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Prior to the 2022 Russian Invasion of Ukraine, the European Union was beginning to make initial steps in integrating the defense capabilities of its member states. The ambition was to incrementally achieve what French President Emmanuel Macron had labeled ‘strategic autonomy’. The Russian invasion of Ukraine exposed the lack of preparedness of western EU member states in front of a serious military threat. The war has so far emphasized the essential role still played by NATO as a guarantor of security in Europe, while undermining the credibility of incremental approaches to a Europeanization of defense achieved through the progressive expansion of pre-war initiatives. Yet, from production to capabilities to strategic thinking, the war has also identified the critical bottlenecks of European defense, and has created a new momentum for defense integration that qualitatively differs from previous initiatives in the field. However, the political feasibility of such programmes remain disputed, as any EU-wide approach to defense will entail both additional financial costs and a share of responsibilities and sovereignty on the matter. Furthermore, any such policy design is inherently multidimensional, differing over scope and level, governance, source of financing among other dimensions. To determine public support for European security cooperation, we conduct the first conjoint experiment ever fielded on public support for alternative defense union designs. We field a pre-registered, randomized conjoint experiment on a highly representative sample of the French, German, Italian, Dutch and Spanish population in November 2022. This multidimensional conjoint experiment allows us to determine the causal link between policy features of potential defense pacts, and public support or opposition to such policy. Our results show that policy packages meeting the most support require higher levels of ambition, joint EU-level governance, joint purchases of military equipment through joint procurement, and progressive taxation increases as the preferred form of financing. All in all, our results not only show that there is considerable cross-border support for defense integration in western Europe, but also that citizens in different western European countries have generally converging preferences regarding the actual design of such policy, indicating that a compromise policy is feasible and publicly supported. Furthermore, our results support ongoing research on the nature of European solidarity at times of crisis, suggesting that European citizens are willing to support the creation of joint institutions and policies to face issues of common concern, and therefore indicating that major crises open important windows of opportunity to re-shape EU-level policies and institutions.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine caught the European Union (EU) off-balance. Many European member-states were, on the onset of the war, heavily reliant on energy supplies provided by Russia. Against this background, some have proposed a unified approach for the creation of EU-wide strategic energy reserves, which would ensure a buffer against future energy shocks, but also provide temporary relief to the participating countries should some of them experience temporary issues with their energy supply. However, the political feasibility of such programmes remain disputed, as any EU-wide approach to energy will entail both additional financial costs and a share of responsibilities and sovereignty on the matter. Furthermore, any such policy design is inherently multidimensional, differing over scope, governance, source of financing among other dimensions. To determine public support for energy security cooperation, we conduct the first conjoint experiment ever fielded on public support for alternative energy union design. We field a pre-registered, randomized conjoint experiment on a highly representative sample of the French, German, Italian, Dutch and Spanish population in November 2022. This multidimensional conjoint experiment allows us to determine the causal link between policy features of potential energy solidarity pacts, and public support or opposition to such policy. Our results show that policy packages meeting the most support require higher levels of ambition, joint EU-level governance, joint purchases and procurement, and progressive taxation as a form of financing. All in all, our results not only show that there is considerable cross-border support for energy solidarity, but also that citizens in different western European countries have generally converging preferences regarding the actual design of such policy, indicating that a compromise policy is feasible and publicly supported. Furthermore, our results support ongoing research on the nature of European solidarity at times of crisis, suggesting that European citizens are willing to support the creation of joint institutions and policies to face issues of common concern, and therefore indicating that major crises open important windows of opportunity to re-shape EU-level policies and institutions.

We seek to understand collective third-party intervention in violent incidents. Based on analyses of 131 video clips captured on mobile phones, we argue that bodily alignment between bystanders creates situational groups that encourage collective de-escalatory action. Qualitative analysis reveals that third parties generate situational groups when they create circular formations, providing greater opportunities to notice each other’s monitoring of the situation while separating those focused on the incident from others just passing by. Statistical analysis shows that the formation of situational groups facilitates the collectivization of de-escalatory action. In contrast to popular but outdated ideas about the dangerous influence of assemblies on individual behaviour (allegedly leading to disorder or apathy), our findings emphasize the self-regulatory, defusing capacity of gatherings.

Published online: 11 July 2022 Do governance reforms affect public acceptance of regulatory decisions, and if so, how? We tackled this critical but under-studied question through a pair of linked survey experiments on public attitudes toward the reform of European Union (EU) pesticides regulation among a representative sample of the adult population in six EU member states. We tested the expectation that citizens are more likely to accept a regulatory decision that runs counter to their prior policy preferences if it is taken under a procedure they support. We first conducted a conjoint experiment to study whether the specific design of decision-making procedures impacts public support for EU pesticide regulation. In a second linked experiment, we asked respondents whether farmers should be allowed to use glyphosate, the best known and most controversial pesticide. We then asked respondents if they would accept an authorization decision on glyphosate contrary to their prior expressed preference if it were taken under a decision-making procedure they supported. The results demonstrate that a regulatory decision-making procedure respondents support increases their willingness to accept a hypothetical authorization decision contrary to their prior expressed preference. Contrary to the findings of previous research, our study thus provides strong evidence that governance reforms supported by citizens can enhance acceptance of controversial regulatory decisions, even on politicized issues such as pesticides authorization.

The authorization and use of pesticides in the European Union (EU) have become increasingly controversial and politically salient over the past decade. In particular the European Commission’s decision to re-authorize the use of glyphosate, the active substance in Bayer/Monsanto’s Roundup, after it had been classified a ‘probable human carcinogen’ by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), was highly controversial and triggered a lively debate on how to reform EU pesticide regulation. In this policy report, we assess whether and how specific reforms to decision-making procedures could impact public support for EU pesticides regulation, including acceptance of authorization decisions on controversial substances such as glyphosate. To do so, we first identified the main challenges of European pesticides regulation exposed by recent developments, including (but not limited to) the glyphosate controversy, as well as the actual and potential reforms proposed by the EU institutions, civil society organizations, academic commentators, and other stakeholders. We grouped these challenges and related reform proposals into four dimensions, namely: 1) the organization of the decision-making process; 2) the factors considered when authorizing pesticides; 3) sources of evidence and potential conflicts of interest; and 4) post-market monitoring and review of authorized pesticides. We then conducted a pair of linked online survey experiments on public attitudes toward reform of EU pesticides regulation in June 2020 among a representative sample of the adult population in six Member States (France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, and Sweden, n=9022). Our results show that the introduction of systematic post-authorization monitoring and review, and consideration of all relevant scientific studies in the authorization decision are the two most promising reforms to increase public support for pesticides regulation. Moreover, if a hypothetical glyphosate authorization decision is taken under a decision-making procedure that citizens (strongly) support, they are more likely to accept it even if they previously opposed this outcome. Our findings are particularly relevant given that glyphosate is currently again undergoing a renewal procedure in the EU.

This interview with Jack Katz offers an inspiring statement about how to study social life. It starts with a discussion of Katz’s three-dimensional social ontology; social life is constituted in embodied interactions in which people adjust to others and create transcendent meanings. Contrasting the ontology with anthropology’s ontological turn, we note that social ontology is about generating empirically accurate descriptions capturing the flow of social life. This leads to a critical discussion of sociology’s pre-occupation with explanans-driven theorizing. Touching upon macro–micro relationships, we consider what a phenomenology of collective emotions would look like. This brings us to emotional transformations, notably the notion of ‘falling’, an important theme in Katz’s work. The interview continues with advice of how to think beyond given categories, to consider the validity of ethnographic description and to look for the absurd. Finally, we conclude that ethnography has the potential to appeal to mass audiences.

Summary: Purpose: To determine the risk of seizures in critically ill patients receiving the antibiotic imipenem, a broad-spectrum antibiotic that has been associated with seizures. Reports generally have not considered other contributing factors such as dose, seizure history, and morbidity index of the underlying illness necessitating the antibiotic. Methods: Charts of all patients in a 450-bed municipal hospital who received imipenem in a 6-month period, as determined by pharmacy records, were reviewed for dosage and duration of imipenem use, occurrence of seizures. and mortality outcome. Attention was paid to demographic features; pattern of seizure occurrence during, before, and after imipenem use; renal function; and correction for dosage based on size. Results: Seventy-five charts were reviewed. Sixty-three patients had no seizures during the hospitalization, four had seizures while receiving imipenem, and eight had seizures during the hospitalization but before or after imipenem use. The incidence of seizures was 4/1,000 patient-days on, and 3.9/1,000 patient-days off imipenem (not significant). The risk of seizure in both groups was considerably higher in those patients with a history of seizures before hospitalization. The presence of other factors that could contribute to increased concentration of imipenem in the brain, such as renal failure or acute stroke, did not contribute to seizure incidence. Metabolic derangement, anoxia, and phenytoin discontinuation did contribute to seizure incidence. Conclusions: Seizure incidence is increased in all critically ill patients (16% of patients studied), but with no added risk during the period patients received imipenem. Determining the proper dose based on a patient's body mass, correction of dose in the presence of renal failure, and avoidance of excess of 2 g/day of imipenem removes any added risk for seizures from imipenem. Despite experimental data to suggest action of imipenem on the glutamate/N-methyl-d-aspartate receptor, or interference with binding to the γ-aminobutyric acid receptor, and early clinical studies that warned against its use because of seizure risk, we found that careful use of this antibiotic is safe.