrád states. The contribution is impossible without historicizing the role of Cohesion Policy in shaping the EU historical core-peripheral relations since the late 1980s. Such a historization facilitates the second main contribution when examining how the post-2004 CEE integration transforms these...