Necessary Illusions: the Transformation of Governance Structures in the New Germany

1992 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 179-199
Author(s):  
Wolfgang Seibel
Keyword(s):  
Structural Change ◽  
Political System ◽  
West Germany ◽  
Governance Structures ◽  
Extended Version ◽  
The West ◽  
Preliminary Account ◽  
German Model

Unified Germany is not simply an extended version of West Germany before 9 November 1989. but a new Germany. The forces dial have made this entity different from the West German model are revealing themselves in the structure of governance that is emerging. In this paper I attempt a preliminary account of this evolving structure of governance. address three questions: First, how the process of unification is being managed politically. Second, what crucial problems and dilemmas arc likely to emerge and how will the German political system deal with these issues. Third, how will the process of unification affect general structural change in Gentian polity.

The Shaping of Popular Satisfaction with Government and Regime Performance in Germany

1999 ◽  
Vol 29 (4) ◽  
pp. 641-672 ◽  
Author(s):  
THOMAS R. CUSACK
Keyword(s):  
Federal Government ◽  
Empirical Analysis ◽  
Political System ◽  
Living Standards ◽  
West Germany ◽  
Government Performance ◽  
The West ◽  
The Government ◽  
Economic Developments ◽  
The Empirical Analysis

The article focuses on citizens’ satisfaction with the German democratic political system. The empirical analysis reported supports the argument that the performance of the economy and the government affect popular satisfaction with the regime. In the East, satisfaction with the regime remains very low and dissatisfaction has spread into West Germany. In the West, the sources of this dissatisfaction are both economic developments and government performance; citizens modify their views on the system as a consequence of the government’s and the economy’s successes and failures. The dynamic is similar in the East. Economic strains, and the perception that the federal government is not making sufficient efforts to equalize living standards, have kept the Eastern population from committing themselves to the new unified political system.

Shocks to the System: the German Political Economy Under Stress

1997 ◽  
Vol 159 ◽  
pp. 57-76 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wendy Carlin ◽  
David Soskice
Keyword(s):  
Export Performance ◽  
German Economy ◽  
Innovation System ◽  
West Germany ◽  
Incremental Innovation ◽  
The West ◽  
High Quality ◽  
Labour Costs ◽  
German Model ◽  
Innovation Strategies

The German economy is recovering hesitantly from the sharp post-unification boom and recession. Two features of recent West German performance are novel: there has been an unprecedented loss of jobs in industry, and manufacturing profitability has been pushed to its lowest level ever and is now low relative to other OECD economies. Serious problems with labour costs and innovation would be expected to show up in a weakening in the trend of export performance. That this has not yet happened is the consequence of the existence of an apparently robust innovation system which enables companies to pursue high quality incremental innovation strategies. However, the experiment of transferring the West German model to the East has proved extremely costly and has not so far established the basis for self-sustaining growth. Problems in profitability, investment and employment in West Germany reflect the failure of the bargaining system—unions, employers, Bundesbank and public sector—to negotiate the sharing of the burden of unification.

The Ostpolitik in the West German 1969 Elections

1970 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 193-217 ◽  
Author(s):  
Klaus von Beyme
Keyword(s):  
Political System ◽  
Great Powers ◽  
Decision Makers ◽  
West Germany ◽  
The Political ◽  
National Society ◽  
The West ◽  
System A ◽  
German Situation ◽  
Better Than

THE POLITICAL SYSTEM OF WEST GERMANY MAY BE CHARACTERIZED as a ‘penetrated system’, a notion which has been developed by James Rosenau. After the restoration of German sovereignty in 1955 , Rosenau's definition seemed less applicable to Germany, since it was defined by the fact that ‘non-members of a national society’ . . . ‘participate directly and authoritatively, through actions taken jointly with the society's members, either in the allocation of its values or in the mobilization of support on behalf of its goals’. Wolfram Hanrieder tried to improve the applicability of the notion of ‘penetrated system’ to Germany by broadening the scope of the concept; he no longer restricted it to ‘direct and authoritative participation of non-members’. This concept fitted the German situation better than G. Modelski's model of ‘internal war’ which has been applied to Germany by some younger scholars since the process of the division of Germany was more or less a result of the action of the great powers and only rather late was it consciously endorsed by decision makers in both parts of Germany.

A POST-LIBERAL ORDER? HANS ZEHRER AND CONSERVATIVE CONSENSUS BUILDING IN 1950S WEST GERMANY

2012 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 681-698 ◽  
Author(s):  
MARCUS M. PAYK
Keyword(s):  
Federal Republic ◽  
Weimar Republic ◽  
Political System ◽  
West Germany ◽  
New Order ◽  
Consensus Building ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Federal Republic Of Germany ◽  
Specific Mode ◽  
Sociopolitical Context

While it is well known that German conservative intellectuals were skeptical or indifferent to the Federal Republic of Germany established in 1949 and to its democratic founding principles, this essay shifts attention to a specific mode of right-wing acceptance of the new order. Focusing on Hans Zehrer, a renowned journalist and notorious opponent of democracy in the Weimar Republic, I will demonstrate how right-wing intellectuals interpreted West Germany's political system as a post-liberal order after the “end of politics”. But this vision of transcending societal and intellectual conflicts in a meta-politics was neither entirely new nor simply raked up from the late 1920s but reshaped to fit the postwar sociopolitical context. The essay illuminates several intellectual connections between Weimar-era neoconservatism and the specific conservative consensus formed after 1949, but it also explores personnel continuities within a network of right-wing journalists as well as continuities in the field of journalistic style.

Legitimizing Transformation without Calling it Change:Tajdīd, Iṣlāḥ, and Saudi Arabia’s Place in the Contemporary World

2015 ◽  
Vol 2 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 55-70
Author(s):  
Sean Foley
Keyword(s):  
Saudi Arabia ◽  
Political System ◽  
New Technologies ◽  
Social Institutions ◽  
Advanced Technology ◽  
The West ◽  
Contemporary World ◽  
The People ◽  
Diverse Society ◽  
Oil Revenues

For decades, many scholars have contended that Saudi Arabia is a fixed political system, where a conservative monarchy uses advanced technology, oil revenues, and religion to dominate the people. Such a system is often portrayed as inherently unstable, a seemingly never-ending series of collisions between an unchanging traditional political structure seeking to hold on to power at any cost and a dynamic modernity—a view encapsulated in a phrase expressed at virtually every public discussion of the Kingdom in the West: ‘you must admit that Saudi Arabia must change’. Ironically this phrase confirms what this article argues is a secret to the success of Saudi Arabia in the contemporary era: the ability to legitimize transformation without calling it change. No society is static, including Saudi Arabia. Throughout the Kingdom’s history, the defining social institutions have repeatedly utilized Tajdīd (Revival) and Iṣlāḥ (Reform) to respond to new technologies and the changing expectations of a diverse society. While Muslim scholars are most often entrusted to arbitrate this process, ordinary Saudis use this process to guide their actions in the various social spaces they encounter both at home and abroad. Critically, this process reflects the response of King Abdulaziz and the founders of the third Saudi state in the early twentieth century to the factors that had brought down previous Saudi states in the nineteenth century.

Letter from Germany

1988 ◽  
Vol 23 (4) ◽  
pp. 465-470
Author(s):  
Klaus von Beyme
Keyword(s):  
Political Culture ◽  
Economic Crisis ◽  
Political System ◽  
West Germany ◽  
Value Change

VIEWED FROM THE OUTSIDE WEST GERMANY SEEMS TO BE AN oasis of stability. The dullness of such a political system has been alleviated, however, by the rise of the Green and alternative movements. Why should Germany become a Mecca for the alternative movements, when so many scholars have testified over the years that its political culture tends to be legalistic, not conflict-oriented or tolerant of unconventional behaviour? Most observers from abroad have attempted to answer this question in terms of value change, motivational or economic crisis theories.

scholarly journals Contemporary Changes in the Role and Spatial Structure of Industrial Production in Hungary

2017 ◽  
Vol 30 (3) ◽  
pp. 127-146
Author(s):  
Ágnes Pál ◽  
Ferenc Győri
Keyword(s):  
Open Economy ◽  
Industrial Production ◽  
Political System ◽  
Considerable Proportion ◽  
Industrial Change ◽  
Capital Investments ◽  
Production Structure ◽  
The West ◽  
Communist System ◽  
Production Value

The aim of our paper is to offer a brief survey of the stages of development of industrial productionin Hungary and the transfomation that followed the changing of Hungary’s political system, as well as the maintrends in the contemporary process of re-industrialization. Hungarian industry has long traditions; as early asthe beginning of the 20th century, in certain branches, it was among the leading countries in the world. Afterthe fall of the centrally planned economy of the communist system and following the crisis treatment policiesof the post-communist years, Hungarian industry, today, has to survive in an open economy. The process ofre-industrializaton in Hungary is, basically, an integral part of global industrial change while, at the same time,it is largely dependent on local industrial developments. The volume indices, the value of industrial investmentsand the number of employees in industry, are all indicators of a positive change. The processing industryrepresents a considerable proportion of industrial production in Hungary and, in addition, vehicle manufacturingis the most dynamically developing segment. At the same time, industry in Hungary can still be characterizedby a dual structure; more than two thirds of its production value us produced by large companies.Small- and medium-sized companies have the possibility of being integrated into the production structure assuppliers. Some of Hungary’s traditional industrial branches have deteriorated, while other segments havebeen able to change their structure and become dynamic again. The main focus of industrial production – dueto capital investments by foreigners – has shifted towards the west, and the largest portion of its productionvalue now comes from Hungary’s western and central Transdanubian regions. The process of re-industralizationis beneficial for those regions in which there is an adequate and ready supply of human resources.

scholarly journals Abstieg West durch Aufbau Ost?

2004 ◽  
Vol 34 (135) ◽  
pp. 321-329
Author(s):  
Ulrich Busch
Keyword(s):  
Federal Government ◽  
East Germany ◽  
Living Conditions ◽  
West Germany ◽  
German Unification ◽  
The West ◽  
Economic Stagnation ◽  
The Eu

14 years after the German unification East Germany is one of the largest European problem areas. Loss of population, economic stagnation and the dependence on transfers from the West determine the situation. With the expansion of the EU, East Germany can become the German mezzogiorno. In this situation a group of experts demands radical measures form the federal government. But these measures will worsen the living conditions in East Germany, which are already very different to those in West Germany.

scholarly journals Medical Science Meets ‘Development Aid’ Transfer and Adaptation of West German Microbiology to Togo, 1960–1980

2016 ◽  
Vol 61 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-24
Author(s):  
Carola Rensch ◽  
Walter Bruchhausen
Keyword(s):  
Doctoral Students ◽  
Medical Science ◽  
International Health ◽  
Development Aid ◽  
West Germany ◽  
Joint Work ◽  
German Development ◽  
German Model ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
Work Abroad

After losing the importance it had held around 1900 both as a colonial power and in the field of tropical medicine, Germany searched for a new place in international health care during decolonisation. Under the aegis of early government ‘development aid’, which started in 1956, medical academics from West German universities became involved in several Asian, African and South American countries. The example selected for closer study is the support for the national hygiene institute in Togo, a former German ‘model colony’ and now a stout ally of the West. Positioned between public health and scientific research, between ‘development aid’ and academia and between West German and West African interests, the project required multiple arrangements that are analysed for their impact on the co-operation between the two countries. In a country like Togo, where higher education had been neglected under colonial rule, having qualified national staff became the decisive factor for the project. While routine services soon worked well, research required more sustained ‘capacity building’ and did not lead to joint work on equal terms. In West Germany, the arrangement with the universities was a mutual benefit deal for government officials and medical academics. West German ‘development aid’ did not have to create permanent jobs at home for the consulting experts it needed; it improved its chances to find sufficiently qualified German staff to work abroad and it profited from the academic renown of its consultants. The medical scientists secured jobs and research opportunities for their postgraduates, received grants for foreign doctoral students, gained additional expertise and enjoyed international prestige. Independence from foreign politics was not an issue for most West German medical academics in the 1960s.

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