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2751. "Power" in International Relations: concept formation between conceptual analysis and conceptual history

Author:
Stefano Guzzini
Publication Date:
03-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Danish Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
This paper will try to take the reader on a journey from conceptual analysis, used as a means for variable construction, to concept formation as conceptual history through a series of stops which will add different contextual layers to the analysis. This step by step introduction is meant to show the basic connectedness, and indeed crucial importance, of all this layers for constructivism-inspired scholarship where concept formation is not simply a means but an important end in our knowledge. Throughout the journey, references will be made to the concept of power which, in this indirect way – so I hope – will be shown as variable, as core concept in a social theory, as well as a performative speech act, embedded in a certain historical and cultural context, with the effect of "politicising" issues.
Topic:
International Relations, Security, and Government

2752. Global Ungovernance: Mercenaries, States and the Control over Violence

Author:
Anna Leander
Publication Date:
06-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Danish Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
There is a tendency for political protestors and academic critics of 'glo bal-isation' to focus their attention on the institutions of Global Governance. The meetings of the EU and WTO have to placed in far off, complicated location to be safe from the p hysical threats of the pro testors. And there is literally a flood of critical writings on the impact of the IMF, the World Bank or the G7 on developing countries. However, in this article I want to shift the focus to another, and it seems to me potentially more threatening tendency: the tendency towards 'ungovernance'. In particular I want to dis-cuss the role of mercenaries as an example of this d evelopment.
Topic:
Security, Government, and Terrorism
Political Geography:
Europe

2753. Do Affluent Countries Face an Incomes-Jobs Tradeoff?

Author:
Lane Kenworthy
Publication Date:
03-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Institute for European Studies at Cornell University
Abstract:
A commonly-held view suggests that affluent nations face a tradeoff between incomes and jobs. According to this view, in the United States pay for workers at the bottom of the earnings distribution (relative to those in the middle) is very low and government unemployment-related benefits (the "replacement rate") are stingy, but this facilitates the creation of lots of new jobs and encourages such individuals to take those jobs. The result is a high rate of employment and low unemployment. In much of Western Europe relative pay levels are higher for those at the bottom and benefits are more generous, but this is said to discourage job creation and to reduce the willingness of the unemployed to accept low-wage jobs. The consequence is low employment and high unemployment. I undertake a comparative assessment of this tradeoff view, based on pooled cross-section time-series analyses of 14 OECD countries in the 1980s and 1990s. The findings suggest that greater pay equality and a higher replacement rate do reduce employment growth in low-productivity private-sector service industries and in the economy as a whole. However, these effects are relatively weak. The results point to a variety of viable options for countries wishing to maintain or move toward a desirable combination of jobs and equality.
Topic:
Government
Political Geography:
United States and Europe

2754. Minority Languages and Public Administration

Author:
Alexander H.E. Morawa
Publication Date:
10-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
European Centre for Minority Issues
Abstract:
In its views in the Diergaardt et al. v. Namibia case of 25 July 2000, the United Nations Human Rights Committee addressed a complex set of complaints relating to the rights of a small community of people residing in the Rehoboth Gebiet (area) in the vicinity of the Namibian capital Windhoeck. The case as such concerns a situation, shaped by unique historic events, that is not necessarily comparable to minority issues in Europe, and which was decided at the universal, as opposed to the regional, level of human rights protection. Nevertheless, it raises a number of issues that are of relevance beyond the given context.
Topic:
Civil Society, Government, and Human Rights
Political Geography:
Eastern Europe

2755. Kosovo/a Standing Technical Working Group: Tenth Meeting Justice, Human Rights and Law and Order

Author:
Robert Curis
Publication Date:
10-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
European Centre for Minority Issues
Abstract:
The Standing Technical Working Group (STWG) was established in March 2001 to address important issues of public policy in Kosovo/a at a technical level. It is composed of experts from Kosovo/a NGOs, the political parties and other civil society representatives. Its membership is fully interethnic and it prides itself on being able to conduct debate in Kosovo/a in an interethnic way. The Group reviews technical aspects of current policy and formulates proposals and critical questions in relation to them. It then seeks to engage the relevant appointed local and international representatives on these issues. In response to the changed political environment in Kosovo/a following the Assembly elections in November 2001, the Group sought to enhance its role in public policy analysis and development through the establishment of four expert working groups. These Expert Committees (ECs) have devoted their activities in 2002 to monitoring policy developments in four areas considered most relevant to the needs of all communities in Kosovo/a. One of these is the Expert Committee on Justice, Human Rights, and Law Order.
Topic:
Civil Society, Government, and Human Rights
Political Geography:
Europe

2756. Tax Reforms and "Modell Deutschland": Lessons from Four Years of Red-Green Tax-Policy

Author:
Achim Truger and Wade Jacoby
Publication Date:
12-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Institute of European Studies
Abstract:
When the red-green (SPD-Bündnis90/DieGrünen) coalition took over the federal government from the Christian-Democrat/Free-Democrat (CDU/CSU/FDP) coalition in 1998, tax reforms had a very high political priority. And, in fact, the government pushed through an astonishing number of far-reaching tax reforms/tax changes within a period of little more than two years. This paper follows two aims. First, it gives a short description of the measures taken and evaluates them with respect to tax theory and the German tax reform debate of the 1990s. Second, it explicitly addresses the question whether the tax changes were influenced by the wish to reform the Modell Deutschland, i.e. whether something substantial was done to change Germany ́s status as a perceived high tax country and if so, whether the attempt was successful. It will be shown that even though the problem of high taxes might have been many observers ́ and, indeed, also the government ́s dominant concern, there was much more to the German debate. The chapter will also ask whether generously cutting taxes was the right thing to do. It demonstrates that under Germany ́s peculiar economic and institutional circumstances at the end of the 1990s, the attempt to cut taxes led to serious problems for fiscal policy, growth, and employment.
Topic:
Economics, Government, and Political Economy
Political Geography:
Europe

2757. The Uneasy Triangle

Author:
Lloyd Ulman and Knut Gerlach
Publication Date:
11-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Institute of European Studies
Abstract:
". . . It is impossible for any community to have very full employment and completely free collective bargaining and stable prices. Either one of the three will be completely sacrificed, or else all three will have to be modified. ". . . In the last resort the answer will be given not by economists or by administrators but by the public opinion. At each corner of the triangle, the limiting factor is what public opinion will stand, and the degree of comprehension that public opinion will show for an economic policy that tries to preserve balance between competing objectives.
Topic:
Government and Political Economy
Political Geography:
Europe

2758. Germany: Managing Migration in the 21st Century

Author:
Philip L. Martin
Publication Date:
05-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Institute of European Studies
Abstract:
This monograph reviews Germany's evolution from a country of emigration to a reluctant land of immigration between the 1960s and 1980s, as guest workers settled and asylum seekers arrived. During the 1990s, Germany became a magnet for diverse foreigners, including the families of settled guest workers, newly mobile Eastern Europeans and ethnic Germans, and asylum seekers from throughout the world. Germany, with a relatively structured and rigid labor market and economy, finds it easier to integrate especially unskilled newcomers into generous social welfare programs than into the labor market. Since immigration means change as immigrants and Germans adjust to each other, an aging German populace may resist the changes in the economy and labor market that could facilitate immigrant integration as well as the changes in culture and society that invariably accompany immigrants.
Topic:
Government and Migration
Political Geography:
Europe and Germany

2759. Immigration in the United States

Author:
Philip L. Martin
Publication Date:
04-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Institute of European Studies
Abstract:
This chapter summarizes migration patterns, puts the immigration and integration challenges facing the US in a global context, reviews the evolution of US immigration and immigration policy, and then focuses on some of the immigration and integration issues being debated early in the 21st century. Immigration is likely to continue at current levels of 900,000 legal and 300,000 unauthorized a year, so that Americans will, in the words of former Census director Kenneth Prewitt, "redefine ourselves as the first country in world history which is literally made up of every part of the world."
Topic:
Government, Human Welfare, and Migration
Political Geography:
United States

2760. Restructuring "Germany Inc." The Politics of Company and Takeover Law Reform in Germany and the European Union

Author:
John W. Cioffi
Publication Date:
04-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Institute of European Studies
Abstract:
The reform of German company law by the Control and Transparency Law ("KonTraG") of 1998 reveals politics of corporate governance liberalization. The reforms strengthened the supervisory board, shareholder rights, and shareholder equality, but left intra-corporate power relations largely intact. Major German financial institutions supported the reform's contribution to the modernization of German finance, but blocked mandatory divestment of equity stakes and cross-shareholding. Conversely, organized labor prevented any erosion of supervisory board codetermination. Paradoxically, by eliminating traditional takeover defenses, the KonTraG's liberalization of company law mobilized German political opposition to the EU's draft Takeover Directive and limited further legal liberalization.
Topic:
Government and Industrial Policy
Political Geography:
Europe and Germany