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The Covid-19 pandemic has created a widespread need for social support. Similar to previous crises, we can observe activation in society to meet these needs: citizens have offered practical, emotional, and financial support, often within their social networks, but also to strangers and civil society organizations. In this paper, we examine the role of social capital in receiving social support during the Covid-19 pandemic in Germany using unique micro-level survey data. We investigate the importance of three aspects of social capital – the size of one's support network, social trust, and organizational membership – for receiving (sufficient) social support. We focus on three types of support networks: family and friends, neighbors, and civil society actors. First, we find that while all three elements of social capital matter for receiving social support, a larger support network and organizational embeddedness matter primarily for receiving support beyond family and friendship networks. Second, civil society actors have been less likely to provide sufficient support in the pandemic, mainly acting in addition to strong ties and providing complementary support for individuals in particular need. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper argues that Covid-19 has produced a set of social characters during the corona crisis and that these characters represent different approaches toward control. Social characters emerge as constructs responding to current discourses. They may function as role models in uncertain times and offer orientation. The paper identifies such characters in communication on the online platform Jodel. It analyses and discusses the properties of the following social characters, which are reconstructed inductively from the data, classifying 156 Jodel posts into the following typology: the social worker, the crisis entrepreneur, the worried and depressed loner, the crisis manager, the admonisher, and the health expert. All these characters also display different approaches to how the crisis could be controlled. Some of them highlight economic discourses, others psychological discourses, and again others bureaucratic discourses. The analysis of the social characters and their approaches to control contributes to research on the role of discourses in modern European societies and on how these discourses contribute to different approaches to controlling a crisis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper is concerned with the spatial dimension of the coronavirus crisis and the tensions it created in multilevel governance in the Polish–German border region. Regarding the spatial dimension of the crisis, territoriality is referred to as the political competence to exert control over a national territory and over places particularly affected by the coronavirus crisis and its management – from local hubs of outbreaks to twin cities in border regions facing closed borders. Territoriality was mirrored in the unilateral decisions of the central governments to close national borders in Europe. Considering spatiality as well as the asymmetric multilevel setting of cross-border Polish–German relations, this paper investigates to what extent subnational actors were able to interact in a cross-border sense in this situation. The paper shows the relevance of subnational political authorities and highlights the significance of civil society actors in times of crisis, as they were able to lobby for a less restrictive border management response and helped to hold – merely through digital activities – the web of bilateral relations together. In this light, it may enhance the ability of further research to take a multilevel territorial perspective for a more nuanced picture of the pandemic's effects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides a timely evaluation of whether the main COVID-19 lockdown policies – remote work, short-time work and closure of schools and childcare – have an immediate effect on the German population in terms of changes in satisfaction with work and family life. Relying on individual level panel data collected before and during the lockdown, we examine (1) how family satisfaction and work satisfaction of individuals have changed over the lockdown period, and (2) how lockdown-driven changes in the labour market situation (i.e. working remotely and being sent on short-time work) have affected satisfactions. We apply first-difference regressions for mothers, fathers, and persons without children. Our results show a general decrease in family satisfaction. We also find an overall decline in work satisfaction which is most pronounced for mothers and those without children who have to switch to short-time work. In contrast, fathers' well-being is less affected negatively and their family satisfaction even increased after changing to short-time work. We conclude that while the lockdown circumstances generally have a negative effect on the satisfaction with work and family of individuals in Germany, effects differ between childless persons, mothers, and fathers with the latter being least negatively affected. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing on three waves of survey data from a non-probability sample from Germany, this paper examines two opposing expectations about the pandemic's impacts on gender equality: The optimistic view suggests that gender equality has increased, as essential workers in Germany have been predominantly female and as fathers have had more time for childcare. The pessimistic view posits that lockdowns have also negatively affected women's jobs and that mothers had to shoulder the additional care responsibilities. Overall, our exploratory analyses provide more evidence supporting the latter view. Parents were more likely than non-parents to work fewer hours during the pandemic than before, and mothers were more likely than fathers to work fewer hours once lockdowns were lifted. Moreover, even though parents tended to divide childcare more evenly, at least temporarily, mothers still shouldered more childcare work than fathers. The division of housework remained largely unchanged. It is therefore unsurprising that women, in particular mothers, reported lower satisfaction during the observation period. Essential workers experienced fewer changes in their working lives than respondents in other occupations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Few studies have shown that exercise withdrawal and forced inactivity lead to negative mood states and increased symptoms of depression. Involuntary inactivity has become reality for millions during the Covid-19 pandemic, as mitigation and containment policies included the closings of sports facilities and leisure infrastructures. Based on representative survey data from Germany (≥14 years, N = 1001), the paper addresses the changes in sport and exercise activities in the pandemic situation and their association with emotional well-being. Findings show a reduced level of emotional well-being in the German population during the Covid-19 pandemic. In particular, those individuals who stopped or considerably reduced their sport and exercise activities during the pandemic report a significant decline of well-being compared to the time before the pandemic. Individuals, who reduced sport and exercise due to external constraints, reported the largest decline in well-being. In contrast, the small group of individuals who intensified their sporting activities during the pandemic stands out with the most positive well-being levels. Irrespective of sport and exercise adaptations, findings additionally show that females report a steeper decline in well-being during the crisis compared to men. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses the willingness of individual citizens to show solidarity in the context of the Eurozone crisis. Taking a cost-sensitive approach to solidarity, we assessed the extent to which citizens would be willing to personally contribute to a bailout fund, and examined the sociodemographic and attitudinal causes for this willingness. We conducted a survey during the 2012 sovereign debt crisis in Germany and Portugal, two Eurozone countries representing a strong economy and a net recipient of loans respectively. As a part of this survey, we used a scenario in which respondents were asked whether they would be willing to pay a European solidarity tax at varying rates. Descriptive findings reveal that 48% of the Germans and 56% of the Portuguese accepted at least one of three tax rates proposed. Multivariate analyses reveal that a willingness to pay is mainly formed by political attitudes and cosmopolitan beliefs, and not by the socio-economic characteristics of respondents. The overall likelihood of emerging social cleavages is rather weak, meaning these findings may encourage European Union actors to internally foster the idea of a socially and financially integrated Europe in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the factors associated with a gendered division of childcare among parents in Germany. While much is known on the gender division of housework in families and the economic and sociological factors that may be driving it, we still know relatively little about whether and how these factors may affect the division of unpaid childcare in families. We first assess the relevance of partner’s combined gender ideologies and relative resources on the division of unpaid childcare. Second, we assess whether the effect of economic resources may be contingent on the partners’ agreement or disagreement on gender ideologies concerning maternal employment. We address these questions using data from the German Panel Analysis of Intimate Relationships and Family Dynamics (pairfam) and MLM Growth Curve Models. Our findings consistently show a significant positive effect of partners’ combined gender ideologies and her share of income on his share of childcare. These effects are strongest, and robust, among couples with matching ideologies supporting maternal employment, which we term ‘egalitarian island’ couples. Economically efficient divisions of childcare thus appear dependent upon the couples’ ideological pairing and on mothers’ ideologies towards maternal employment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent research into educational inequalities has shown the importance of decomposing social origins into parental class, status and education, representing economic, socio-cultural and educational family resources, respectively. But we know little about how inequalities in educational attainment at the micro-level map onto institutional characteristics of educational systems at the macro-level, if we treat social origins in a multidimensional way. Drawing on the rich over-time variation in educational systems in four European countries – Britain, Sweden, Germany and Italy – this paper develops and tests a number of hypotheses regarding the effects of various components of social origins on individuals’ educational attainment in different institutional contexts. It is evident from our results that a great deal of similarity exists across nations with different educational systems in the persisting importance for individuals’ educational attainment of parental class, status and education. But our findings also indicate that changes in the institutional features of educational systems have, in some instances although not in others, served to reinforce or to offset the social processes generating educational inequalities at the micro level. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper examines the determinants of family migration from a post-socialist country, the former German Democratic Republic (today, the eastern part of reunified Germany), to a western country, West Germany. The paper seeks to answer the following questions: (1) How does the migration behavior of married and cohabitating men and women differ from that of individuals who live alone? (2) What factors influence family migration? (3) Are there gender-specific differences in the factors that influence migration? Hypotheses are derived from theories of gender roles, household economics, and bargaining to investigate the migration of individuals and families. Data from the Socio-Economic Panel Study covering the period 1992 to 2007 are analyzed using logistic hierarchical regression models. The results show that the male partner's education level is the most important determinant of migration, whereas the female partner's education is of secondary importance. The results generally support the predictions of gender role theory. Despite their egalitarian views and socialization in a socialist country, couples from East Germany exhibit a traditional orientation toward gender roles when making migration decisions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Secondary education is associated with a comparatively high level of inequality in Germany. This has often been attributed to the early ability-based between-school tracking in the German school system. However, as yet there has been no empirical evaluation of the actual impact of initial track placement on social inequality in final school attainment. Since educational reforms in the 1960s increased educational mobility after track placement, it can be expected that initial track allocation has become less important for the process of secondary educational attainment and the inequalities therein. By drawing on longitudinal life-course data for different birth cohorts from the 1930s to the 1980s, this paper analyses temporal developments in the connections between track placement, educational mobility and social inequality in final school outcomes. The analyses reveal that the impact of track placement actually diminished for those cohorts exposed to the reformed school system. Instead, social inequalities in school attainment are increasingly influenced by processes of educational mobility after track allocation. Furthermore, the analyses show that developments in educational mobility have contributed more to declining inequalities in access to upper secondary education than changes of the selectivities in the transition to secondary education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On the basis of inter-cohort comparisons, this paper describes patterns of intra-generational occupational mobility in Germany and their long-term trends since World War II. It also presents conceptual links between individual mobility and developments of inequality along the life course, with a special focus on the question of the extent to which employment careers are characterised by specific forms of cumulative advantage and disadvantage. Finally, it is asked how intra-generational developments are related to inter-generational social mobility. The paper also discusses how mobility patterns can be linked to specific institutions which - together with labour market conditions - are crucial determinants of the development of inequality within a cohort. In its empirical part, the paper presents evidence from cohort-specific analyses based on life-course data from a broad range of West German birth cohorts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The question of workplace participation opportunities and limitations in small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) has gained momentum in sociological debates in Germany over the last years. Against the background of fundamental changes in the German industrial relations system, sociological research on this topic has shifted its focus from indirect to direct participation. On this basis, the paper aims to analyse and discuss the panoply of participation practices in an economic cluster in the region of Dortmund, a town in the German Ruhr Valley. The paper starts with an introduction of the empirical case, the development of the high-technology microsystems cluster in Dortmund, and gives an overview of the relevant private enterprises on the basis of three different company types. We go on to discuss the practice-orientated approach of participation which we combine with relevant sociological research results about direct and indirect participation as well as human resource management in SMEs and the New Economy. After a short overview of the methodological and empirical background of our research, we discuss the existing practices and cultures belonging to and surrounding direct and indirect participation with regard to the three types of businesses in the Dortmund cluster. The correlation between participation practices and business types is, however, not sufficient to fully describe the situation. The concept of participation cultures is therefore used as an additional concept. [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]

By adopting a reflective–reflexive approach, the paper explores aspects of positionality in relation to gender and culture and examines in what way they affect the generation of status and power within the relationships and social interactions of the research participants. By drawing on my personal experience as a female researcher operating in a male-dominated, foreign and yet familiar setting, I will analyse the mechanisms involved in the negotiation of the positions occupied by the various players and how this determined my status in terms of insider/outsidership. Particular attention will be paid to the facilitation of access to the field and the construction of knowledge. The data informing this paper were collected as part of a study of school-based models of initial teacher training in Germany, including contributions from the directors, tutors and mentors of three teacher training Seminars as well as my own observations. The relatively small sample of respondents and the researcher's subjective perspective of reporting and interpreting the findings preclude any conclusions of a general nature to be drawn. However, interesting data emerged, suggesting that aspects of gender and culture as well as the researcher's biographical background constitute powerful factors in the positioning of the research participants, which have methodological and epistemological implications. In the light of these findings I would argue that by adopting a reflective–reflexive approach the quality of the research account can be enhanced by making the mechanisms involved in the negotiation of positions of power and control more transparent. Finally, the analysis presented is intended to act as a caveat against the simplistic assumption that a researcher's familiarity and biographical affiliation with the setting will assist him/her in establishing and maintaining control over the research process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous research indicates that social relationships can influence the probability of successfully finding a first job. This paper contributes to this field of research by empirically analysing the rarely studied question, if social networks can help adolescents find an apprenticeship in the strongly company-based vocational training system of Germany. In contrast to most previous studies, not only the youth's networks, but also their mothers' networks are taken into account. In addition to the social, the ethnic composition of the networks is also considered. Event data analyses of German panel data on natives and migrants from the project ‘Young Immigrants in the German and Israeli Educational System’ show that adolescents' networks have no effect on the success of an apprenticeship search. In contrast, the mothers' networks play a crucial role. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we use panel data from the UK and Germany to investigate the effect of employer changes and in-firm job changes on year-to-year wage mobility of male full-time workers. Following segmentation theories and the job search theory, we study whether this effect differs for the low- and high-wage workers. As wage growth is endogenous to the decision of changing jobs, a two-stage Heckman selection approach is used. Specifically, we first estimate a random-effects multinomial logit model for the selection into a job transition and then a fixed-effects panel regression model for the wage growth. The findings suggest that both external and in-firm job changes result into substantial wage gains for the low-paid workers but not for the medium- or high-paid workers. However, the wage gain of low-paid workers due to an in-firm job change is only observed in the UK and is less pronounced than their gain by an external job change. In the German labour market, the later effect is insignificant. The results indicate that low-paid workers profit more from a voluntary change of employer in the coordinated German labour market and from a voluntary in-firm change in the liberal British labour market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Assuming that migration and integration have lasting effects on economic and social processes, this paper analyses if a diverse cultural environment has a positive impact on labour market success. We expect that culturally diverse labour markets provide new opportunities through an open and tolerant climate, thus contributing to overall economic growth. We test this assumption by analysing the successful transition from education to work depending on the regional distribution and ethnic mix of the foreign population in Germany (cultural diversity). To account for variation within Germany, cultural diversity is observed at small administrative units. We analyse a cohort of young adults at the time of the successful completion of their apprenticeship in Germany and follow them through the beginning of their career. The concentration on a homogenous group regarding occupational certificates enables us to focus on the effects of the local and social environment as well as individual characteristics such as their national background on finding a job (or not). We apply an instrumental variable design to disentangle the effects of cultural diversity and share of foreigners. The results show that both young foreigners and Germans face significantly lower barriers for employment entry in culturally more diverse German regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper considers two common assumptions that often arise in the empirical literature on xenophobia - namely that xenophobic attitudes are found mostly among the poorly educated, and that xenophobia mainly concerns immigrants from low social classes and from geographically and culturally disparate nations. These arguments will be discussed in the context of the migration of high-skilled Germans to Switzerland, a phenomenon that has increased markedly in the last few years, leading to major controversies. A survey conducted in the city of Zurich has shown that Germans are considered less likable than other Western Europeans. Over the course of our analyses, two arguments are tested. First, I consider whether the boundaries between culturally similar groups are actually less fragile than those occurring between more dissimilar groups. Following this line of reasoning, I consider whether Swiss-Germans perceive German immigration as a cultural threat. Second, I consider whether well-educated people in high positions or people who seek to improve their job positions may feel threatened by new arrivals who are similarly well-educated. This rationale corresponds to the classic argument that working class people are xenophobic out of a fear that immigrants will take their jobs. Ultimately, this study finds empirical support for both arguments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the impact of gender differences in tertiary education, i.e., field of study and level of tertiary degree, on two selected labour market risks: unemployment and low-status jobs. Using Labour Force Survey data from the year 2000, results of the logistic regression models and non-linear decomposition analyses generally confirm our expectation that the field of study explains a sizable portion of the gender gap in unemployment and low-status jobs in both countries. However, the level of tertiary degree earned explains only part of the female disadvantage behind holding a low-status job in Spain. The analyses also show that compared to men, women with a degree in a predominantly male field of study seem to be systematically disadvantaged in both Germany and Spain, particularly with respect to unemployment. Overall, the analyses reveal that gender differentiation in tertiary education leads to similar outcomes in two very different institutional contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous research has shown that track mobility during secondary education is influenced by parental background. However, family background effects might vary due to institutional variations in the educational structure. Therefore, in our paper we compare social selectivity of track mobility in two countries, Germany and The Netherlands. Both countries offer a hierarchically tracked educational system, but differ in details. Further, both countries established educational reforms in the late sixties, changing the conditions for track mobility differently. In our empirical analyses using data from the Family Survey Dutch Population and the German Life History Study we find that changing to a higher track is more likely for students who face the threat of status demotion, whereas changing to a lower track is independent of status maintenance motives. Intra-secondary transitions occur less often in The Netherlands than in Germany and are less motivated by status maintenance. Educational legislation reduces the effects of relative education of the parents only on upward mobility in Germany and only on downward mobility in The Netherlands. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

By comparing the US environmental justice movement with recent European developments, this paper suggests an environmental justice framework which is based on the idea of environmental justice as a heterogeneous process rather than an analytical or normative category. Using major debates on environmental justice particularly in the UK and Germany as a touchstone, eight dimensions of environmental justice are carved out and integrated into a processual model. It is discussed how environmental justice as a process may become robust enough to integrate and react to changing natural and social conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

European pension systems are in the process of change. A general development is the retrenchment of public schemes. In combination with the aim of individualizing pension entitlements, it is crucial that the pension situation of women, and of mothers in particular, be improved. Some European countries attempt to reduce the gender pension gaps with child care credits. This paper takes a closer look at the French and German systems. Can adjustments to the pension norm, in terms of different allowances for child care as introduced in both countries, balance gender pension gaps? Following the logic of the individual factors, the duration of insurance and the level of paid contributions, the main factors are analysed to evaluate the efficiency of care credits. Within the complexity of pension-related factors, adjustments to the originally male pension norms have very ambiguous effects, and they are insufficient to de-gender pension gaps. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article studies the development of social services in Britain, France and Germany since the 1980s. In this period services grew strongly and were extended to large population groups, although the welfare state was in crisis. Moreover, the power of the state was enhanced. The share of public service provision declined somewhat, but this was more than balanced by increased public funding and intensified state control of delivery. The paper argues that the rise of social services does not signal a 'new' welfare state. Rather, the belated expansion of social services compared to other areas is explained by the fact that services have become crucial for the economy and the labour market only recently. Since this was the case, they have followed the classical path of welfare state expansion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Within the European Employment Strategy benchmarking and learning from good practices are main mechanisms to improve national performance. This is also the case for WLB strategies which are reinforced because of economic reasons to increase employment and population growth. The paper asks for the main criteria for public policies to promote WLB and whether or under which conditions such policies are transferable between the successful Nordic countries and the less successful conservative countries like Austria and Germany. Denmark and Finland are used as ‘good practice’ examples. The analysis shows that childcare leave regulations are an important instrument to encourage mothers for continuous working careers. But the consequences of these regulations concerning employment turn out to be quite different, even in measures with similar orientation. What we can learn from the Nordic countries is that the consistency of welfare state regulations and institutions are an important precondition for a successful WLB. This calls for an interplay of different fields and means that the imbalance of family and work and family reconciliation can hardly be solved by flexible working contracts or longer parental leave possibilities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Current debates about activation policies focus only to a very limited degree on continental or conservative welfare states, as countries like Austria and Germany are usually assumed to exhibit a low degree of activation. However, active labour market policies have a long tradition in both countries. This paper analyses the development of active labour market policy in Germany and Austria during the last two decades with special emphasis on recent reform attempts. Against this background, the potential outcome of the central reforms is discussed. In spite of claims to 'modernise' the welfare system and labour market policies, current developments work mainly in the direction of curtailing benefits and rights of the unemployed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we examine the impact of temporary work on two dimensions of social inequality: income and career mobility. Additionally, we are taking a comparative perspective on this subject by comparing Germany and the UK. To investigate the effects of temporary work we use data from the German Socio-Economic Panel and the British Household Panel Study on non-self-employed respondents. The results show that temporary work does influence the system of social inequality: we found wage penalties and an increased probability of severe negative effects on the working careers of temporarily employed persons in both countries (net of education, age, and a variety of other covariates). Thus we can conclude that temporary employment represents a substantial socio-economic risk for employees. Most importantly, this holds true for both the German and the British case, two quite distinct labour market regimes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In European societies there are some differences in the way and extent of women's integration into the labour market due to different economic development, political ideas and cultural traditions. In this paper two countries are compared, namely Finland and Germany, which differ considerably concerning women's employment patterns, employment prospects and their life orientations. While most Finnish women are participants of the labour force in full-time jobs, the working pattern of German women is of rather discountinous nature, depending on their chosen intimate relationships in private life, implicating their role as unpaid carers. As there is no sufficient provision of public care services, many German women are dependent on a male breadwinner while leaving their jobs for family purposes. In contrast, Finnish mothers return to their full-time jobs after maternity leave as the welfare state provides enough public care services for children and the dependent elderly. Thus it appears that Finnish women have gained financial autonomy and economic independence, a pre-requisite for living in democratic, individualized intimate relationships with equal decision power. Even if, during the last decades, empirical evidence has revealed the transformation of the well known breadwinner model to a modernized version, or partially a shift to an 'adult worker model', in Germany there is still no evidence for a general trend to a fully individualized life pattern of women with children. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the course of the transition from an industrial to a service economy, fundamental changes in the functioning of the labour market are expected to occur. A number of authors assert that these changes will result in an increasing external-numerical flexibility of firms which is assumed to affect labour market processes in terms of a generally higher labour market mobility and a decreasing employment stability ('high-velocity labour market'). This paper examines the hypothesis of a growing importance of numeric-external flexibility, applying simple descriptive statistical methods to the event-history data of the IAB Employment Subsample for the West German labour market covering the years 1976 to 1995. There is no evidence for an acceleration of labour market 'churning', but rather for a stagnation or even slight decline of labour market mobility since the 1970s. Furthermore, job stability has not decreased over time, as one might have expected, but rather increased. In spite of these general results it might be conceivable that service-sector jobs have become more unstable but that this effect is cancelled out by a considerable stabilization of jobs in manufacturing. It turns out, however, that there is no evidence for developments in the 'old' and 'new' labour markets to contrast in such a simple way. Services display divergent trends when broken down by sub-sectors; jobs in some of them have stabilized while there is no or an opposite change in others. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Protestant and Catholic churches in Germany embodied continuity in a country marked by discontinuity. During the forty years of division, they were the only organizations in East Germany to retain strong ties and organizational structures with their West German counterparts. Yet, the continuity that characterized the churches as organizations does not corroborate the stability of their values and self-definitions. Drawing on conceptual tools such as guiding metaphors and organizing principles, this paper looks at the debates that accompanied the re-establishment of the churches' unity after radical political change in order to delineate the conflicting conceptions of the churches' public role. The focus is on the work carried out by religious agents in either maintaining or changing these conceptions, a process we refer to as the 'politics of institutionalization'. Hirschman's framework on rhetoric enables us to reconstruct the debates to identify and compare the strategies and patterns of argumentation advanced by the actors in this process. Special attention is paid to the 'East German metaphors', or what is generally termed the 'positive experiences of the GDR and the 'Wende', and their defenders following the remarkable events that paved the way for the collapse of the German Democratic Republic and for German unification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the past twenty-five years, unemployment has been growing continuously in West Germany. In this study one of the reasons for growing unemployment is analysed: unemployment of older people in their transition from employment to retirement. First, the different possibilities of transitions into retirement are explained within the framework of social security regulations. Taking this legal framework as a starting point, early retirement passages are then modelled with the IAB unemployment sub-sample. It will be shown that - due to the long duration of these unemployment episodes - early retirement contributed considerably to the rise of total unemployment. Early retirement patterns will be broken down by economic sub-sectors and establishment size. It turns out that this kind of unemployment originates primarily from large establishments in manufacturing and extractive industries. Multivariate analysis presented at the end of the paper also includes personal characteristics such as gender or skills and income levels. In the light of these findings, the 'push' and 'pull' hypothesis common in explaining early exit are discussed. Drawing on the statistical findings as well as on the institutional analysis, it is argued that both kinds of factors are at work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses the impact on the professions of changes in their institutional environment during the past two decades. A comparison is made between two professions - solicitors/advocates and pharmacists - in the contrasting institutional contexts of British and German society. It is suggested that, despite common pressures from the state and the market, there remains a significant degree of diversity in the way professions organize themselves in the two societies. A contrast is drawn between British modernizers and German traditionalists, but some convergence is also noted. In both Britain and Germany, professional authority and privilege can no longer be taken for granted but have to be earned by proven performance and enhanced accountability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the conventional story of modernization, the emergence of the nuclear family and of public old age security have been seer as parallel and mutually reinforcing processes. According to this view, the traditional intergenerational transfers in the family have been crowded out and replaced by those in the public sphere. In recent years, a growing body of research has demonstrated that substantial transfers between adult generations in the family beyond the nuclear households still exist. Their direction has beer reversed, however. The new evidence shows that there is a net downward flow of private resources from the older generations to their adult offspring, i.e. counter to the public transfers. Two questions then arise: How are private and pubic transfers linked, i.e. to what extent do the private transfers from the older to the younger generations in the family depend on public transfers through old age pensions? And what are the effects of channelling public resources to younger family generations by way of older pension recipients? The paper addresses these questions by taking Germany as the model case. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]