Aktuelle Publikationen

With the introduction of quasimarket principles in the mid-1990s, the German social service sector faced several challenges from above (the state), within (the organizations), and outside (new competitors and “players”). Within the social services, considerable differences prevail between subsectors; although all reforms have been oriented at the principle of (quasi)markets, the governance arrangements implemented have been rather divergent across subfields. This article compares the effects of the introduction of quasimarket principles in two subfields with very different governance architectures: youth welfare and old-age care. Basic findings include different degrees and variants of hybridity at the meso-level of local welfare arrangements as well as at the micro-level of the organizations in the field. The analysis shows a considerable effect of different governance regimes on the openness of the subfields to new competitors (profit-oriented and voluntary), the reactions of established third sector organizations (internal reforms and hybridization), and the modes of political steering (with varying degrees of informality and oversight).

This contribution studies the process of building an EU member state through democracy promotion in the case of Croatia with a special focus on two reform initiatives in the field of Public Administration Reform (PAR). Croatia’s experience is representative of intense efforts of the international community to overcome the consequences of violent state dissolution and civil war. The EU in particular has assisted post-conflict democratization with diplomatic initiatives, the provision of aid, and political conditionality. The Croatian political elite showed great willingness to implement democratic reforms, while at the same time remaining critical of what they viewed as ‘too much’ external interference in domestic state affairs. Based on 30 interviews with Croatian officials, Croatian civil society actors, members of the EU delegation and other representatives of the international donor community, we empirically assess progress and setbacks in Croatia’s public administration reform and explain why some reform initiatives have been successfully implemented while others are still pending.

Taking the organizational characteristic of international organizations seriously, this article draws attention to the internal bureaucratic dimension of United Nations Peace Operations. It focuses on the obstructing behavior of individual members of this international bureaucracy and its potential impact on an operation’s overall performance. It does so by extending Stedman’s spoiler concept to include actors within the peace operations bureaucracy. Subsequently, based on findings from public administration research, a working definition of “bureaucratic spoilers” is developed. In order to demonstrate the empirical relevance of the theoretical concept “spoilers from within,” empirical examples are presented to illustrate the main forms of bureaucratic spoiling in UN peace operations: dissent-shirking, obstruction, and sabotage.

In this study we investigate if and when age-gender faultlines relate to team innovative performance. Based on social identity, social categorization, and social dominance theory we first hypothesize that team innovative performance is impaired if subgroups of old male members and young female members are formed within a team. In a second step, we apply the theoretical framework of inclusion in diverse teams and propose that both, creating collective belongingness and emphasizing the individual uniqueness of team members are important context factors to reach innovative performance in age-gender faultline teams. Therefore, we hypothesize that collective-focused leadership and differentiated individual- focused leadership, which are tailored toward the two distinct dimensions of the inclusion framework, are useful leadership behaviors for buffering the negative impact of age–gender faultlines on team innovative performance. We test the hypotheses using a sample of 89 research and development (R&D) teams from an automotive company. We find support for the main effect of age–gender faultlines on team innovative performance as well as the context role of differentiated individual-focused leadership, whereas collective-focused leadership turns out to be non-significant as a moderator. These results are discussed in light of their theoretical contributions to the diversity, faultline, and leadership literature, as well as their practical relevance for an increasingly diverse workforce.

This paper extends the knowledge of the concept of subjective age in organizations by exploring organizational-level antecedents and consequences of employees on average feeling younger than their chronological age. We draw from the theories of selection-optimization-compensation and socio- emotional selectivity to build a theoretical framework for subjective age in organizations. We hypothesize that companies in which employees on average perceive themselves to be younger than they actually are have a higher average individual goal accomplishment and in turn experience higher company performance. We further hypothesize that employees’ average experience of high work-related meaning relates to a younger subjective age in organizations. In addition, we assess the role of environmental dynamism and age-inclusive human resource management as moderators in this theoretical model. Through empirically testing this model in a multisource dataset including 107 companies with 15.164 participating employees, we received support for the hypothesized relationships. Our results contribute to current debates in the scientific literature on age and have important practical implications in light of the demographic changes faced by many companies. This research indicates to both audiences that it is not employees’ chronological age but their subjective age, a factor that can be influenced, that drives organizational performance outcomes.

Previous research on morality does not present a clear picture regarding religious effects on abortion and same-sex partnership policies. An examination of the level of permissiveness in the two policy fields across Western European countries reveals that Catholic states do not significantly differ from their Protestant counterparts in terms of policy outputs. Our descriptive analysis of the reform processes in the two fields from 1960 to 2010 shows that Catholicism has no direct impact on morality policy outputs, but may slow down the pace of reforms. The delaying effect, however, is contingent upon the presence of additional conditions. In order to inductively develop theoretical insights into this relationship, particular emphasis is placed on the case of Austria, which was quick to liberalise abortion but a laggard in introducing legal recognition of same-sex couples. The Austrian case reveals that the influence of the Catholic Church may impede reforms so long as institutional and cultural opportunity structures do not promote secular efforts to politicise the issue and build consensus for policy change.

Whereas some researchers emphasize how World Trade Organization (WTO) dispute settlement reduces complexity and clarifies legislation, others argue that dispute rulings promote co-operation by providing an enforcement mechanism. This article identifies empirical implications from these distinct arguments and tests them on WTO disputes from 1995 to 2006. The study's analytical approach combines a three-step coding of dispute escalation with a strategic bargaining model and statistical backwards induction to account for governments’ forward-looking behavior. It finds strong support for the argument that WTO dispute settlement primarily serves as an enforcement device. It finds much less support for the argument that dispute settlement reduces complexity and clarifies trade law. These results suggest that the role of WTO dispute settlement in generating information on acceptable trade policy standards is less relevant than proponents of the complexity argument tend to assume.

Many experiments comparing individual and group behavior find that groups behave more egoistically than individuals. However, most of these studies do not control for the influence of within-group decision-making rules that might have an important impact on group behavior. In this article, we report findings from laboratory experiments comparing individual and group behavior in a public goods game. We find that rather than cooperation levels differing between individuals and groups per se, the intragroup decision-making rule has an influence on the cooperativeness of groups. Groups decide either by majority or unanimity rule. While groups deciding by majority rule reach roughly the same level of cooperation as individuals, groups deciding by unanimity rule contribute significantly lower amounts to the public good.

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Der Beitrag untersucht, welche Faktoren die Bewertung eines Theaterbesuchs aus Sicht der Zuschauer bestimmen und mit welchem Gewicht die verschiedenen Faktoren in das Urteil der Besucher einfließen. Konkret zielt der Beitrag auf die Beantwortung der folgenden Fragen:
1) Welche Rolle spielen die Kernleistung einerseits und die Zusatzleistungen andererseits für die Bewertung eines Theaterbesuches aus Sicht der Zuschauer?

2) In welchem Maße trägt die unmittelbare (kognitive, emotionale und konative) Reaktion eines Theaterbesuchers auf die Aufführung zu seiner Bewertung eines Theaterbesuches bei?

Aufbauend auf den Ergebnissen einer qualitativen Vorstudie berichten wir die Ergebnisse einer quantitativen Untersuchung von 2.795 Besuchern von 44 Aufführungen in 12 Theatern aus dem deutschsprachigen Raum.