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This paper aims to discuss the influence of migration policy risk on market segmentation of housing and rental markets in the Euro Area. Policy risk is represented by the Migration Policy Uncertainty Index (MPUI) and Migration Fear Index (MFI) of Germany and the United Kingdom; in this study, whether these indexes influence the interaction between the housing and rental markets of the two countries and euro-area countries was examined. The empirical results showed that the influence of the United Kingdom's migration policy risk on the euro-area countries is higher than that of Germany. The United Kingdom's MPUI and MFI significantly contribute to the influence of the United Kingdom's housing market on other markets except for Belgium and Spain. Compared with housing market connectedness, the rental market connectedness is less influenced by migration policy risk and migration fear. This may be because variables related to short-term residence policies influence the rental market. The high policy risk is more likely to influence decisions related to long-term house purchase, but not those related to short-term residence. Finally, this study found that the higher the uncertainty of the migration policies of the United Kingdom and Germany is, the higher the house market segmentation is. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The inclusion of the natural environment in the theory, education and practice of social work has increasingly become a matter of interest amongst scholars and social work educators. There is a large and increasing amount of literature on this topic. However, the inclusion of environmental issues in the curricula seems to be evolving very slowly to date. This paper examines 94 social work curricula in four European countries, and notes the presence of environmental issues in their content, by using term categories. Findings show that the natural environment is extremely under-represented in the education of social workers. The paper argues that social work curiccula need to undergo immediate reform on an international level. The discussion section includes suggestions on how the natural environment could be integrated into social work curricula. The first suggestion is to create new subjects with a direct reference to environmental issues and green social work. The second one is to include in existing subjects topics that will draw on environmental sociology and focus on the interconnections between social and environmental problems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present article explores the structure of and recent developments in research activities in the polar regions. Based on a bibliographic study of published papers indexed in the ISI Web of Science during the period 1981-2007, we have analyzed trends in publication, scientific disciplines and subdisciplines, coauthorship, and international collaboration within the field of polar research. We have uncovered several rather striking trends. Scientific output in terms of refereed publications has increased far more rapidly in polar research compared to science in general, quadrupling rather than doubling over the surveyed period. There is a nearly 1:1 ratio between papers covering the Arctic relative to the Antarctic, with the vast majority within either the geosciences (40%) or biology (33%). There has been particularly a steep rise in the number of climate-related papers. The U.S.A. is by far the largest contributor to polar research on both the Arctic and the Antarctic, followed by Canada, the U.K., Germany, Norway, and Russia. The number of coauthored papers has grown markedly, reflecting geopolitical shifts and changing national and international funding priorities during the period. We believe our publication-based survey reveals interesting developments in scientific activities and international cooperation in general, and in polar science strategies and priorities in particular. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the social construction of house size expectations in two national panel datasets: German Socio Economic Panel Study (GSOEP) and the British Household Panel Study (BHPS). More specifically, it tests the aspiration spiral theory and positional good theory using data on housing/life satisfaction and house size judgements. In both countries, it finds substantial evidence that the current space expectations of individuals who have 'upsized' depends on the level of living space they experienced in the past year. For downsizers, however, the evidence in support of the aspiration spiral theory is weaker. In terms of the positional good theory, this paper finds no consistent evidence that an individual's space expectations are influenced by those around them. In both countries, the paper tests for two reference groups – the average level of living space in the region, and the mean size of the largest decile of houses in the region – and neither are found to be significant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hydraulic fracturing or "fracking" is a relatively new method of energy extraction that makes it possible to use considerable amounts of shale gas that were hitherto unreachable. Although proponents of fracking voice their hopes for energy independence and an economic boost, fracking has been under discussion in several countries, its possible risks playing a key role when it comes to political decisions regarding the technology. This paper shall examine media discourses surrounding the usage of fracking with a specific regard to the risks that are constituted. Discourses in the UK, the US and Germany are compared, focusing on similarities and differences. These three countries are chosen since the political approach on fracking has been quite different, with the US being one of the first countries to use fracking. The corpora are analyzed with a focus on the depiction of conflictive issues in the framework of so-called agonality. The public perception of risks is shaped by their dominance in the media and the way they are phrased (e.g. as something to worry about), which means that differences in the depiction of risks between the corpora of these three countries are particularly noteworthy. Most readers will not be experts on fracking and thus rely on linguistic descriptions of the technology and its possible potentials and risks. Thus, it is important to analyze how language constitutes fracking. While all three corpora focus on risks concerning drinking water, there are major differences, e.g. when it comes to the discursive weight of earthquakes that might be caused by fracking. Although this is a risk that could affect all countries, only the UK press describes this as a serious risk. The paper also focuses on risks that are harder to grasp, e.g. threats to the traditional social structure of communities where fracking is practiced. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on contemporary press articles and applying a comparative methodology, this study examines the responses of important British and American quality papers to the unfolding of Nazi anti-Semitism from September 1930 until April 1933. Besides reconstructing and comparing the press coverage, the study seeks to explain the patterns beneath the journalistic perceptions and interpretations of Nazi anti-Semitism in the liberal democracies. During the final years of the Weimar Republic the papers reported fully and critically on Nazi anti-Semitism, yet they underestimated its radical nature. The extent of the assault on the Jews following Hitler's seizure of power therefore surprised British and American observers. Between 30 January 1933 and the anti-Jewish boycott of 1 April 1933 the journalists struggled to grasp the nature of Nazi anti-Semitism and the role of Hitler therein. Ultimately, their reading of events in Germany was preconditioned by their own liberal democratic outlook. Even if they reached differing conclusions, they were united in their conviction that Hitler and the Nazis would not dare to continue their anti-Semitic campaign in the face of adverse ‘world opinion’. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The disruptions associated with health and energy crisis have emphasized the need for hyperlocal cities. However, in Europe, a tool to measure the efficiency of land use and accessibility planning for localizing urban mobility is missing. In this paper, we construct a comparable 15-Minute-Walking City (15-MWC) index that assesses the walking performance of 121 European metropolitan areas and seven amenity types. The data are combined equally following the PROMETHEE II multicriteria approach to assign a final score and to present a ranking of 15-Minutes cities. The main visualization demonstrates European-level disparities and indicates that most of leading cities are in Germany, while most of the worst performers are in the UK. We also reveal a statistically significant difference in 15-MWC performance due to their GDP per capita disparities. The empirical results may serve as a referencing tool for cross-city comparisons and may support policymakers when designing transport and city-planning strategies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the acceptance of Autonomous Vehicles (AVs) in Japan, the UK and Germany and speculates on the implications for policy and practice. Three on-line surveys of 3,000 members of the public in total, which were conducted in January 2017 (Japan), March 2018 (UK) and November/December 2018 (Germany) were analysed using Principal Component Analysis and then with an Ordered Logit Model. It finds that acceptance of AVs was higher amongst people with higher expectations of the benefits of AVs, those with less knowledge of AVs, and those with lower perceptions of risk. It also finds frequent drivers and car passengers to be more accepting, but that socio-economic factors were mostly insignificant. Finally, there were significant cultural differences between the levels of acceptance between Japan (broadly positive), the UK (broadly neutral) and Germany (broadly negative). These findings suggest that AV promoters should raise (or at least maintain) expectations of AVs among the public; engage with the public to reverse the negative perception of AVs; address AV-generated fears; not bother targeting people by socio-economic group; target frequent car drivers and passengers with information about what AVs could do for them; and target countries where AVs already enjoy a positive image. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Children and young people who come into conflict with the law tend to be disengaged with education and learning. This paper reports on research from an EU Erasmus+ project in Spain, Italy, Germany and the UK. The research focused on the impact of Authentic Inquiry (AI) on learners in custodial or youth justice settings and the impact on educators and their pedagogy. Quantitative data (from 82 educators and 73 young people), demonstrated the young people could be re-engaged with education and learning as evidenced in the change in Learning Power profiles. Qualitative data (from 16 educators and 14 young people) showed the greatest impact to be on the emotional component of engagement. The AI had an impact xon educators as learners by improved Learning Power profiles and on their pedagogical approach. Ways to embed the approach into education in youth justice settings in the different country contexts are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents the results of a cross-national study into the ecologically conscious consumer behaviour of senior consumers (aged 50+, mean age 64 years) in the UK, Germany, Japan, and Hungary. Using a survey, the study (n = 1275) utilises a modified version of the Ecologically Conscious Consumer Behaviour Scale, in addition to a battery of variables to measure wider ethical purchasing behaviour and sociodemographic characteristics. Findings suggest that there are segments of older consumers in all countries under study who demonstrate ecologically conscious consumer behaviour, and at the same time there are segments that do not. These segments cannot be identified by sociodemographic variables, but do differ in their wider ethical purchasing behaviour. The study is the first of its kind to measure actual ecologically conscious consumer behaviour in the senior market across different nations. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper analyses the roles of institutions in facilitating or impeding the creation of new technological pathways in different countries. It is argued that the successful invention, innovation and diffusion of new technologies require the co-evolution of relevant institutions. It is argued that informal institutions, through their impact on people's beliefs, perceptions and consequential behaviour, crucially influence whether formal institutions coevolve with technological development and changing circumstances. At the same time, the rigidity of the pre-existing formal institutional arrangements impacts on whether agents can stimulate their co-evolution with the introduction of new technologies. These arguments are explored by comparing the creation of new wind power technologies in Britain and Germany since the 1970s. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, a number of welfare reforms have been introduced in the UK by Conservative-led governments. The most high profile of these is Universal Credit (UC), which is currently being rolled out across the country. A key feature of UC is a change in the way the income-related housing allowance for social housing tenants (Housing Benefit) is administered, as under UC, it is paid directly to tenants (direct payment), who are responsible for paying their rent. This represents a step change for them as for more than 30 years landlord payment has been the norm in the UK. There has been little research into direct payment. This paper seeks to address this gap in knowledge by presenting the key findings of an initiative designed to trial direct payment. It finds that many tenants experienced difficulties on direct payment. Reflecting this, landlords' arrears rose markedly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on research undertaken as part of the EU funded EPPIC project, this paper aims to update and elaborate on the relationship between drug use and offending behaviours by exploring variations within a cross-national sample of drug-experienced young people in touch with criminal justice systems. Adopting a trajectory-based approach, interviews were undertaken with 198 young people aged 15–25 in six European countries (Austria, Denmark, Germany, Italy, Poland, and UK). Data were analysed by applying the Bennett and Holloway categorization of the drugs-crime link, with a focus on the concept of social exclusion as developed by Seddon. Three main types of mechanisms (economic, pharmaceutical, and lifestyles) are used to interpret the data, showing how the relationship between drugs and offending can vary according to type of substances and over time. Furthermore, it can be associated with very different degrees of social exclusion and needs. The results suggest that while economic inequalities still play key roles in explaining drug use and offending, both behaviours can originate from a state of relative deprivation, resulting from the contradictions inherent in 'bulimic societies' that raise aspirations and desires while providing young people scarce opportunities for self-realisation and social recognition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the legacy of the great French experimental physicist Victor Regnault through the example of Gabriel Lippmann, whose engagement with electrical standardization during the early 1880s was guided by Regnault's methodological precept to measure ‘directly’. Lippmann's education reveals that the theoretical practice of ‘direct’ measurement entailed eliminating extraneous physical effects through the experimental design, rather than, like physicists in Britain and Germany, making numerical ‘corrections’ to measured values. It also provides, paradoxically, exemplars of the qualitative theoretical practices that sustained Regnault's misguided ambition to avoid theory. By considering the largely negative reactions to Lippmann's proposals for selecting suitable electrical units and methods of measuring the ohm, this paper associates these theoretical practices with the ineffectual rhetorical strategies employed by Lippmann to promote his work, and thereby indicates that the practice of direct measurement was limited to French experimental physics. Whilst this result aligns readily with the existence of divergent nineteenth century British and German cultures of precision, it emerges from a very different disciplinary context in which the practice of precision electrical measurement developed independently of submarine telegraphy. This is because, as this paper illustrates, telegraphic engineering and experimental physics remained separate professions in France. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In recent years, the transition from higher education to work in comparative perspective has attracted increasing attention from scholars and practitioners alike. Previous studies reveal similarities and differences in labour market outcomes across countries, but explanatory frameworks mainly refer to fields of study, whereas differences by types of institutions and types of degrees remain largely descriptive. Therefore, this paper specifically focuses on these institutional structures by arguing that the institutional stratification of higher education systems is crucial for shaping graduate employment prospects. More specifically, it is assumed that the higher the vertical differentiation of types of institutions or types of degrees, the stronger the differences of employment outcomes. This assumption is tested empirically by analysing two country cases most different in the institutional set-up of their higher education systems: Germany and Britain. By applying hazard models to the German Socio-Economic Panel and two British cohort studies (NCDS and BCS70), the paper shows that the vertical differentiation of British higher education institutions and degrees differentiates the transitions to the service class more strongly than in Germany. Thus, for understanding transition patterns from higher education to work in comparative perspective, it is necessary to take into account the institutional structure of higher education systems. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In January 2006, the so-called "Debye Affair" emerged, triggered by the publication of a Dutch book on Einstein. Debye was accused of Nazi collaboration in his capacity as chairman of the German Physical Society when he requested, in December 1938, the remaining Jewish members to leave the society. Within a month, two Dutch universities deleted Debye's name from their research institute and scientific award, and this led, both nationally and internationally, to a heated discussion. The Dutch government commissioned the Netherlands Institute for War Documentation to investigate the case. In its final report, the accusation was toned down to 'opportunism'. This paper is based on new information. Above all, I have researched Debye's extensive American archive. This archive disclosed the correspondence (1940-1963) with his friend Paul Rosbaud, an important MI6 intelligencer in Berlin during the Nazi period. The correspondence, combined with information from other sources, suggests that Debye might have been one of Rosbaud's informants. Therefore, this paper also includes a powerful warning against hasty and definitive conclusions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is a numerical exploration of the following. Assume, in the European Union context, that decision-makers want to spend more on higher education via higher tuition fees, but also want payments to be deferred and income-contingent. There are several possible ways to achieve this. First, ask graduates to repay a fixed amount each year if their current net income is above a certain threshold - income-contingent loans (ICL). Second, ask former students to repay a fixed proportion of their income - human capital contracts (HCC). What are the respective distributional properties of these policies, and how do they compare with traditional financing through income taxation? This paper shows that, irrespective of major variations between countries with different higher education, labour market and fiscal structures, with income taxation non-graduates pay more that 50% of the increased higher-education costs. It also shows that the HCC and ICL have vertical equity properties because non-graduates do not pay, but also because the income contingency principle on which they are based redistributes income among heterogeneous graduates. Finally, the paper shows that HCC are the best way to take account of graduates' ability to pay. It also reveals, however, that the ICL can be made to be almost as equitable. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes an EU-funded project under the Training and Mobility of Researchers (TMR) Programme, with a particular emphasis on the Oxford-based part. Involving six European universities, the overarching investigation was concerned with the tensions between standardization and tradition in education. In Oxford the focus was on aspects of EU education and training policy in four Member States: the United Kingdom, German, Sweden, and France. The paper describes the research undertaken and its outcomes, using the project as an example of EU funding programmes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How does the content of so-called 'fake news' differ across Western democracies? While previous research on online disinformation has focused on the individual level, the current study aims to shed light on cross-national differences. It compares online disinformation re-published by fact checkers from four Western democracies (the US, the UK, Germany, and Austria). The findings reveal significant differences between English-speaking and German-speaking countries. In the US and the UK, the largest shares of partisan disinformation are found, while in Germany and Austria sensationalist stories prevail. Moreover, in English-speaking countries, disinformation frequently attacks political actors, whereas in German-speaking countries, immigrants are most frequently targeted. Across all of the countries, topics of false stories strongly mirror national news agendas. Based on these results, the paper argues that online disinformation is not only a technology-driven phenomenon but also shaped by national information environments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a primary objective in transport planning urban neighbourhood accessibility plays an essential role in the sustainable transformation of cities and their infrastructure. In most studies, accessibility is objectively measured using aggregate travel time or generalised costs as an indicator of the separation of people from places. However, this approach does not reflect perceptions of residents, which ultimately shape mobility decisions and represent the "lived reality" of accessibility. This paper addresses this research gap, adding to a growing evidence base on understanding the relationship between perceived and objective measures of accessibility, and discusses opportunities for incorporating perceptions into measures of accessibility. We offer suggestions for how and why individual perceptions of accessibility differ from objective measures using data from Germany and the UK. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Europe's two largest economies – Germany and the UK – are phasing out coal from electricity production as part of European efforts to fulfil increased climate policy ambitions that require comprehensive energy system transitions. German and UK governments varied in the ways they sought support from diverse societal interests to make the transition socially acceptable and politically feasible. Drawing on 22 expert interviews and process-tracing methods, this paper compares and explains how political and economic institutional differences influenced efforts to balance energy transition concerns, like speed and cost-effectiveness with justice for companies, workers and communities most adversely affected by the transition. We find that the increasing attention to just transition perspectives after the Paris Agreement affected the design of coal phase-out processes in different ways in the two countries. Just transition concerns were given priority by policymakers in Germany, but more so if they overlapped with the interests of incumbents. In the end, politically powerful stakeholders dominated the policy outcome. In the UK, policymakers and stakeholders gave only weak attention to just transition concerns, mainly because coal's market position had collapsed. Coal interests did not have strong representation in the decision-making process. But we find that just transition concerns are likely to gain more attention in the UK because a more challenging transition away from gas will take place over the next two decades. Key policy insights Policymakers must balance the objective of a fast decarbonization process against two other important concerns: cost-effectiveness and a just transition. Political-economic institutional design and capacity shape the extent to which just transition concerns are given weight in coal phase-out processes. State capacity for including just transition concerns in coal phase-out processes is higher when political and economic institutions strongly mediate government-stakeholder interaction in the policy process, and broad stakeholder participation increases the political feasibility and legitimacy of policy change. In Germany, the government's attention to just transition concerns was strong because broad stakeholder representation in the formal process, and transition assistance policies to target potential losers in the transition, became crucial to enhance the legitimacy of coal phase-out policies. In the UK, cost-effectiveness trumped just transition concerns in the coal phase-out process, but just transition issues have increasing salience and will likely become pertinent in the upcoming gas phase-out process because more jobs and key economic interests are at stake. Our findings are relevant for policymakers in countries struggling with balancing speed, cost-effectiveness and just transition concerns in similar transition processes: phasing out coal, gas, or oil from their energy system. The findings may also inform future energy transition research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to explain the origins of the rules of parliamentary agenda control, which can be regarded as the single most important institutional determinant of parliamentary power. Based on the premises of distributive bargaining, the paper develops a causal mechanism for the delegation of agenda control to the government majority. Given that only anti-system or anti-establishment parties strictly prefer to participate in plenary proceedings, these ‘anti’-parties potentially obstruct legislation. Such legislative obstruction by ‘anti’-parties causes establishment parties to commit themselves to procedural reform and thus triggers attempts to centralise agenda control. The delegation of parliamentary agenda powers is successful if opposition to procedural reform is confined to anti-system parties. The causal leverage of this mechanism is assessed in a process-tracing of three reform attempts in two most different cases: the initially ineffective, but then successful introduction of a closure procedure in the United Kingdom and the failed attempt to facilitate the closure in Germany. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In many standard textbooks on comparative international accounting, a separate chapter is devoted to classification models of national financial reporting systems. Typically, the authors of 'international accounting classification models' not only organize national financial reporting systems into certain groups and assign descriptive labels to these categories. Rather, they also tend to draw analogies with the disciplines of the natural sciences so as to justify the methodology which underlies their theoretical constructs. The validity of these methodological claims is indirectly being examined in this paper, which argues predominantly from an empirical angle. The focus of the essay is on the notion - usually advanced by the authors of the models under discussion - that German financial accounting practice can be described as 'uniform', thus forming a contrast to the 'fair-judgemental' approach to financial reporting which is commonly held to prevail in the United Kingdom. In order to test these propositions, the accounting policies in the area of foreign currency translation in the consolidated accounts of a sample of British and German chemical companies are subjected to scrutiny. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The principles of sustainable development are becoming extremely relevant for organisations. In the case of universities, these institutions can act as agents in promoting these principles within society. The literature contains a wide range of studies which show how universities may play a critical role in disseminating sustainability principles on the one hand, and their translation into practice, on the other. At present, many higher education institutions are becoming more aware of their impact on the environment, and trying to understand the environmental needs and implications of their operations. Going further, some universities are incorporating sustainability principles into their activities. One of the questions that universities are now facing is how education for sustainable development can be translated into practice so that it can be effective in transforming society. This paper will discuss the need for and the usefulness of integrative approaches to implement sustainable development in higher education. In addition to a theoretical review of the state of the art, the paper will use case studies from the Hamburg University of Applied Sciences (Germany) and Bournemouth University (UK) to illustrate the effectiveness of integration of sustainable development principles in university research and teaching activities, and the many benefits integrative approaches may bring about. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Contrasts some approaches to quality and design, comparing Japan, Germany, Italy and the UK. The case for design is discussed and various types of design are covered in relation to the product development process. The author describes how to manage the design process to achieve quality products; four important areas are highlighted--management commitment, employee involvement, appropriate use of technology, and emphasis on the customer. Finally the paper looks briefly at the management of new product development and the formation and composition of the product development team. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Provides an overview of the topics discussed in the October 2004 issue of "Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs." Evaluation of the Turkish diaspora community in the U.S.; Examination of the Turkish-Muslim diaspora in Great Britain; Presentation of the essay exploring the situation of the Turks in Germany who are claiming a particular Islamic identity.

This paper explores endogeneity problems in multilevel estimation of education production functions. The focus is on level 2 endogeneity which arises from correlations between student characteristics and omitted school variables. Theses correlations are mainly the result of student stratification between schools. From an econometric point of view, the correlations between student and school characteristics imply that the omission of some variables may generate endogeneity bias. Therefore, an estimation approach based on the Mundlak [20] technique is developed in order to tackle bias and to generate consistent estimates. Note that our analysis can be extended to any multilevel-structured data (students nested within schools, employees within firms, firms within regions, etc). The entire analysis is undertaken in a comparative context between three countries: Germany, Finland and the UK. Each one of them represents a particular system. For instance, Finland is known for its extreme comprehensiveness, Germany for early selection and the UK for its liberalism. These countries are used to illustrate the theory and to prove that the level of bias arising from omitted variables varies according to the characteristics of education systems. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In light of continuing mixed results in the literature, this paper re-examines the German Dominance Hypothesis (GDH) and considers whether the UK should join the Eurozone. For this purpose, short-term interest rate relationships between the UK, Germany, the Eurozone and the USA, for the period January 1982 to June 2007, are studied. The policy implication of a loss of monetary autonomy for the UK in favour of Germany or the European Central Bank (ECB) would give support to the UK joining the EMU as an economic response. From the early 1980s the Bundesbank's responsibility was to use money growth targets to keep average inflation rate down in the long run. This long run objective suggests that an appropriate methodology for testing the GDH is to test whether the German stochastic trend is a driving stochastic trend. In other words we determine whether a permanent shock to the German interest rate has a permanent effect on the UK interest rate. To this end the structural shocks in a VECM are identified by imposing long-run restrictions of the type developed in King et al. (1991). We apply the same techniques to testing whether the UK has suffered a loss of monetary autonomy in favour of the ECB. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the deployment of microgeneration in Germany and the UK from a technological innovation systems (TIS) perspective. Based on the TIS functions approach, we condense supportive and obstructive factors and discuss the differences in the respective national setting for small-scale renewable and combined heat and power (CHP) technologies. The findings underline the relevance of legitimation and of institutional and financial support. High degrees of legitimacy were achieved in both the UK and Germany. In Germany, early institutional and financial support reduced uncertainty for new market entrants and consumers, and fuelled a self-reinforcing diffusion dynamic for small renewables. In the UK, by comparison, microgeneration enjoys little support. The paper concludes that distributed generation will not be successful without a more focussed and technology-oriented innovation policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Containing urban sprawl and limiting greenfield developments has become an important aim of land use planning policy over recent decades. Traditionally planning instruments such as greenbelt designations and restrictive development controls have been used to achieve this aim. Beyond that in recent years the systematic reuse of brownfield land has become an important policy objective, which could in turn ease the pressure to develop on greenfield land. The aim of this paper is to identify factors explaining differences in the success of such strategic brownfield reuse policies in England and Germany. To do this the paper explores the underlying spatial development paradigms in both countries as well as differences in planning policies and institutional settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper finds empirical support for a Taylor (1993) type interest rate determination rule. The model is solved analytically, estimated and used for simulation, impulse response analyses and forecasting with quarterly time series data for the UK and annual time series data for Germany, France, Japan, the UK and the US. The results confirm that such rules implicitly exists during the period of analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Only a few studies so far have tried to assess the role of HRM-flexibility in cross-national location decisions. None of these, however, investigates a potential heterogeneity across multinationals in terms of their specific needs concerning different types of flexibility in HRM. In this paper, I theoretically and empirically analyse the impact of HRM-flexibility on the type of investment being attracted. The theoretical implications are based on a real options framework and are derived in the context of a British-German comparison. They are confronted with data from an original survey on US-multinationals with manufacturing subsidiaries in Germany and the UK. The analysis reveals that in UK subsidiaries, investments in R&D are significantly lower, and technological uncertainty is significantly felt less strongly than in their German counterparts. Both results are compatible with the implications derived from the real options framework. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Currently, deregulation of social welfare provision is underway throughout Western Europe. The major tendency is for disorganisation, together with the emergence of welfare markets. This is also changing the way elderly people are provided with personal and socio-medical services. Focusing on domiciliary eldercare, the paper explores if this is accompanied by a change in what Kohli has termed the moral economy of old age welfare. Departing from a general reflection on the organisation of social services in modern welfare capitalism the paper sketches evolutions in the eldercare system of three major European countries, with a special focus on the role of civic rationales and professional norms in the organisational field under consideration. It is argued that the moral economy of eldercare has become fluid, thus implying a broader transformation in the societal treatment of old age. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In general, the 'mega-trends' represented by, for example, globalisation, the shift to a service economy coupled with high levels of technological change and a long-term shrinkage in the working population all make a more adaptable and skilled workforce in high income countries necessary. The pervasive effects of these mega-trends are often interpreted as suggesting that there is only one optimal institutional configuration to achieve good employment outcomes, which therefore needs to be adopted by all countries. As Britain seems closer to this ideal type than Germany, one would expect a better labour market performance in the former than in the latter, as well as a convergence in labour market policies and outcomes in Germany towards the British model. Taking into account the different starting positions of Germany and Britain, particularly with regard to important differences in monetary policy contexts, the paper evaluates whether and to what extent national public policy patterns are actually converging towards a higher level of flexibility. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper employs four cointegration test approaches, PO, HI, JJ and KSS, to test for pairwise long-run equilibrium relationships between Taiwan's stock price index and each of the stock price indexes of four European markets – French, German, Dutch, and British stock markets. The results from these four tests are robust and clearly consistent in suggesting that the Taiwan stock market is not pairwise cointegrated with the four European stock markets. This provides strong evidence that there exist long-run benefits for Taiwan investors diversifying in the equity markets of Taiwan's major European trading partners, France, Germany, Holland, and the UK, over the sample period considered from 6 January 1998 to 30 May 2002. These findings could be valuable to Taiwan individual investors and financial institutions holding long-run investment portfolios in the equity markets of France, Germany, Holland, and the UK. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper I identify whether budgets in Denmark, Germany, the United Kingdom, and the United States are punctuated and investigate the variation in budget punctuations over time. Building on stochastic process methods, I find that budgets in all four cases exhibit mostly incremental changes punctuated by extreme shifts. In order to explain variation in budget punctuations over time, I rely on two models: partisan control of government and partisan distance of the assembly. The two models are tested using national budgetary data across all government functions for the four countries from the mid-1960s to 1989. I find that greater distance in strength and ideology among parties leads to increases in the degree of punctuations in the German and the British cases, whereas there is some evidence for the partisan control model in the American cases. In the Danish cases, partisan distance reduces the degree of budget punctuations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is an introductory survey of the evolution of multiculturalism in Britain and Germany over the past two centuries. The historical approach argues that the main determinants of difference between these nation states lie in their long-term traditional attitudes towards immigrants and ethnic minorities. It focuses upon the patterns of immigration into Britain and Germany as well as the differing imperial traditions, which have both left differing legacies. An equally important historical factor has been the legal position of aliens in the two states, in which, until very recently, Britain adopted a policy of ;MS solis, whereas Germany pursued one of jus sanguinis. The paper then examines the realities of multiculturalism in the two states. Due primarily to the historical traditions of nationality legislation, immigrants and their descendants in Britain have come to play a more important role in recent British history than their contemporaries in Germany, particularly if we examine their role in the political process and in popular culture. While the conclusion reiterates the differences, it also stresses that we should not view Britain and Germany as the opposite ends of the multicultural spectrum, as both are modem liberal democracies with significant ethnic minority populations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyses how British popular music culture defined and responded to Krautrock, a subgenre of West German underground rock, during the 1970s. It examines and contextualises British and West German interactions in popular music immediately before Krautrock and at the time of its early definition. The article then explores how so-called Krautrock bands related to the British public and press and how they were described and understood in relation to their nationality. The article suggests that stereotypes and prejudices, shaped by the memory of World War 2, remained a significant aspect of British discourse on West Germany into the 1970s. However, interest in Krautrock gave rise to social and cultural interactions that inspired some to challenge and renegotiate ideas of Germany and Germanness. To some, bonds made through music, culture and politics proved more profound than the history of conflict between Britain and Germany. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the scope for privatizing unemployment insurance in Britain and Germany. The research builds on two consecutive projects, undertaken in the two countries between 1996 and 2000. The studies investigated people's attitudes towards the welfare state and private insurance, and families' strategies to manage the financial risk of unemployment. About 6% of the working population of both Britain and Germany claimed to possess private unemployment insurance. A further 23% in Britain and 12% in Germany expressed an intention to acquire private unemployment insurance. Attitudes towards private unemployment insurance were influenced by perceptions of unemployment risk, household circumstances, private money management strategies, and perceptions of the welfare state and the efficiency and trustworthiness of its institutions. The risk of exclusion from insurance in the two countries, either voluntary or as a result of actuarial risk assessment, is investigated. There is at present little evidence of adverse selection, nor would an expansion of the private unemployment insurance market necessarily entail that risk. However, the study found some, albeit limited, evidence of moral hazard. Significant country-specific differences were apparent in all aspects of the study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

According to the theory of instrumental actualization in mediated conflicts, the mass media tend to exaggerate events consistent with the editorial line. This theory was tested using press coverage in Germany, Switzerland, France, and the United Kingdom on the Japanese seaquake, the tsunami it caused, and the nuclear disaster of Fukushima. Within a period of seven weeks after the seaquake, the coverage in the four countries in 27 national newspapers and magazines on the three events was analyzed. As hypothesized from theory, German and Swiss media concentrated on Fukushima and stressed its relevance to domestic nuclear plants, whereas French and British media placed a greater emphasis on the tsunami and rarely related the nuclear catastrophe in Japan to domestic nuclear programs. In addition, there were remarkable correlations between the views of journalists and the bias of statements on nuclear energy presented in their news sections. Findings are discussed and related to the theory of public opinion and political decisions in liberal democracies. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The economic and political crisis of 1931 provoked the reappearance of rank and file movements in Britain. This article examines the unofficial organisations that developed in building, engineering, passenger transport and the railways – as well as more ephemeral bodies. It critically synthesises the existing historiography and replenishes it with new material from the Russian archives. The progress of rank and filism to 1939 is surveyed and the largely forgotten project of a new Communist-led rank and file organisation, a Trade Union Militant League, which would supersede the National Minority Movement, is recuperated. The article stresses the role of Comintern policy in harnessing and moulding grass-roots rebellion. It validates that strand in the literature which argues that Moscow’s subsequent turn to the popular front and aspirations to alliances with labour movement leaders predominated over, and legitimated, indigenous influences, enhanced existing adaptation to trade unionism, and encouraged subordination of oppositional movements to activity in official structures. By 1939, the Communists had abandoned the idea of a national rank and file movement they had pursued since 1923. Little survived of the revolutionary enterprise launched in 1931. Rank and filism endured only as a handful of sectional, party-sponsored, trade union ginger groups. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper is based on a comparative study of the UK and German operations of the McDonald's Corporation. The main focus of the paper is the interaction between multinational enterprises (MNEs) and the German system of co-determination. Commentators have suggested that industrial relations practices in host countries are particularly difficult for MNEs to avoid because they are so deeply embedded in societal frameworks. However, there are also opposing global pressures for MNEs to impose their industrial relations practices across national borders in order to transmit 'best practice' to their subsidiaries. Ferner and Edwards (1995) suggest that Germany is something of a 'test case' for MNEs because of the strength of its legislative underpinning and institutional arrangements. Most analysis on the German system of co-determination has suggested that it is only small and medium-sized firms which avoid or undermine the German system (Lane, 1989). However, evidence brought together in this study suggests that, along with other large companies and MNEs of different origins and across different industries, McDonald's have been able to take advantage of weaknesses in regulation in the German system of co-determination. The paper puts forward a typology of possible 'avoidance strategies' within the German system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper outlines and analyses the major changes in work-force organization that have been introduced by British and German steel producers in the past decade, against a backcloth of retrenchment in the industry, new product development and technological change. Including multiskilling, a reduction in demarcation and team-working, these changes have had a major effect upon the composition of the work-force and the nature of work undertaken at the shopfloor level. While these changes have had a common broad trajectory, they have been introduced at a different pace and in different forms. The contrasts are provided not only at the international level, but between plants in the same countries. The paper further outlines the response of trade unions to these changes and the implications for industrial relations at the shopfloor level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Foreign-owned firms help to disseminate management practices across UK companies; this includes the ability of indigenous firms to learn improved human resource management (HRM) practices from leading foreign companies. Analysing the transfer of HRM policies forms an important strand of the international HRM and comparative capitalisms literatures; however, large-scale, comparative studies of voice patterns in German, US and, in particular, French subsidiaries in the UK are limited. This paper draws on a major survey that includes the, to date, largest sample of French MNC subsidiaries. It does not simply identify the existence of different kinds of voice mechanisms, but examines how these different practices come together in the implementation of subsidiaries' voice policies. This enables the detection of subtle, but important, differences in the subsidiaries' voice practices. French subsidiaries are significantly less likely to pursue a partnership approach to voice than their German and US counterparts. French and US establishments are significantly more likely to adopt a ‘bleak house’ approach than German ones. Importantly, these key differences only emerge at a fine-grained level of analysis that examines how subsidiaries implement voice practices. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In ‘inventing’ and exporting modern sports to the world, the British influenced innumerable people. However, by the inter-war period, there was a general anxiety regarding British decline. The reasons were threefold. First, British health and fitness experts underlined the low physical standards of their people. Second, it became evident that Britain's leading position in international sport was under threat. Third, the fascist states seemed to be doing particularly well in this area. How could the British Empire last without strong men to defend it? Perhaps part of the solution might be found overseas in just the place where the present ‘danger’ came from. This paper studies this reversed influence and shows how German influence affected British fitness policies in the 1930s. In a period marked by appeasement, sports meetings, official visits and a large amount of cultural propaganda resulted in the sharing of British and German experiences. However, the attitude of the British was complex and their determination to go their own way limited the effectiveness of German influence. By the time the war broke out, the British had distanced themselves from German organization and values once again. The brief flirtation with fascist forms of physical culture was over. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In this paper I investigate the resonance of the volumeThe Empire Strikes Backwithin the debates on racism in Germany since the late 1970s. I am interested in this long-term intellectual exchange in light of the current need to conceptualize racism in a European framework and thereby reflect upon the characteristics, concepts and possibilities of such a framework. I begin by situating the debate at that time within the context of the New Left. What connected both situations, in Germany and the UK, was an inscription of the then-ongoing anti-colonial and decolonial struggles of the South in the North, not least through the ‘retaliatory effect’ of migration movements and struggles of migration arriving in Europe. I argue that the understandings of racism and anti-racism are grounded in a materialist framework and that the concept of articulation helped and continues to help thinking the complexity and heterogeneity of the social. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Very little attention has been paid to the political impact of directly-elected mayors. This paper sheds light on the topic by comparing the English case with that of North Rhine-Westphalia. Both demonstrate that parties continue to monopolize their local political systems and most aspects of mayoral office; nevertheless, some de-party-politicization is noted. There is much to learn about the English case from observation of the mayoral model in North Rhine-Westphalia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The period 1880–1930 saw women composers achieve unprecedented prominence as composers of large-scale works. This success coincided with the first wave of feminist movements in England, France and Germany. This article views the junctions where these two groups of women met through the vehicle of the feminist press, documenting the tensions and misunderstandings that occurred between emerging women composers attempting to be taken seriously as creative entities and feminists seeking to improve the political, social and professional lot of women. The pervasive aesthetic of male musical genius remained unquestioned by many feminists in spite of examples of female creative brilliance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper uses panel data from the UK and Germany to investigate the difference in the learning effect between workers who enter the labour market with a fixed term and a permanent job. Our results verify the existence of a wage penalty for entering the labour market with a fixed-term contract for the British males (7.1%) and especially for the British females (21.2%). British females also have a very strong learning effect that is especially large for temporary starters. In Germany, the initial wage penalty for temporary starters is smaller than in the UK—4.5% for the males and 3% for the females—and is persistent only for the males. Although initial wage differences are mitigated through the accumulation of skills on the job, this process differs between temporary and permanent starters. This suggests that the type of the starting contract may be a feature of labour market segmentation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]