Hertie School Research Repository
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Coder Reliability and Misclassification in the Human Coding of Party Manifestos
No full textThe Comparative Manifesto Project (CMP) provides the only time series of estimated party policy positions in political science and has been extensively used in a wide variety of applications. Recent work (e.g., Benoit, Laver, and Mikhaylov 2009; Klingemann et al. 2006) focuses on nonsystematic sources of error in these estimates that arise from the text generation process. Our concern here, by contrast, is with error that arises during the text coding process since nearly all manifestos are coded only once by a single coder. First, we discuss reliability and misclassification in the context of hand-coded content analysis methods. Second, we report results of a coding experiment that used trained human coders to code sample manifestos provided by the CMP, allowing us to estimate the reliability of both coders and coding categories. Third, we compare our test codings to the published CMP “gold standard” codings of the test documents to assess accuracy and produce empirical estimates of a misclassification matrix for each coding category. Finally, we demonstrate the effect of coding misclassification on the CMP’s most widely used index, its left–right scale. Our findings indicate that misclassification is a serious and systemic problem with the current CMP data set and coding process, suggesting the CMP scheme should be significantly simplified to address reliability issues
Foundations in Germany: A Portrait
No full textThe article presents the findings of a research project on the roles and positioning of foundations in Germany, with a focus on the fields of education, higher education, social services, and arts and culture. Results show that fields as well as differences in size and mode of operation are key to understanding the roles and positioning of foundations. Germany is a coordinated market economy with a conservative welfare regime and a corporatist nonprofit sector. However, especially the latter of the two characteristics is gradually changing, and foundations are moving away from a state orientation toward a greater civil society focus
Philanthropic Foundations in Cross-National Perspective: A Comparative Approach
No full textComparative studies on philanthropic foundations are still in their infancy. To advance the comparative understanding, the article proposes to use two countries—the United States and Germany—as comparative cases against which to assess the main contours of foundations in other countries. Both countries have large foundations communities; yet both are rather distinct in terms of their historical development as well as in terms of their institutional characteristics, patterns, and activities. Looking at the positioning, roles, advantages, and disadvantages of foundations, the article offers a framework for their comparative study using the varieties of capitalism, welfare regimes, and the social origins classifications
Civil Society in Times of Change: Shrinking, Changing and Expanding Spaces and the Need for New Regulatory Approaches
No full textThe relationship between many G20 governments and organized civil society has become more complex, laden with tensions, and such that both have to find more optimal modes of engagement. In some instances, state-civil society relations have worsened, leading some experts and activists to speak of a “shrinking space” for civil society. How wide-spread is this phenomenon? Are these more isolated occurrences or indeed part of a more general development? How can countries achieve and maintain an enabling environment for civil society? The authors suggest that much of the current impasse results foremost from outdated and increasingly ill-suited regulatory frameworks that fail to accommodate a much more diverse and expanded set of civil society organizations (CSO). In response, they propose a differentiated model for a regulatory framework based on functional roles. Based on quantitative profiling and expert surveys, moreover, the paper also derives initial recommendations on how governments and civil society could find ways to relate to each other in both national and multilateral contexts
Reconciling Independence and accountability at the European Central Bank: The false promise of Proceduralism
No full textThis article revisits the balancing act between independence and accountability at the European Central Bank (ECB). It contrasts procedural and substantive concepts of accountability, and challenges the mainstream idea that independence and accountability can be reconciled through narrow mandates, the indiscriminate increase of transparency, the creation of multiple channels of accountability, and the active use of judicial review. These assumptions form the pillars of a procedural type of accountability that promises to resolve the independence/accountability dilemma but fails to do so in practice. The article brings evidence to show how ECB accountability has become a complex administrative exercise that focuses on the procedural steps leading up to monetary and supervisory decisions while simultaneously limiting substantive accountability. The failure to acknowledge the trade‐off between independence and accountability (said to be ‘two sides of the same coin’) has resulted in a tendency to privilege the former over the latter
Democracy challenged
No full textLooking at recent developments around the world, it seems that democratic values — from freedom of association and speech to fair and free elections and a system of checks and balances — have come under threat. Experts have, however, disproportionately focused on the problems of democracy in the West, and pointed to familiar sets of shortcomings and emerging deficiencies. By contrast, and with few exceptions, there is less attention to assessing the numerous
efforts and innovative activities that are taking place at local, national and international levels. They seek to counteract backsliding and subversion by improving resilience and consolidation and by promoting the expansion of democracy, especially in an era of limited sovereignty and, frequently also,
statehood.
The Governance Report 2017 focuses on those policies, programs, and initiatives meant to address the causes of the current democratic malaise, to foster democratic resilience, and to stimulate the (re-)consolidation and development of democratic regimes. The Report's ambition, reflecting its evidence-based approach, is to shed light on how to manage and care for democracy itself. Specifically, against the backdrop of an assessment of the state of democracy and enriched by
cross-national, comparative indicators and case studies, the Report emphasizes solutions geared toward enhancing citizen participation and improving institutions in various contexts, including the rise of neo-populism. Going beyond descriptions of best practices, the Report also examines their origins, identifies the
actual and potential trade-offs these solutions entail, and makes concrete recommendations to policymakers
Shifting Paradigms in Carbon Pricing
No full textCarbon pricing is essential to achieve a reduction in global CO2 emissions. A carbon price can either be set directly via a carbon tax (price control) or be achieved through a cap-and-trade system (quantity control). While there has been much debate about the relative merits of each approach, cap-and-trade systems have been favoured in the political arena. In principle, they offer the most straightforward way to achieve a country’s emission reduction target by simply setting the cap at the remaining emission budget. Existing emissions trading schemes (ETSs) can be found in Europe, California and Québec, for example
ICT use, competitive pressures and firm performance in Mexico
No full textThis paper presents a set of stylized facts on the relation between information and communications technology (ICT) use, firm performance, and competition. Taking advantage of a novel firm-level data set on information and communications technology for Mexico, the study finds that firms facing higher competition appear to have more incentives to increase their use of information and communications technology. Accordingly, although there is indeed a positive relation between information and communications technology use and firm performance, this effect is greater for firms that face higher competition pressures, which is consistent with the theoretical predictions of the trade-induced technical change hypothesis
Russian volatility: Obstacle to firm survival and diversification
No full textThe need for economic diversification receives a great deal of attention in Russia. This paper looks at a way to improve it that is essential but largely ignored: how to help diversifying firms better survive economic cycles. By definition, economic diversification means doing new things in new sectors and/or in new markets. The fate of emerging firms, therefore, should be of great concern to policy makers. This paper indicates that the ups and downs -- the volatility -- of Russian economic growth are key to that fate. Volatility of growth is higher in Russia than in comparable economies because its slumps are both longer and deeper. They go beyond the cleansing effects of eliminating the least efficient firms; relatively efficient ones get swept away as well. In fact, an incumbency advantage improves a firm's chances of weathering the ups and downs of the economy, regardless of a firm's relative efficiency. Finally, firms in sectors where competition is less intense are less likely to exit the market, regardless of their relative efficiency. Two policy conclusions emerge from these findings -- one macroeconomic and one microeconomic. First, the importance of countercyclical policies is heightened to include efficiency elements. Second, strengthening competition and other factors that support the survival of new, emerging and efficient firms will promote economic diversification. Efforts to help small and medium enterprises may be better spent on removing the obstacles that young, infant firms face as they attempt to enter, survive and grow
