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The Corporate Governance of Public Banks before and after the Global Financial Crisis
No full textDuring the 2008–09 financial crisis, many states were forced to nationalize faltering private banks. But also public banks ran into trouble and market actors continue to worry about their stability and crisis resilience. During the crisis, German public Landesbanken and Spanish public Cajas were hit hard. Yet, German public Sparkassen emerged strengthened from the crisis. This calls for a closer examination of the regulatory framework and corporate governance of public banks. We compare how corporate governance choices affected the financial crisis performance of public banks in three countries. Italy that had privatized its extensive public banking sector over the past decades; Spain that had problems with its savings banks during the crisis, which were eventually privatized or shut down; and Germany whose public savings banks navigated the financial crisis relatively well while its public Landesbanken got into serious trouble, and where calls for privatizing public banks resurface periodically. The paper considers the question whether Italy's banking crisis is partly rooted in the legacies of its formerly public banks and how the privatization of public banks in Spain and Italy can inform the debate in Germany and in other European Union countries with significant public banking sectors
The Caring Hand that Cripples: The East German Labor Market after Reunification
No full textThe East German labour market has hardly made any progress since German reunification, despite massive migration flows and support from the West. We argue that East Germany is in trouble precisely because of the support it has received. This paper explores the phenomenon of 'the caring hand that cripples,' arising from bargaining by proxy, the adoption of the West German welfare system and the associated employment persistence. Even the steady decrease of labour cost (normalized by productivity) since the beginning of the 1990s did not help to kick start the East. We suggest that labour force participants fell into 'traps,' concerning low skills, ageing of the workforce, labour-saving capital and skills, capital underutilization, and unemployment arising from the decline of the tradeable secto
Why did France intervene in Mali? Examining the Role of Intervention Entrepreneurs
No full textIntervention Entrepreneurs are the key to understanding the political processes leading up to a military intervention and thus ultimately why military interventions come about. Intervention entrepreneurs are private citizens, bureaucrats, associations and groups which lobby for intervention. In this process they follow a similar playbook to promote their intervention proposal. This playbook contains five different tasks: (1) creating a narrative for intervention; (2) selling the narrative; (3) building a domestic coalition supportive of the intervention; (4) creating faits accomplis that accelerate the path toward intervention and (5) lobbying the head of state in favor of the intervention proposal. This article illustrates these five tasks by means of a case study of the decision-making process that led to the French intervention in Mali (2013)
Der Gender Pension Gap in Ost- und Westdeutschland: Welchen Einfluss hat eine Scheidung auf die Alterssicherung?
No full textDieser Beitrag untersucht den „Gender Pension Gap“ in Deutschland auf Basis der sechsten Welle des „Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe“ (SHARE-RV), welcher mit Registerdaten der Deutschen Rentenversicherung aus dem Jahr 2015 verbunden wurde. In die Untersuchung gehen Frauen und Männer der Geburtsjahrgänge 1930 bis 1955 ein. Für diese Kohorten existiert in Westdeutschland ein erheblicher „Gender Pension Gap“. Frauen dieser Geburtsjahrgänge haben im Schnitt nur halb so hohe Anwartschaften in der gesetzlichen Rentenversicherung aufgebaut wie Männer. Im Vergleich zu verheirateten und verwitweten Frauen können ledige und geschiedene Frauen in Westdeutschland deutlich höhere Altersrenten vorweisen. Geschiedene Frauen dieser Kohorten konnten vor allem aufgrund des Versorgungsausgleichs ihre Rentenanwartschaften um etwa 20 Prozent erhöhen. Bei westdeutschen Männern zeigt sich hingegen ein umgekehrter Zusammenhang, d.h. ledige und geschiedene Männer erhalten im Vergleich zu anderen Männern stark unterdurchschnittliche Altersrenten. In Ostdeutschland existiert kein Zusammenhang zwischen Familienstand und Rentenniveau.
Abstract:
The Gender Pension Gap in East and West Germany: How Does Divorce Affect Old-Age Pensions?
This study examines the gender pension gap in Germany based on data from the sixth wave of the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE-RV). This data has been combined with register data from the German Pension Fund of the year 2015. The analytical sample for our analysis includes women and men born between 1930 and 1955. We observe a substantial gender pension gap for West Germans of these cohorts. Women have earned only half of the pension credits of men. Comparing pension entitlements by family status, one finds that single and divorced West German women were able to collect much higher pension entitlements than their married or widowed counterparts. Divorced women could profit from the splitting of pension points that is conducted after divorce. The equalization of the pension points in the case of divorce increases West German women’s pensions by about 20 percent.
For West German men the relationship is vice versa: Single and divorced men are at a particular
risk of receiving a low old age pension. There is no relationship between family status and pension entitlements in East Germany, though
European Parliament elections and EU governance
No full textThe decision to establish direct elections to the European Parliament was intended by many to establish a direct link between the individual citizen and decision making at the European level. Elections were meant to help to establish a common identity among the peoples of Europe, to legitimise policy through the normal electoral processes and provide a public space within which Europeans could exert a more direct control over their collective future. Critics disagreed, arguing that direct elections to the European Parliament would further undermine the sovereignty of member states, and may not deliver on the promise that so many were making on behalf of that process. In particular, some wondered whether elections alone could mobilise European publics to take a much greater interest in European matters, with the possibility of European elections being contested simply on national matters. Evaluating these divergent views, the subject of this article is to review the literature on direct elections to the European Parliament in the context of the role these elections play in governance of the European Union. The seminal work by Reif and Schmitt serves as the starting point of our review. These authors were the first to discuss elections to the European Parliament as second-order national elections. Results of second-order elections are influenced not only by second-order factors, but also by the situation in the first-order arena at the time of the second-order election. In the 30 years and six more sets of European Parliament elections since the publication of their work, the concept has become the dominant one in any academic discussion of European elections. In this article we review that work in order to assess the continuing value of the second-order national election concept today, and to consider some of the more fruitful areas for research which might build on the advance made by Reif and Schmitt. While the concept has proven useful in studies of a range of elections beyond just those for the European Parliament, including those for regional and local assemblies as well as referendums, this review will concentrate solely on EP elections. Concluding that Reif and Schmitt’s characterisation remains broadly valid today, the article allows that while this does not mean there is necessarily a democratic deficit within the EU, there may be changes that could be made to encourage a more effective electoral process
Klassenklima, schulisches Wohlbefinden und Gesundheit von Schülerinnen und Schülern in Deutschland: Ergebnisse des Nationalen Bildungspanels
No full textZiel Ziel des Beitrags ist es, erstmalig mit den Daten des Nationalen Bildungspanels den Zusammenhang zwischen Merkmalen des Klassenklimas und des schulischen Wohlbefindens mit der selbstberichteten Gesundheit und krankheitsbedingten Schulfehltagen von Schülern in deutschen Regelschulen zu untersuchen.
Methodik Datenbasis bildet das Nationale Bildungspanel (NEPS). Die Stichprobe umfasst (n=7348) Schüler der siebten Klassen in Regelschulen (Startkohorte 3, Welle 3, 2012). Merkmale des Klassenklimas umfassen Anforderungen, Kontrolle und Lernorientierung im Unterricht, Autonomie und Interaktion der Schüler sowie die Unterrichtsqualität, jeweils auf die Lehrkräfte in Deutsch bezogen. Das schulische Wohlbefinden wird über die Schulzufriedenheit sowie Hilflosigkeit in zentralen Schulfächern erfasst. Es werden sowohl bivariate Analysen als auch logistische Mehrebenenmodelle, unter Kontrolle von Alter, Geschlecht und besuchter Schulform, durchgeführt.
Ergebnisse Die Ergebnisse der Mehrebenenmodelle zeigen, dass insbesondere Schüler mit einer höheren Schulzufriedenheit eine bessere Gesundheit und weniger krankheitsbedingte Fehltage berichten. Eine höhere Hilflosigkeit und Lernorientierung sind dagegen negativ mit beiden Zielgrößen assoziiert. Hauptschüler besitzen zudem ein erhöhtes Risiko krankheitsbedingter Fehltage im Vergleich zu Gymnasiasten.
Schlussfolgerung Die Ergebnisse unterstreichen, dass insbesondere das schulische Wohlbefinden in Form der Schulzufriedenheit sowie der Hilflosigkeit in zentralen Schulfächern eng mit der subjektiven Gesundheit und krankheitsbedingten Fehltagen assoziiert ist. Maßnahmen zur Gesundheitsförderung sollten daher v. a. auf das schulische Wohlbefinden gerichtet werden sowie Schüler adressieren, die eine andere Schulform als das Gymnasium besuchen
Foundations in Germany: Culture and the Arts
No full textThe article discusses how the structure of the German cultural landscape shapes the self-understanding and positioning of philanthropic foundations that engage in art and culture. The contribution undertakes a mapping of the different forms of roles and relationships that foundations use to gain impact in this field of activity. The main argument is that in a field characterized by a high multiplicity of actors with partly overlapping and sometimes competing competencies that enable manifold possibilities for complementary partnerships and relatively high, but still scarce financial resources, the durability of foundations becomes their most important characteristic. As a result, cultural foundations take a more conservative approach than foundations in other fields. Typically set up with rather small endowments and with an operating focus, they are built to serve niches of cultural supply and demand that gives them versatile manifestations that have in common the goal of preserving tradition
The blind spots of collaborative innovation
No full textIn discussing some of the core claims of collaborative innovation, this article uses the notion of ‘blind spots’ in a double meaning. On the one hand, it points at some blind spots in the debate on collaborative innovation, i.e. potential weaknesses, risks, and unintended effects of public sector innovation strategies resting on principles of collaborative innovation. Second, the paper considers collaborative innovation as a counter-strategy against blind spots and attention biases of public organizations. Drawing on this perspective helps to critically discuss some of the key assumptions supporting the promise of collaborative innovation to deliver benefits critical for public governance