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A key Eurosceptic argument is that countries can selectively retain only those aspects of European integration from which they benefit, while opting out of those aspects they dislike. How convincing is this "have your cake and eat it, too" argument to voters? This article argues that voters can learn about the feasibility of such a strategy by looking at the experience of countries that pursued a similar path. Positive experiences can strengthen voters' support for a similar strategy, while negative experiences can deter them. This argument is tested in a study of the effects of the Brexit negotiations on public opinion in Switzerland. Drawing on a panel survey fielded between 2019 and 2021, the article shows that Brexit had a small but non-negligible impact on Swiss voters' expectations about the EU's resolve, as well as on vote intentions on two EU-related policy proposals. These findings confirm that voters learn from foreign political developments about the costs of non-cooperation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Minoritized groups have been severely affected by the Covid-19 pandemic, highlighting the need to better understand how they and their interests were (not) represented in the political process during this challenging period. We identify common and unique features of Covid-19 and past crises, and discuss why the pandemic may have represented a moment for change before identifying gaps in past research. Finally, we present seven articles in this Special Issue that analyze the political representation of minoritized groups in politics, the news media and online. This Special Issue brings together a diverse group of scholars using different theoretical approaches, methodologies and data sources. Using interdisciplinary and intersectional perspectives, we shed new light on minoritized people’s representation during Covid-19 across the globe, focusing on how ethnic and racial groups have experienced the pandemic themselves. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The liberal international order has recently come under increasing nationalist pressure, evidenced by a rise in nationalist demands to withdraw from international institutions. A growing literature examines the domestic economic, social, and political origins of this nationalist backlash against international institutions. However, less is known about the extent to which precedents of withdrawals of one country affect nationalist pressures for future withdrawals elsewhere. In this paper, we argue that initial withdrawal episodes provide new information about the feasibility and desirability of withdrawals to nationalist elites in other countries. Hence, we expect nationalists abroad to be either encouraged or deterred to follow a similar path – depending on the success of these precedents. We explore this argument in the context of the British withdrawal from the European Union (Brexit), which arguably marks the most significant withdrawal from an international institution to date. Based on a quantitative analyses of media reports in ten European countries, we show we show that nationalist parties in Europe increased or moderated the aggressiveness about their EU-related rhetoric as the ups and downs of the Brexit-drama unfolded. Our results suggest that precedents of nationalist withdrawals shape domestic politics well beyond the concerned countries themselves. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nitrogen oxides (NOx), primarily generated from combustion processes, pose significant health and environmental risks. To improve the coordination of measures against excessive NOx emissions, it is necessary to effectively monitor ambient NOx concentrations, which requires the development of precise and cost-efficient detection methods. This study focuses on developing a microwave- or radio frequency (RF)-based gas dosimeter for NOx detection and addresses the optimization of the dosimeter design by examining the dielectric properties of LTCC-based (Low-Temperature Co-fired Ceramics) sensor substrates and barium-based NOx storage materials. The measurements taken utilizing the Microwave Cavity Perturbation (MCP) method revealed that these materials exhibit more pronounced changes in dielectric losses when storing NOx at elevated temperatures. Consequently, operating such a dosimeter at high temperatures (above 300 °C) is recommended to maximize the sensor signal. To evaluate their high-temperature applicability, LTCC substrates were analyzed by measuring their dielectric losses at temperatures up to 600 °C. In terms of NOx storage materials, coating barium on high-surface-area alumina resolved issues related to limited NOx adsorption in pure barium carbonate powders. Additionally, the adsorption of both NO and NO2 was enabled by the application of a platinum catalyst. The change in dielectric losses, which provides the main signal for an RF-based gas dosimeter, only depends on the stored amount of NOx and not on the specific type of nitrogen oxide. Although the change in dielectric losses increases with the temperature, the maximum storage capacity of the material decreases significantly. In addition, at temperatures above 350 °C, NOx is mostly weakly bound, so it will desorb in the absence of NOx. Therefore, in the future development of a reliable RF-based NOx dosimeter, the trade-off between the sensor signal strength and adsorption behavior must be addressed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How do foreign political events shape voters' evaluation of policies whose outcomes are hard to observe? We argue that policy-specific political processes abroad provide information about the policy's feasibility and desirability that allows voters to update their preferences. We analyze how key events in British Brexit politics affected attitudes towards the European Union in other European countries. The results of 'unexpected events during survey' designs, a natural experiment, and a panel analysis show that events highlighting the difficulties of the United Kingdom's withdrawal from the European Union led to a higher support of European integration in remaining member states, whereas an event highlighting the opportunities of Brexit resulted in more Eurosceptic attitudes. The article demonstrates that foreign events can influence voters' policy attitudes in other countries, highlighting the systemic consequences of events like Brexit. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Owing to increasingly stringent emission limits, particulate filters have become mandatory for gasoline-engine vehicles. Monitoring their soot loading is necessary for error-free operation. The state-of-the-art differential pressure sensors suffer from inaccuracies due to small amounts of stored soot combined with exhaust gas conditions that lead to partial regeneration. As an alternative approach, radio-frequency-based (RF) sensors can accurately measure the soot loading, even under these conditions, by detecting soot through its dielectric properties. However, they face a different challenge as their sensitivity may depend on the engine operation conditions during soot formation. In this article, this influence is evaluated in more detail. Various soot samples were generated on an engine test bench. Their dielectric properties were measured using the microwave cavity perturbation (MCP) method and compared with the corresponding sensitivity of the RF sensor determined on a lab test bench. Both showed similar behavior. The values for the soot samples themselves, however, differed significantly from each other. A way to correct for this cross-sensitivity was found in the influence of exhaust gas humidity on the RF sensor, which can be correlated with the engine load. By evaluating this influence during significant humidity changes, such as fuel cuts, it could be used to correct the influence of the engineon the RF sensor. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research into parliamentary speech making–behaviour of Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) usually takes a static perspective. We offer an interactive and dynamic approach that understands parliamentary debates as a relational network phenomenon and investigates MEPs' debate interactions. This allows us to uncover dynamics of inclusiveness and pluralism, self-reinforcing power relationships and transnational policy alliances. Analyzing 11,408 debate interactions between MEPs using a combination of text and dynamic network analysis, we find that male, senior and influential parliamentarians from powerful member states receive more attention with evidence for a self-reinforcing effect over time. Interestingly, seniority matters more for debate attention than leadership positions. Sharing the same nationality and a similar political leaning also shape debate coalitions with the former being more important than the latter. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, particulate filters have become mandatory in almost all gasoline-powered vehicles to comply with emission standards regarding particulate number. In contrast to diesel applications, monitoring gasoline particulate filters (GPFs) by differential pressure sensors is challenging due to lower soot masses to be deposited in the GPFs. A different approach to determine the soot loading of GPFs is a radio frequency-based sensor (RF sensor). To facilitate sensor development, in previous work, a simulation model was created to determine the RF signal at arbitrary engine operating points. To ensure accuracy, the exact dielectric properties of the soot need to be known. This work has shown how small samples of soot-loaded filter are sufficient to determine the dielectric properties of soot itself using the microwave cavity perturbation method. For this purpose, mixing rules were determined through simulation and measurement, allowing the air and substrate fraction of the sample to be considered. Due to the different geometry of filter substrates compared to crushed soot samples, a different mixing rule had to be derived to calculate the effective filter properties required for the simulation model. The accuracy of the determined mixing rules and the underlying simulation model could be verified by comparative measurements on an engine test bench. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the systemic implications of the growing popular backlash against international cooperation and analyzes how voter-endorsed attempts to withdraw from international institutions reverberate abroad. Observing other countries' disintegration experiences allows voters to better assess the feasibility and desirability of such withdrawals. More positive withdrawal experiences encourage exit-support abroad, whereas negative experiences are likely to have a deterring effect. These contagion effects will be conditioned by the availability of information and voters' willingness to learn. The article empirically examines this argument for the case of Brexit. It leverages original survey data from 58,959 EU-27 Europeans collected in six survey waves during the Brexit withdrawal negotiations and from a two-wave survey of 2,241 Swiss voters conducted around the first Brexit extension in spring 2019. It finds both encouragement and deterrence effects, which are bigger when respondents pay attention to Brexit and are dampened by motivated reasoning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, the world has seen a rising backlash against globalization. This article reviews the nature, causes, and consequences of the globalization backlash. It shows that, contrary to a popular narrative, the backlash is not associated with a large swing in public opinion against globalization but is rather a result of its politicization. The increasing influence of globalization-skeptic actors has resulted in more protectionist, isolationist, and nationalist policies, some of which fundamentally threaten pillars of the contemporary international order. Both material and nonmaterial causes drive the globalization backlash, and these causes interact and mediate each other. The consequences are shaped by the responses of societal actors, national governments, and international policy makers. These responses can either yield to and reinforce the global backlash or push back against it. Understanding these dynamics will be an important task for future research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research examines migrant women’s representation in British and German news during the COVID-19 pandemic, paying particular attention to expressions of solidarity. While previous research has focused on the representation of women and migrants, studies have largely treated these groups as distinct entities. Combining topic modelling with informed grounded theory, this research compares the representation of migrant women, including women from ethnic minorities, across a diverse corpus covering 2020–21. This two-step methodology facilitates intersectional analysis at the macro and micro level, revealing the salience, topical concentration and context of migrant women’s coverage. Findings show that solidarity emerged through the platforming of migrant women’s voices, and connected to discourses of class, poverty and precarity. Representations containing empathy and pity – less likely drivers of social change – were more prevalent. This research contributes to our understanding of migrant women’s coverage during the pandemic and provides a granular and intersectional lens for analysing minoritized group representation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Participating in patient self-help groups is highly recommended to patients in cancer care. Yet, engagement is relatively rare. A total of 253 patients participated in our study conducted as a paper-and-pencil questionnaire. A binominal logistic regression, with interest in participation in self-help groups being the dependent variable, was run. General interest in self-help was high among the respondents. Female gender, higher age, higher education and low self-efficacy were found to significantly predict interest in self-help. Patients reported a lack of information provided by medical professionals. Self-efficacy as a predictor might contribute to characterizing patients who might benefit from self-help group participation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite years of crisis, the euro has enjoyed strong popular support across the Eurozone periphery. In light of the high costs of internal devaluation strategies, this begs the question why the public has remained in favor of the common currency. In this article, we propose a theoretical mechanism that accounts for both voters' pocketbook preferences and their sociotropic assessments over the noisy trade-offs associated with the outcomes of euro membership and euro exit. Using original survey data from three consecutive survey waves in Greece (conducted in July, September, and December 2015, respectively), we analyze the attitudes of Greek voters toward the euro in an environment of acute uncertainty, austerity, high unemployment, and economic recession. First, we juxtapose our uncertainty mechanism of popular euro attitudes against other explanations put forward in the literature and find strong support for our argument. Second, we conduct a survey experiment to tap into attitudes toward the euro-austerity trade-off and find that as uncertainty over policy outcomes diminishes, framing effects abate in significance, especially among those who voted No in the July 2015 referendum. Finally, we derive distinct sets of euro preferences for different 'vulnerability profiles'. Over time, as the trade-offs of euro membership become more pronounced, we find a marked fall in euro support between July and December 2015. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A surprising development in the post-referendum Brexit process has been that vote intentions have remained largely stable, despite the cumbersome withdrawal negotiations. We examine this puzzle by analyzing the role of voters' expectations about the European Union's willingness to accommodate the UK after the pro-Brexit vote. Using data from the British Election Study, we explore how these expectations are updated over time, and how they are related to vote intentions. We find that voters who were more optimistic about the European Union's response were more likely to vote Leave. Over the course of the negotiations, Leavers have become more disillusioned. These adjustments, however, have not translated into shifts in vote intentions. Overall, we find evidence that motivated reasoning is an important driver of public opinion on Brexit. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Theorizing information flows is at the heart of traditional communication theories such as the two-step flow of communication and the concept of opinion leadership. Social media have fundamentally altered how information reaches people. This study examines opinion leadership in social media networks and argues that opinion leaders may no longer need to rely on information provided by the media if they have access to first-hand information. To test this assumption empirically, we used data from the 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP21). Attendees of the conference had direct information about what was happening, which they were able to share live with their followers via social media. We used geo-located tweets to identify Twitter users who attended the COP21 summit. We then located these users in a data set of tweets that were collected based on the main conference hashtag (#COP21) and represent the wider social media debate on the conference. Our results, which are based on network analysis measures and Twitter user data, show that COP21 participants were more central actors compared to the average user in the network, and that they were more likely to have brokering positions. They were also more involved in the debate and received more attention from other users. We used automated content analysis to divide COP21 participants into different actor types and performed the analysis by actor group. The results show only minor differences across the actors and support the robustness of our analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The United Kingdom is the first country to withdraw its membership from the European Union (EU). Immigration featured high on the Brexit news agenda and EU citizens' rights to work and live in the United Kingdom are likely to be affected by the country's exit from the EU. This study analyzes how salient EU citizens were in Brexit news, and investigates whether there was a relationship between the negative portrayal of EU citizens and the type of news outlet. The analysis is based on 19,367 news stories published between June 1, 2015, and June 23, 2016. Automated content analysis was used to determine whether EU citizens were mentioned. The results do not reveal a divide between tabloids and broadsheets, but between national and regional papers. It is only in regional papers from England and Wales that EU citizens were more likely to be mentioned if the tone of a news story was more negative. The findings also suggest that the news media presented the Brexit referendum as a vote about migration in general rather than about intra-EU migration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Analyzing international negotiations among the member states of the European Union raises a number of analytical issues, especially in unusual circumstances such as the Eurozone crisis. Our article discusses these issues in the light of existing theory and informed by the empirical analyses assembled in this special issue. 'National preferences' or ideal points of the governments involved are driven by their domestic socio-economic and political conditions and institutions, the dimensionality of the negotiations, and strategic considerations. We then discuss how national preferences, states' bargaining power, the strategic and institutional bargaining context, and the bargaining dynamics jointly influence the bargaining outcome. Examples from European negotiations in the context of the Eurozone crisis illustrate both the complexity of the process and the value of serious, theoretically informed, empirical analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many observers of contemporary global politics conclude that the present moment represents one of the most unsettled times in global politics since the fall of the Berlin Wall. Eilstrup-Sangiovanni and Hofmann therefore clarify our understanding of "the global order" and offer a pared-down conceptualization: a multilateral, rules-based order comprised of states as the primary actors that promotes economic liberalism. Goodman and Schimmelfennig then tackle the politics of migration, an increasingly salient policy field that spans the national and international dimensions of the contemporary crisis. [Extracted from the article]

How does offshoring affect individual party preferences in multiparty systems? We argue that exposure to offshoring influences individual preferences for those political parties with clear policy positions on issues relevant for individuals with offshorable jobs (left, liberal, and center-right parties) but does not affect voting decisions for parties concentrating on other issues (green or populist right parties). Examining individual-level data from five waves of the European Social Survey for 18 advanced democracies, we find that these effects vary by skill level and exposure. Offshoring increases preferences for liberal and center-right parties that advocate economic openness among the highly skilled. In contrast, low-skilled individuals exposed to offshoring are more likely to prefer leftist political parties that champion social protection and redistribution. Offshoring does not affect the propensity to vote for green and populist right parties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In developing countries, trade is increasingly associated with greater returns to high-skilled labor and rising inequality. These empirical patterns are at odds with canonical models of trade in the developing world. What does this mean for the political economy of trade in these countries? We argue that although developing countries have a comparative advantage in low-skill products, these are produced by workers that are relatively high-skilled compared to their peers. Trade and global production benefit relatively skilled workers, particularly those exposed to exports and inward foreign direct investment in manufacturing. Our argument offers insight into why relatively skilled workers are most supportive of free trade and why inequality is rising in developing countries. We examine micro- and macro-level implications of our argument using cross-national survey data on policy preferences and aggregate data on trade and inequality. The findings have important implications for the political economy of trade and global production in developing countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While previous research has taken into account different normative theories when examining the concept of the public sphere at the national level, the underlying normative conceptualisation of the European public sphere has often remained vague. However, better understanding whether the European public sphere is functional and able to fulfil its democratic role needs further specification of the underlying normative criteria. This study considers different normative public sphere theories in the context of the European Union (EU) news coverage. Specifically, it focuses on one main criterion, namely the actor structure, and examines which normative theory is able to describe the actor structure of the EU best. The visibility of national and European governmental actors, civil society actors and citizens is examined by drawing on secondary data of a large-scale content analysis of television and newspaper articles of all 27 EU member states gathered during the 2009 European Parliament election campaign (N = 12,850). [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The Eurozone crisis constitutes a grave challenge to European integration. This article presents an overview of the causes of the crisis and analyzes why it has been so difficult to resolve. We focus on how responses to the crisis were shaped by distributive conflicts both among and within countries. On the international level, debtor and creditor countries have fought over the distribution of responsibility for the accumulated debt; countries with current account surpluses and deficits have fought over who should implement the policies necessary to reduce the current account imbalances. Within countries, interest groups have fought to shift the costs of crisis resolution away from themselves. The article emphasizes that the Eurozone crisis shares many features of previous debt and balance-of-payments crises. However, the Eurozone's predicament is unique because it is set within a monetary union that strongly constrains the policy options available to policy makers and vastly increases the interdependence of the euro crisis countries. The outcome of the crisis has also been highly unusual because the costs of crisis resolution have been borne almost exclusively by the debtor countries and taxpayers in the Eurozone. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On 23 June 2016, a majority of 52% of British voters decided in a referendum that the United Kingdom should leave the European Union. The decision sent shockwaves around Britain, Europe, and the world: the ‘Brexit’-vote presents the first instance that a country has voted to exit a major supranational institution, putting both the European integration project and the future of the United Kingdom in a globalized world into question. At the time of writing, four months after the referendum vote, the contours of Brexit remain unclear. Yet even within this short time frame, Brexit politics have been remarkable on both the domestic and the international level. In this paper, we first present a brief overview of IPE research in the open economy politics (OEP) tradition. We then discuss the insights OEP provides that help us to better understand the referendum vote and Brexit politics, but also emphasize that they present a number of puzzles for OEP-inspired researchers. Based on this analysis, the final section suggests avenues for advancing the OEP research program. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Due to the increased importance of transnational governance, individual states become increasingly interdependent. This is also reflected in the news media coverage and media attention to foreign affairs. The European Union (EU) represents a case of advanced globalization. This study investigates news media attention to fellow EU member states. The main objective of this study is toexplainwhat factors determine whether EU member states report abouteach other. The analysis is based on large-scale content analysis data of TV news and newspaper articles of 27 EU member states gathered during the 2009 European Parliament election campaign (N = 19,106) and employs network analysis to explain differences in media attention. The findings show that there are indicators at the national level that are independent of EU governance, as well as factors related to the European integration that determine whether two states report about each other. As such, countries that are neighbors, and where the same language is spoken, are more likely to report about each other. Furthermore, smaller, older, and EU member states that are more supportive of the European integration report more on fellow states. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article is a commentary on Noon et al., 212: 444–460. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When countries face balance-of-payments crises, their policy responses vary widely. This article argues that the choice between the two main options of internal adjustment (i.e., austerity and structural reforms) and external adjustment (i.e., exchange-rate devaluation) depends on how costly each of these strategies is for a country overall. Although the choice of adjustment strategy is thus structurally determined, the level of political conflict associated with crisis management depends on both the national vulnerability profile and partisan interests. Moreover, irrespective of the adjustment strategy, all governments design the specific reforms in ways that shelter their own voters. Empirically, this article uses qualitative case studies and survey data to examine the significant variation in crisis responses, crisis politics, and distributive outcomes of the 2008-2010 global financial crisis in eight Eastern European countries. The article concludes with a discussion of the implications of the Eastern European experience for crisis politics in the Eurozone crisis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How does national crisis management affect the electoral fortunes of coalition governments? Drawing on micro-level data from just before the 2009 federal elections in Germany, this article investigates how voters' evaluation of specific policies against the global financial crisis affected approval of and voting intentions for the then-governing grand coalition. We find that voters in favour of the two most prominent anti-crisis policies, the car-scrap bonus and the public guarantee for banks, were more likely to approve of and to vote for the two incumbent parties. These evaluations of specific policies influenced individuals' vote choice in addition to their assessments of the economic situation more generally and in addition to party identification. This suggests that even in the greatest economic turmoil with blurred political responsibilities, government parties can win or lose voters through the implementation of specific economic policies. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Solid cancers are not simple accumulations of malignant tumor cells but rather represent complex organ-like structures. Despite a more chaotic general appearance as compared to the highly organized setup of healthy tissues, cancers still show highly differentiated structures and a close interaction with and dependency on the interwoven connective tissue. This complexity within cancers is not known in detail at the molecular level so far. The first part of this article will shortly describe the technology and strategies to quantify and dissect the heterogeneity in human solid cancers. Moreover, there is urgent need to better understand human cancer biology since the development of novel anti-cancer drugs is far from being efficient, predominantly due to the scarcity of predictive preclinical models. Hence, in vivo and in vitro models were developed, which better recapitulate the complexity of human cancers, by their intrinsic three-dimensional nature and the cellular heterogeneity and allow functional intervention for hypothesis testing. Therefore, in the second part 3D in vitro cancer models are presented that analyze and depict the heterogeneity in human cancers. Advantages and drawbacks of each model are highlighted and their suitability to preclinical drug testing is discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When faced with speculative pressure on their currencies, policymakers often delay devaluations by spending billions of dollars in defense of a given exchange rate peg, only to succumb and devalue their currency later on. Using a political economy approach we argue that the interaction of distributional concerns, cognitive limitations, time-consistency problems, and institutional structures can keep governments from implementing the economically optimal policy response. We argue that distributional concerns often lead to a ‘bias’ in favor of currency defense as long as market pressures are mild. The political incentives to initially delay devaluations can be exacerbated by institutions that either increase the size of interest groups vulnerable to depreciation or give policymakers incentives to adopt a short time-horizon. Once market pressure becomes strong, however, the politically salient alternative to not depreciating becomes raising interest rates rather than just running down reserves. This acts as a wake-up call that changes perceptions of the underlying distributional considerations and hence the political trade-off between the costs and benefits of an exchange rate defense. As the coalition of devaluation-proponents grows, the likelihood of a devaluation increases. We illustrate our argument by discussing the salient distributional issues and their interaction with domestic institutions in four brief case studies. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The debate on how globalization affects the welfare state has so far largely neglected to examine the microlevel causal mechanism underlying different macrolevel claims. Based on survey data from Switzerland, this article provides empirical microfoundations for the so-called compensation hypothesis. It finds that globalization losers are more likely to express feelings of economic insecurity. Such feelings, in turn, increase preferences for welfare state expansion, which in turn increase the likelihood of voting for the Social Democratic Party. The analysis also shows that globalization losers and winners differ significantly with regard to their social policy preferences and their propensity to vote for left parties. The article is innovative on two counts: First, it uses a number of different and more nuanced indicators measuring individuals’ positions as beneficiaries or losers of increasing global competition. Second, rather than focusing on one particular part of the causal chain, it tests the entire individual-level causal mechanism implied by the compensation hypothesis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary: We empirically analyze the effect of International Monetary Fund (IMF) involvement on the risk of entering a currency crisis and, respectively, the outcome of such a crisis. Specifically, we investigate whether countries with previous IMF intervention are more likely to experience currency crises. In a second step, we analyze the IMF’s impact on a country’s decision to adjust the exchange rate, once a crisis occurs. We find that IMF involvement reduces the probability of a crisis. Once in a crisis, IMF programs significantly increase the probability that the authorities devalue the exchange rate. The amount of loans and compliance with conditionality have no impact. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Politicians are often assumed to be opportunistic. This article examines both whether there is a limit to this opportunism and whether voters reward policy makers for opportunistic behaviour. By looking at currency crisis situations, the article presents a graphic rational opportunistic political business cycle model in which incumbents face a tradeoff between their wish to signal competence and the economic constraints imposed by the crisis. It analyses how electoral incentives affect policy makers' management of currency crises and how this management in turn affects the subsequent election outcome. The empirical results of probit models with selection using a sample of 122 crises in 48 industrial and developing countries between 1983 and 2003 confirm the model's prediction that under certain circumstances some types of policy makers do indeed have incentives to deviate from optimal policy in the run-up to elections – and that voters reward this behaviour by re-electing policy makers who follow such strategies. However, there is a limit to the readiness to manipulate: when speculative pressure is too severe, incumbents no longer manipulate policy but implement the least painful policy option instead. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recently, a laboratory setup for microwave-based characterization of powder samples at elevated temperatures and different gas atmospheres was presented. The setup is particularly interesting for operando investigations on typical materials for exhaust gas aftertreatment. By using the microwave cavity perturbation method, where the powder is placed inside a cavity resonator, the change of the resonant properties provides information about changes in the dielectric properties of the sample. However, determining the exact complex permittivity of the powder samples is not simple. Up to now, a simplified microwave cavity perturbation theory had been applied to estimate the bulk properties of the powders. In this study, an extended approach is presented which allows to determine the dielectric properties of the powder materials more correctly. It accounts for the electric field distribution in the resonator, the depolarization of the sample and the effect of the powder filling. The individual method combines findings from simulations and recognized analytical approaches and can be used for investigations on a wide range of materials and sample geometries. This work provides a more accurate evaluation of the dielectric powder properties and has the potential to enhance the understanding of the microwave behavior of storage materials for exhaust gas aftertreatment, especially with regard to the application of microwave-based catalyst state diagnosis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Gasoline particulate filters (GPFs) are an appropriate means to meet today's emission standards. As for diesel applications, GPFs can be monitored via differential pressure sensors or using a radio-frequency approach (RF sensor). Due to largely differing soot properties and engine operating modes of gasoline compared to diesel engines (e.g., the possibility of incomplete regenerations), the behavior of both sensor systems must be investigated in detail. For this purpose, extensive measurements on engine test benches are usually required. To simplify the sensor development, a simulation model was developed using COMSOL Multiphysics® that not only allowed for calculating the loading and regeneration process of GPFs under different engine operating conditions but also determined the impact on both sensor systems. To simulate the regeneration behavior of gasoline soot accurately, an oxidation model was developed. To identify the influence of different engine operating points on the sensor behavior, various samples generated at an engine test bench were examined regarding their kinetic parameters using thermogravimetric analysis. Thus, this compared the accuracy of soot mass determination using the RF sensor with the differential pressure method. By simulating a typical driving condition with incomplete regenerations, the effects of the soot kinetics on sensor accuracy was demonstrated exemplarily. Thereby, the RF sensor showed an overall smaller mass determination error, as well as a lower dependence on the soot kinetics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How does economic globalization influence domestic political stability? Building on innovations in trade theory, we argue that international trade amplifies political discontent and protest in contexts in which trade losers concentrate, but has a pacifying effect in contexts dominated by beneficiaries of free trade. We examine this argument focusing on variation in Russian regions. Using negative binomial regression models on data from 2007 to 2012, we show that regional education levels condition the effect of trade intensity on protest frequency. High exposure to trade leads to more protests in regions with low average education levels, but fewer protests in regions in which residents are well-educated. Probing the underlying mechanism, we find that the effect of trade on regional economic welfare is conditioned by education levels, that poorly educated Russians face more economic difficulties when they live in regions exposed to trade, and that economically aggrieved individuals participate more in protests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How do external economic shocks influence domestic politics? We argue that those materially exposed to the shock will display systematic differences in policy preferences and voting behavior compared to the unexposed, and political parties can exploit these circumstances. Empirically, we take advantage of the 2015 surprise revaluation of the Swiss franc to identify the Polish citizens with direct economic exposure to this exogenous event. Using an original survey fielded prior to the 2015 elections and an embedded survey experiment, we show that exposed individuals were more likely to demand government support and more likely to desert the government and vote for the largest opposition party, which was able to use the shock to expand its electoral coalition without alienating its core voters. Our article clarifies the connection between international shocks, voters' policy preferences, partisan policy responses, and, ultimately, voting decisions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Is the contemporary global order under threat? This contribution weighs the case for and against the notion that we are witnessing an existential challenge to the contemporary global order. We show that there are grounds for optimism with respect to the endurance of the first two ordering principles of the contemporary global order: a state-led global order and economic liberalism, because states remain key actors in the current world order and because overall support for economic liberalism remains strong. However, we see greater challenges to the procedural principle of inclusive, rule-based multilateralism, such as unilateral disintegration challenges and rising popular scepticism about international institutions that provide considerable reasons to worry about the future of the global order. Yet, given that the global order has proven robust time and again in the past, we see some reasons for cautious optimism overall, despite considerable risks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reviews the book "Political Communication in European Parliamentary Elections," by Michaela Maier, edited by Jesper Strömbäck and Lynda Lee Kaid.

A planar microstrip ring resonator structure on alumina was developed using the commercial FEM software COMSOL. Design parameters were evaluated, eventually leading to an optimized design of a miniaturized microwave gas sensor. The sensor was covered with a zeolite film. The device was successfully operated at around 8.5 GHz at room temperature as a humidity sensor. In the next step, an additional planar heater will be included on the reverse side of the resonator structure to allow for testing of gas-sensitive materials under sensor conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses the connection between economic context, voters’ individual assessment of the economy, and party identification, taking the German national elections of 2009 as an example. Based on the results of multinomial and multilevel regression models, the article shows that partisanship moderates how the economy affects the vote. In cases of increasing unemployment in the constituency, voters are less likely to vote for the Social Democrats instead of the CDU and the opposition. This effect is particularly strong amongst voters who report that they identify with the Social Democrats. Regarding the effect of voters’ assessment of the national economy, the results are different. In this case, a better evaluation of the regional economy increases the probability to vote for right-wing parties – notably amongst voters without partisanship. These findings suggest that the moderating effect of partisanship on the economy’s impact on voting behaviour should not be overestimated. What is more, this analysis implies that research on economic voting should always account for both contextual factors and voters’ personal assessment of the economy, as these measures reveal different dimensions of economic voting. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]