Archiv Veranstaltungen 2019

Moderated by Shelly Kupferberg

Discussant: tba

We cordially invite you to the next session of our workshop series on Authoritarian Politics and International Relations at WZB! 

The conference explores political epistemologies of big data. Political epistemologies are practices by which societies construct politically relevant knowledge and the criteria by which they evaluate it. Big data is the practice of deriving socially relevant knowledge from massive and diverse digital trace data.

Moderated by Edgar Grande

Contemporary organizations are increasingly implementing flexible working time arrangements (FWTA) that provide workers with more control over individual working hours. Despite these changes, managers and policy-makers are less informed about whether these arrangements reduce worker turnover and for which populations of workers.

The WZB is planning an international conference on matching markets. The conference "Designing and evaluating matching markets,” starting in the morning of June 27, 2019, and ending on June 28, 2019, will take place at the WZB in Berlin. The conference is organized by Inácio Bó (WZB), Dorothea Kübler (WZB), and Lars Ehlers (University of Montreal).

Die Fachtagung, die 2011 ins Leben gerufen wurde, beschäftigt sich mit vielfältigen Fragen des Wissenschaftssystems und insbesondere der Rolle von Publikationen. In jährlichen Abständen treffen sich hier Herausgeber*innen und Redakteur*innen von sozial- und geisteswissenschaftlichen Zeitschriften, um aktuelle Fragen aus dem Zeitschriftenkontext miteinander zu diskutieren.

The tremendous growth of digital transactions –mainly through online platforms— has profoundly affected the way we interact, opening vast opportunities to improve our lives. Consumers have benefited from an unprecedented proliferation of new services and products that previously were simply too costly to be developed and marketed to customers. At the same time, network effects in platform business models have brought market power concerns back to the front stage.

Europa scheint aus den Fugen geraten. Die europäische Integration wird massiv in Frage gestellt. Ungewissheit und Ängste vor Migration und steigender Ungleichheit dominieren die öffentliche Diskussion und haben zum Erstarken populistischer Parteien geführt. Um an die wegweisende Kraft der europäischen Einigung zu erinnern und Veränderungen anzustoßen, braucht es positive Erzählungen. Gemeinsam können Wissenschaft und Kultur dafür einen Beitrag liefern.

European debates about the reception and accommodation of refugees have since the very beginning of the so called “refugee crisis” in 2015 circled around religious issues: Some (of the most secularized) postsocialist countries rediscovered their Christian cultural heritage as an argument against the immigration of Muslims, and in Germany reports on interreligious conflicts nurtured claims for a separation of refugees along religious lines. The talk draws on an extensive case study on religious diversity and practice in refugee accommodation centers in Lower Saxony.

Moderation: Heike Solga

Welche Unterstützungsstrukturen existieren in Österreich für den Übergang von Schule, Ausbildung und Beruf von Jugendlichen mit Behinderung? Welche Möglichkeiten der Partizipation existieren für junge Menschen?

Discussant: Alexandros Tokhi (WZB)

With the rise of Internet behemoths and the surveillance of increasingly personal domains there is a trend of questioning life online. This talk draws attention to hacking practices that interrogate the diverse faces of online veillance. I will first introduce current debates about hackers as interrogators of surveillance. Instead of portraying hacking as a simple counterculture I seek to complicate dichotomies of power vs. resistance, online vs. offline, and technological system vs. social practice.

On June 5, 2013, the publishing of thousands of secret documents began. These later became known as the “Snowden Revelations,” as the documents had been handed over to journalists by former NSA employee and whistleblower, Edward J. Snowden. They offered proof of the comprehensive global hacking and surveillance practices of the “Five Eyes” intelligence cooperation, mainly by the United States National Security Agency (NSA) and the British Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ).

Abstract

Diskussion mit Philipp Gassert und Dieter Rucht

Moderiert von Simon Teune und Swen Hutter

The core of the asylum regime is the principle of non-refoulement that prohibits governments from sending refugees back to their persecutors. Governments attempt to evade this legal obligation to which they have explicitly agreed by manipulating territoriality. A remote control strategy of “extra-territorialization” pushes border control functions hundreds or even thousands of kilometers beyond the state’s territory.

Im Jahr 2017 haben sich das Bündnis für Gute Arbeit des Landes Brandenburg und das international renommierte Wissenschaftszentrum für Sozialforschung Berlin (WZB) auf den Weg gemacht, um über „Gute Arbeit“ zu diskutieren und dabei Erfahrungen und Wissen auszutauschen. Die Arbeitswelt von heute befindet sich in einem dynamischen Wandel und es ist uns ein gemeinsames Anliegen, diesen Veränderungsprozess so zu gestalten, dass die Arbeit der Zukunft für alle Erwerbstätigen eine gute Arbeit ist.

Why is it that we describe our societies in terms of networks? Academic and popular literature usually suggests that computers and the internet produced the network society. However, there is another story to be told. Vincent August reveals how social and political thought deliberately enforced cybernetic network ideas to re-shape the way we think about society and politics.

Soziale Ungleichheit ist Gegenstand aktueller öffentlicher Debatten: Bleiben Ungleichheiten trotz einer boomenden Wirtschaft bestehen oder nehmen sie sogar zu? Wie werden Ungleichheiten über Generationen hinweg reproduziert? Warum werden Ungleichheiten gruppenspezifisch unterschiedlich wahrgenommen? Welche individuellen und gesellschaftlichen Folgen von Ungleichheit gibt es, insbesondere in Bezug auf politische Teilhabe?

It is now widely supposed in many democracies that the modern political campaign needs to be “data driven” to consolidate existing support and to find potential new voters and donors.  The capture of data on political opinions and affiliation permits the construction of profiles on individual voters and the “micro-targeting” of increasingly precise messages to increasingly refined segments of the electorate.  To what extent should modern campaigns be allowed to “know” the electorate?  The answer to this question relies to some extent on privacy and data protection rules, based on principles

The hour-glass ceiling refers to a ceiling on pay and advancement which arises when good jobs become predicated on long hours. This ceiling is time- not merit-based; it pushes otherwise qualified and capable women out of well-paid and influential jobs into short hour and less privileged jobs, compromising their income and earnings, creating a two-tiered, gender-polarised labour market that undermines equality. This seminar discusses recent research on how time and health are related.

Die Digitalisierung, soziale Medien und Phänomene wie Hackerangriffe oder Fake News stellen die Demokratie vor Herausforderungen. Dabei besteht ein Spannungsfeld zwischen den Chancen, die die Digitalisierung für eine optimale Beteiligung von Bürgerinnen und Bürgern am politischen Prozess bietet, und den Risiken, die die Resilienz der Demokratien im digitalen Zeitalter auf die Probe stellen können.

Roundtable with Clara Iglesias Keller (HIIG / Rio de Janeiro State University), Julia Pohle (WZB), Cornelius Puschmann (Hans-Bredow-Institut Hamburg) and Camille Roth (CNRS / CMB).

Moderation: Christian Mihr (Reporter ohne Grenzen)

Digital spaces have progressively become a significant part of the public space as a whole, and the dynamics of deliberation, communication and information in these spaces are key to understanding contemporary political and democratic processes.

California and Germany are among the largest economies of the world, and they also share similarly ambitious goals for achieving climate-neutral energy systems.

Wer hätte vor ein paar Jahren gedacht, dass Grundfragen der Demokratie in Deutschland zu Debatte stehen und intensiv diskutiert werden? Viele Wählerinnen und Wähler haben sich abgewandt und sind enttäuscht. Andere sind entschlossen, sich nicht entmutigen zu lassen und demokratische Standards zu verteidigen. Welchen Beitrag können ein Museum und ein wissenschaftliches Institut dazu leisten? Das WZB und das Deutsche Historische Museum (DHM) laden in der WZB-Reihe „Achtung: Demokratie“ zu einem Diskussionsforum über die neuen Herausforderungen für die Demokratie ein.

The Working Group in African Political Economy (WGAPE) brings together faculty and advanced graduate students in economics, political science, and other social science disciplines, with a combined focus on field-based research and political economy methods. The workshop involves in-depth discussions of papers and research designs that are circulated and read in advance, and is ideally suited for feedback on work-in-progress.

Organizers: Ana Garcia-Hernandez, Alexandra Scacco, Michael Seese

Moderated by Anette Fasang

Discussant: Macartan Humphreys
Moderated by Swen Hutter

The European Union (EU) is facing one of the rockiest periods in its existence. No time in its history has it looked so economically fragile, so unsecure about how to protect its borders, so divided over how to tackle the crisis of legitimacy facing its institutions, and so under assault of Eurosceptic parties. The unprecedented levels of integration in recent decades has led to increased public contestation, yet at the same the EU is more reliant on public support for its continued legitimacy than ever before. Catherine E.

Discussant: tba

“Wir sind das Volk”, “defending the heartland”, “the pure people” versus “the corrupt elite”—these are the rallying cries of populists across the globe. If nothing else, a strong anti-elitism unites those parties and movements. However, it remains unclear why this assertion would resonate with citizens if they felt well represented.

Die liberale Demokratie ist in Bedrängnis. Jenseits sozialer und ökonomischer Konflikte reichen neue Auseinandersetzungen tief in die Identität und Kultur der westlichen Gesellschaften hinein. Konflikte über Grenzen, Migration, Menschenrechte und den Umgang mit Minderheiten führen zu einer stärkeren Politisierung und Mobilisierung. Viele Menschen engagieren sich und wollen die Welt verändern. Gleichzeitig sind die Eliten in die Kritik geraten. Eine zunehmende Sprachlosigkeit zwischen den verschiedenen gesellschaftlichen Gruppen erschwert die Suche nach Lösungen.

Migration is one of the defining challenges of the 21st century. Many countries in Europe and North America have experienced a stark increase in the size and diversity of their immigrant and refugee populations. Reeling and reactive, governments are struggling to facilitate their successful integration. Much is at stake in this process. With the right approach, governments can set up immigrants for success and thereby strengthen the economy and enrich civil society.

Since its foundation in the 1970s, the Manifesto Project has provided data for measuring party positions and preferences based on parties’ electoral programs. The Manifesto Dataset which offers data on party preferences on specific policy issues and overarching policy scales in over 60 countries has strongly influenced research on political parties in the last decades. Recently, the Manifesto Project has extended its data collection and now provides access to the Manifesto Corpus – the digital and annotated manifesto collection of MARPOR.

Discussant: Wolfgang Merkel
Moderated by Swen Hutter

When do voters form accurate perceptions of party positions, and when do they feel certain about their perceptions? We believe that information availability plays a crucial role, and argue that election campaigns, by increasing information availability, enhance voter accuracy and certainty. Yet, we also argue that campaigns are less effective for voters’ perceptions about governing parties’ positions. In addition, we argue that changing party positions reduce voter certainty.

Democracy is a system of peaceful conflict resolution. It places an absolute ban on the exercise, tolerance, and encouragement of political violence. Existing democracies, however, are not immune to violent action but suffer from multiple forms of political violence. Antidemocratic actors who openly justify and exercise violence are one part of the problem. Those who are suspicious of acting as their masterminds, accomplices, or sympathizers are the other part.

Using a new measure of “comprehensive democracy,” our analysis traces the global democratic trend over the last 116 years, from 1900 until 2016, looking in particular at the centennial trend’s cultural zoning. As it turns out, democracy has been proceeding and continues to differentiate the world’s nations in a strongly culture-bound manner: high levels of democracy remain a distinctive feature of nations in which emancipative values have grown strong over the generations.

We invite researchers to submit papers or extended abstracts to the 4th Economics of Media Bias Workshop. Organized by the eponymous research network, the workshop will be a platform to discuss current research, exchange ideas, and explore new collaboration scenarios.
As a group of economists and political scientists, we investigate forms, causes, and consequences of media bias, especially in news markets. Main questions of interest are:

Klimawandel, Energie- und Verkehrswende – in den nächsten Jahrzehnten kommen große Veränderungen auf die Bürgerinnen und Bürger zu. In der Politik wird die Vernetzung über Ressortgrenzen hinweg immer wichtiger, wenn es darum geht – auch unbequeme – politische Entscheidungen über neue Mobilitätsformen oder Klimaschutzmaßnahmen zu treffen. Wie lässt sich Akzeptanz für diese neuen Energie- und Fortbewegungsmodelle schaffen? Welche Rolle kann hier die Forschung spielen?

While in most Western democracies women support left-leaning and progressive parties at higher rate than men, five decades ago the opposite was the case. To explain the realignment along gender lines on the left, we analyze it jointly with the rise of the radical right – two phenomena usually studied separately. Unlike most studies of the gender gap, we focus on men’s vote.

In cooperation with the doctoral program “Work and its Subjects” at the University of Duisburg-Essen, the WZB doctoral program “Good Work” is organizing an interdisciplinary PhD conference. International PhD students from different disciplines who have dedicated their PhD project to the topic of “work” in a broad sense will come together to exchange their progress and to connect with each other.

(supported by CRC TRR 190 Rationality and Competition)

Die Wissenschaftsfreiheit steht in einigen Ländern unter Druck: Forschungsergebnisse werden immer wieder öffentlich diskreditiert, der internationale Austausch zwischen Wissenschaftlerinnen und Wissenschaftlern behindert, unbequemen Forschenden die nötigen finanziellen Mittel entzogen. In Deutschland können wir Angriffe auf die Wissenschaft in dieser Dramatik zwar noch nicht beobachten. Dennoch: Auch hier sieht sich die Wissenschaft immer stärkeren Rechtfertigungszwängen ausgesetzt.

Die Veranstaltung ist ausgebucht, leider sind keine Anmeldungen mehr möglich!

The Berlin Applied Micro Seminar (BAMS) is a weekly seminar, jointly organized by DIW Berlin, Hertie School of Governance, HU Berlin, FU Berlin, TU Berlin, WZB, the Berlin Centre for Consumer Policies (BCCP) and the SFB TRR 190.

We cordially invite you to the next session of our workshop series on Authoritarian Politics and International Relations at WZB!