SNF Grant100017_159341; CHF 348’553.-, main applicant with Denise Traber, Thomas Kurer and Michael Pinggera Under what conditions can welfare states be reformed? More specifically: how can established social policy programmes be adapted to changing demographic, economic and social constraints? These are the key questions in today’s welfare state politics, and they have consequently become the key questions in political science research on the welfare state. In this research project, we made use of the exceptional conjunction of theoretical advances in the relevant literature, methodological innovation in public opinion research and the unfolding of the most ambitious and encompassing pension reform in Switzerland in decades to provide answers to precisely these questions With regard to the literature on welfare state reforms, one of the key insights of research over the past decade has been that welfare politics are multidimensional. This means that individuals are not just “in favor or against social policy”, but they hold specific preferences for different aspects of social policy. One major difficulty – for researchers as well as policy-makers – is, however, that the relative importance that individuals or social groups attribute to these different dimensions is almost impossible to observe reliably in standard survey analysis. Conjoint analysis is an experimental survey method that allows to measure whether changes in the composition of a reform package lead to sizeable shifts in support among the public as a whole, or among specific groups. The Swiss pension reform “Altersvorsorge 2020” was an ambitious attempt at reforming the entire system of old age income protection. It therefore provided the perfect opportunity to combine the insights in welfare state theory regarding multidimensionality with conjoint analysis. We conducted a panel study which accompanied the political reform process.
This project examines disintegration referenda, that is referenda aimed at the partial or full withdrawal of individual member states from international institutions, which present a new but growing challenge to international cooperation. This project aims at improving our understanding how disintegration referendums challenge existing institutions and the remaining member states, and how they respond to such referendums. It focuses both on the actions of foreign governments during the referendum campaign and on how the negotiating processes and outcomes surrounding the negotiation process following a successful disintegration referendum affect regime stability by influencing domestic politics and public opinion in the remaining member states. Its theoretical contribution lies in conceptualizing disintegration referenda as a specific type of sovereignty referendum that confronts international institutions and their remaining members with a trade-off between economic prosperity and regime stability. Empirically, the project focuses on disintegration referenda in Greece, the UK, and Switzerland.
Why do some governments compensate losers for the adverse effects of trade, while others reward winners, often exacerbating distributive conflict and inequality? A standard view in the literature is that trade leads to greater demand and supply of social policy. But this explanation cannot account for the striking policy differences across countries for given levels of trade exposure. I argue that economic geography and electoral institutions condition the effect of trade exposure on compensation. Trade leads to greater compensation when losers are geographically concentrated and politicians have incentives to target specific constituencies. Relative to geographically dispersed trade losers, concentrated losers constitute attractive targets for politicians elected in small electoral districts. This conditional theory contrasts with views positing a generalized relationship between trade and welfare spending.
In der vorliegenden Fallstudie wird am Beispiel der Stadt Aarau untersucht, wie sich die lokale Demokratie nach Gemeindefusionen verändert und welche Bedeutung dabei den Quartieren bzw. Stadtteilen zukommt. Die Studie widmet sich drei Fragenkomplexen. Im ersten Fragenkomplex wird die Rolle intermediärer Organisationen genauer beleuchtet. Die Ergebnisse aus sechs ExpertInnen-Interviews mit VertreterInnen von Aarauer Parteien bzw. Vereinen zeigen, dass Aarauer Quartiere für die politische Arbeit relativ unbedeutend sind. Politische Organisationen sind gesamtstädtisch organisiert und fühlen sich gegenüber der Gesamtstadt bzw. der eigenen Partei verpflichtet. Quartiersinteressen werden meist über Mitglieder an die Parteien herangetragen, die sich auch in Quartiervereinen engagieren. Die beiden Quartiere Zelgli und Gönhard sind in der Wahrnehmung der InterviewpartnerInnen in der Aarauer Politlandschaft überrepräsentiert. Aufgrund der Schwierigkeiten, politisches Personal zu rekrutieren, stösst die Berücksichtigung der verschiedenen Quartiere durch die Parteien an praktische Grenzen. Der neue Stadtteil Rohr wird von den Parteien primär symbolisch berücksichtigt, lediglich eine der interviewten Parteien legt eine fixe Quote für RohrerInnen im Parteivorstand fest. Das Parteiensystem hat sich durch die Fusion lediglich aus Rohrer Sicht verändert: die zuvor in Rohr präsenten Parteilosen wurden von VertreterInnen der national etablierten Parteien verdrängt. Die Existenz des gerade für Parteilose attraktiven lokalen Vereins Pro Aarau verhinderte aber eine komplette Delokalisierung des Rohrer Parteiensystems. Der zweite Fragenkomplex zur Einwohnerratsgrösse widmet sich der Frage nach den Konsequenzen unterschiedlicher Sitzzahlen für die Interessenrepräsentation in Aarau. Eine Simulation verschiedener Einwohnerratsgrössen auf der Grundlage der Wahlergebnisse der Gesamterneuerungswahlen vom 24. November 2013 zeigt, dass sich die Parteistärken kaum verändern würden. Bezüglich der Quartierrepräsentation bestätigt die Analyse die Dominanz der beiden Quartiere Zelgli und Gönhard. Diese würde bei einer Vergrösserung des Einwohnerrates sogar zunehmen. Die Parteienvielfalt ist in diesen beiden Quartieren besonders gross, d.h. in allen Szenarien ab 40 Sitzen erreichen in beiden Quartieren fünf verschiedene Parteien mindestens ein Einwohnerratsmandat. Das Telli ist deutlich untervertreten und die Unterrepräsentation nimmt mit zunehmender Einwohnerratsgrösse sogar noch zu. Die Vertretung der Altstadt würde sich hingegen bei einer Vergrösserung verbessern. Auch in einem 80 Sitze umfassenden Einwohnerrat sind jedoch nicht alle Quartiere vertreten. Im dritten Fragenkomplex werden die Auswirkungen einer Einführung von Wahlkreisen diskutiert. Die Stadt Aarau bildet aktuell einen Einheitswahlkreis, in dem 50 Mandate zu vergeben sind. Im Vergleich zu einer Unterteilung in mehrere Wahlkreise ermöglicht dies eine angemessene Vertretung der Parteien, d.h. auch kleine Parteien haben reelle Chancen auf einen Sitzgewinn. Ungleich fällt die Quartiervertretung aus. Eine Unterteilung des Stadtgebietes in mehrere Wahlkreise könnte dem entgegenwirken und zu einer fairen Vertretung der Quartiere beitragen, allerdings zulasten der Vielfalt politischer Strömungen. Eine Unterteilung der Stadt in mehrere Wahlkreise würde gemäss Interviewaussagen zudem die bestehenden Rekrutierungsprobleme verschärfen und die Wahlkampfkosten vervielfachen. Gerade auch im Hinblick auf neue Fusionen stellt sich die Frage, wen oder was der Einwohnerrat repräsentieren soll.
According to the church law (Kirchengesetz; KiG) the canton of Zurich contributes since 2010 to the costs of the cantonal church corporate bodies for their activities in the fields of education, social issues and culture for society as a whole (§ 19 Abs. 2 KiG). For the time period 2014-2019 the financial support for the evangelical-reformed state church of the canton of Zurich and the roman-catholic corporate body of the canton of Zurich is based on activity programs with global budgets. This study aims at providing the systematic scientific basis in regard of the next funding period (2020-2025). For the churches the findings serve as guidelines for the elaboration of the next activity programs. Furthermore they support the cantonal government and parliament in the evaluation of the programs. The study proceeds as follows: After clarifying definition issues, the researchers develop an instrument to gather data on the church activities. This instrument enables to group the activities according to the defined categories. The identification of activities with cultic content or activities with benefits for a society as a whole allows the researchers to evaluate financial effort of the churches in the fields of education, social issues and culture for society as a whole and to compare these efforts with societal activities of third parties.
This research project (starting March 2015) seeks to better understand how the new realities of the global economy are impacting multilateral development outcomes in Africa. How has the fact that a number of developing countries have stronger economies and more borrowing options affected the ability of the World Bank and the regional MDBs to promote development and reduce world poverty through lending and advisory services? If a country has a fiscal surplus, one can imagine that an MDB’s leverage to enforce loan conditionality involving politically difficult policy changes is greatly reduced. As well, a country able to fund major infrastructure projects through well-priced sovereign bond issues or new bilateral financing sources such as China would be able to ignore MDBs’ strict environmental and social requirements and bypass the meticulous project appraisal process. The study proposes to analyze these issues using a mix of quantitative and qualitative methods, considering the cases of the World Bank, African Development Bank (AfDB), and PTA Bank, as well as key bilateral donors active in Africa such as China. The analysis will focus on two questions: 1. How has the economic rise of many middle-income developing countries in recent years changed the ability of MDBs to effectively utilize policy conditionality on budget support lending operations to promote reform? 2. How are changing economic circumstances and increasing bilateral and private financing alternatives reshaping the types of MDB investment loans taken by developing countries, and with what environmental and social impacts?
Multilateral development banks are facing a rapidly changing context for their activities, driven by the rising economic strength of many low and middle-income countries and a dramatic increase in alternative sources of financial flows to the developing world. For example, public debt among developing countries represented on average only 40% of GDP in 2010 and was expected to decline to 30% by 2015 (IMF 2011), while the non-OECD share of total global foreign exchange reserves rose from below 30% in 1990 to about 65% in 2010 (Reisen, 2013). How has this dramatic shift in global economic conditions affected the development activities of MDBs? This is of considerable importance to effective development cooperation, but as yet has been little analyzed in academia. This proposed research project seeks to better understand how the new realities of the global economy are impacting multilateral development bank (MDB) operations in Africa. As the poorest region of the world (over 47% of population living on less than US$1.25 per day; World Bank, 2012), Africa is of particular interest to international development research and practice. At the same time, the economies of many African countries are growing very quickly, fueled largely by commodity price booms. Sub-Saharan Africa currently has the highest growth rates of any region in the world outside of developing Asian countries (5.6% in 2013; IMF 2013). With low debt levels and major investment plans, many governments are borrowing heavily from new bilaterals flooding into the region (US$75 billion in official Chinese financing between 2000 and 2011 ; Strange et al., 2013)—and raising money on capital markets. Has the fact that a number of developing countries have stronger economies and more borrowing options affected the demand for MDB services in Africa, and if so, in what ways? One can imagine that an MDB’s leverage to impose a particular vision of development policies and activities is greatly reduced in these circumstances. A government with alternative options for finance might prefer to allocate development investment resources within its country for reasons other than strictly poverty reduction criteria, for example. It may also be less inclined to agree to unpleasant policy conditions as part of a budget support loan, or to submit to highly restrictive environmental, social and procurement safeguards required by some MDBs along with infrastructure investment projects. This project intends to explore how these new dynamics are playing out at the level of the continent as a whole and within a sub-set of country cases, across three different multilateral banks: the World Bank, the African Development Bank (AfDB) and the Eastern and Southern African Trade and Development Bank (PTA Bank). The overarching hypothesis of the research project is that i) changing economic conditions among borrower governments and ii) differing governance structures of MDBs are two critically important independent variables that can explain variations in aspects of MDB operations.
What explains the striking variation in the adoption of non-contributory cash transfers around the developing world? Using panel data for 64 developing democracies, we find that left governments are likely to adopt such programs when the informal sector is large and rigid labour markets threaten protected insiders with exclusion, but not otherwise. Using cross-sectional survey data for Latin America, we find evidence for the demand-side mechanism that insiders support transfers when labour markets are rigid. in a related project, I explore the micro-foundations of this argument and draw on unique survey data from Argentina to analyse how differences in labour market status shape individual support for non-contributory transfers and active labour market policies.
Two volumes published in 2022 with Oxford University Press: Volume I: The World Politics of Social Investment (Volume II): Welfare States in the Knowledge Economy. Volume II: The World Politics of Social Investment (Volume II): The Politics of Varying Social Investment Strategies. The “World Politics of Social Investment” (WoPSI) is a collaborative research project which has brought together an international research network and aims at explaining variance in social investment agendas and social investment reforms across democratic countries in different regions of the World. Recent research on the development and implementation of social investment (investment in human capital, work-care support policies and active labor market policies) has shown that there is some level of implementation of social investment policies not only in different regions of Europe, but also in Latin America and South East Asia. However, one cannot speak of a general development of a social investment welfare state, as the phase but also-and especially-the specific substance of the social investment agenda varies strongly between these regions. Why have social investment ideas and policies been more developed in some regions and countries than in others? Going beyond different structural pressure, the project aims at theorizing the politics of social investment and testing different explanations empirically. The aim is to assess what are the political conditions for the development of social investment policies. Given that similar governments in different contexts have adopted different strategies with regard to social investment, the project investigates the institutional and socio-structural factors that enable or prevent political support coalitions for social investment. This project will assess the political conditions for the development of social investment policies, investigate the politics of Social Investment in Europe, Latin America and East Asia along the following three questions: What explains the content of the social investment agenda? (empirically: identify framing and the effect of institutional legacies – constraints, economic strategy- on the social investment agenda in different regions of the world) How does political conflict over social investment map onto other conflict lines and cleavages? (empirically: identify actor positions, dimensionality, links between actor positions on different issues). What political coalitions support or prevent a social investment turn ? (empirically: identify reform coalitions and the institutional and structural conditions that produce them)
The euro crisis has turned into the most serious challenge the European Union has ever had to face. Although the causes of the crisis are increasingly well understood, the politics of the crisis are not. This project aims at shedding light on three important puzzles that existing research has not yet been able to resolve. First, why have some governments been able to implement far-reaching reforms, whereas reform progress has been rather spotty in other crisis countries? Second, why have some countries seen serious political turmoil, while others have experienced less public and political opposition? And finally, why have surplus countries been willing to bail out deficit countries, but have varied in their willingness to adjust their own economic policies in an effort the ease the adjustment burden on the South? The project argues that these differences can be explained by the variation in societies’ vulnerabilities to different types of policy responses to the crisis. The argument builds on the insight that the euro crisis is, at its root, a balance-of-payments crisis. The imbalances that underlie such crises can be resolved either through significant economic policy adjustments both in the (peripheral) deficit or the (northern) surplus countries, or be addressed by providing external financing to deficit countries. I argue that the resulting distributive struggles surrounding the politics of the euro crisis in surplus and deficit countries are distinct but related, and should therefore be analyzed in a unified framework. The chances for swift and substantial adjustment are enhanced when politically influential interest groups exhibit a low vulnerability to at least one type of adjustment. In contrast, in contexts where significant parts of society are vulnerable to any adjustment, crisis politics is very contentious. Surplus countries with such a vulnerability profile attempt to push most of the adjustment burden onto deficit countries. In return, they are willing to provide external financing to deficit countries, but this generates conflict about on who should bear this financial burden. Since deficit countries are in a weaker position to push adjustment costs onto surplus countries, the distributional conflicts there revolve around how the cost of adjustment is to be distributed among different societal groups. Empirically, the project examines how vulnerability profiles affect domestic crisis politics and policies on two levels of analysis, the interest-group and the national level. It uses a mixed-methods research design that combines two sets of qualitative comparative case studies of the domestic and international politics of the euro crisis in surplus and deficit countries, respectively, with a quantitative analysis of national vulnerability profiles and crisis politics in a wider set of countries. The overarching goal of the project is to generate an encompassing picture of the distributional politics of the euro crisis and a better understanding of the constraints under which European policymakers operate in their attempts to solve the crisis.