Why does Germany abstain from statutory bargaining extensions? Explaining the exceptional German erosion of collective wage bargaining

Against the European trend, German statutory collective bargaining extensions (SBEs) have decreased in the last two decades, contributing to the exceptional erosion of German wage-bargaining coverage. This article distinguishes between two liberalization dynamics: an intrasectoral dynamic that started with the introduction of employers’ association memberships outside the scope of collective agreements, and an intersectoral dynamic. The latter is the result of an abnormal German institutional feature, the veto power of the employers’ umbrella association in the committees that have to approve SBE applications. Activation of this veto enabled employers to promote collective bargaining erosion in sectors other than their own, in order to contain cost pressures. This intersectoral liberalization dynamic has been part of Germany’s transition into an asymmetrically export-driven growth regime and could be stopped by means of political reforms.

Supranationalism as a taboo

This article assesses the development of Mercosur’s institutions across its 30 years of history. It aims to stress how the insertion of supranational instances in the bloc was historically disregarded by Member States, in the context of both right and left-wings governments. However, the creation of a Technical Secretariat, a Permanent Review Tribunal, and a regional parliament (Parlasur) institutionalized non-executive forums, which have become autonomous regional arenas, despite their marginalized position within the bloc’s decision-making system. Although these bodies have never seriously challenged Mercosur’s intergovernmental, and even interpresidential, institutional design, they have enabled the bloc to expand its agenda beyond the governments’ priorities. Thus, this article aimed to unveil the causes of Mercosur’s resistance to supranational institutional change. The qualitative methodological approach is based on specialized literature, but also draws on primary sources and the normative analysis of official documents and reports which have gone through a deductive assessment. First, the article will introduce the main institutional changes seen in Mercosur during its 30 years of existence. Secondly, we argue that these transformations have maintained Mercosur’s intergovernmentalism as its main institutional feature, although additional non-executive bodies were set up in the 2000s. Afterwards, it reflects upon the current circumstances of the bloc, addressing whether future institutional reforms would alter Mercosur’s structural configurations.

Limited Spin: When the Public Punishes Leaders Who Lie about Military Action

Presidents have significant incentives to mislead the public about the use of force. Under what conditions are members of the public willing to hold presidents accountable for what they say about military action? This article examines both spin and deceit at the micro-level to clarify when individuals are most likely to punish presidents for misinformation. Three survey experiments demonstrate that presidents incur political costs for misinformation, even when operations succeed. Introducing partisanship into the analysis then reveals that not all individuals are equally likely to punish all presidents—Republican leaders primarily concerned with their base have the most leeway to mislead. The findings highlight the dynamic nature of democratic accountability and domestic constraints on military force. Rather than a static institutional feature, the strength of accountability can vary across presidents and electoral coalitions. Additionally, the results show political costs are not limited to large-scale deception—even spin generates backlash.

Candidate Emergence and the Success of Women

At least partially in response to Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential election (Jordan and Balz 2018), 2018 witnessed a record number of women running for and winning legislative elections across the country. This candidacy surge affords a unique opportunity to evaluate why individuals choose to run for office. Extant literature identifies both individual- and institutional-level determinants of candidate entry, yet little attention has been given to a critical institutional feature that can encourage or discourage women to put their names forward: primary type. This article develops a model of candidate emergence positing that different primary systems—by virtue of including and excluding the participation of various subpopulations of a state’s electorate—will be more or less attractive to potential female candidates relative to potential male candidates. We uncover evidence consistent with our theory: women appear less interested in running in certain types of primaries (e.g., semi-closed) but find other systems more appealing (e.g., nonpartisan). The results also indicate that after considering primary type, women tend to outperform men in the subsequent general election across the board. This study provides encouraging evidence that closing the representation gap is an increasingly achievable goal but that the rules of the electoral game continue to determine who is playing.

International Accounting Research: The Italian Context

ABSTRACT Oftentimes, research ideas in the international accounting field arise from the comparison of different contexts and from the curiosity to understand how different constructs work in various settings. Despite knowledge and understanding of the institutional, cultural, and legal settings of countries are prerequisites for this kind of research, studies often focus on very narrow issues and do not allow a grasp of the big picture of the institutional feature of a country, and how this can influence managers' decisions related to accounting choices and disclosures. This paper aims at filling this gap and at fostering an understanding of the Italian institutional setting (e.g., culture, societal values, corporate governance, GAAPs, auditing, and tax regulations), thereby facilitating the work of international accounting researchers who wish to include Italian firms in their samples.

How Injustices Harm You

Chapter 5 mounts the main argument of the book to show that oppression makes everyone unfree. The main ideas are that oppressions are despotic over their victims, that they can endure only if they try to suppress all actual or potential resistance, that any institutional feature of society that suppresses resistance has established authority, that institutional features with established authority are central social institutions, while suppressing resistance to central social institutions counts as authoritarian tactics used against everyone, that such tactics count as arbitrary power, and that to be subjected to such power is to be subjected to unfreedom of the kind theorized by neo-republicans and Hayekian competitive-order theorists. And since we all have a decent-life interest in freedom from arbitrary power, we are all harmed by such oppression, since it sets back this interest for everyone in society.

Measuring the effectiveness of bankruptcy institutions: filtering failures in Slovenian financial reorganizations

We examine the effectiveness of bankruptcy institutions at promoting socially efficient allocation of resources. Under the Slovenian simplified reorganization procedure, firms with rejected reorganization proposals are not automatically liquidated. This unique institutional feature facilitates an estimation of the extent of different types of filtering failures. Based on an ex-post conceptualization of firm viability, Type I errors (the acceptance of plans by non-viable firms) are more likely than Type II errors (the rejection of plans by viable firms) and the overall incidence of filtering failure is 27%. Based on an ex-ante conceptualization of firm viability, any given reduction in Type II errors would give rise to three times as many Type I errors. We contextualize our findings in the light of prior results in the literature, alternative mechanisms for insolvency resolution, and related bankruptcy reorganization schemes internationally where courts are awarded a comparatively more prominent role.

Changing the transmission belt: the programme-to-policy link in Italy between the First and Second Republic

This article analyses the transmission of policy priorities from electoral campaigns to legislative outputs under different institutional configurations. Taking an agenda-setting approach, the article tests whether a mandate effect exists, if incumbents also uptake the priorities of their competitors, and whether and how the introduction of alternation in government impacts on these dynamics. The analysis relies on data sets of the Italian Agendas Project recording the issue content of party manifestos and laws and covering the period 1983–2012. The results of time series cross-sectional models lend support to the presence of a mandate effect in Italy, a mechanism which was strengthened after the introduction of alternation in government. Opposition priorities may have an impact on the legislative agenda, but mostly when considering the legislation initiated in Parliament. Our findings have important implications for the understanding of the impact of government alternation, an institutional feature underlying – with varying intensity – most democracies, on the functioning of democratic representation.

The Executive Branch in Israel

As in other parliamentary democracies, the Israeli government is dependent on the confidence of parliament. Israel is a country with a diverse society, divided by multidimensional political issues and using a proportional representation electoral system. It is therefore not surprising to find a multiparty system with a highly fragmented parliament. This setting produces the central institutional feature of its executive branch: coalition politics. This chapter outlines the process of cabinet formation and the types of coalitions formed, presents an overview of the position of the prime minister, describes the work and structure of cabinet ministers and ministries, explains why governments seldom complete a full term, and assesses claims about both instability and nongovernability in Israel.

The Executive Branch in Israel

As in other parliamentary democracies, the Israeli government is dependent on the confidence of parliament. Israel is a country with a diverse society, divided by multidimensional political issues and using a proportional representation electoral system. It is therefore not surprising to find a multiparty system with a highly fragmented parliament. This setting produces the central institutional feature of its executive branch: coalition politics. This chapter outlines the process of cabinet formation and the types of coalitions formed, presents an overview of the position of the prime minister, describes the work and structure of cabinet ministers and ministries, explains why governments seldom complete a full term, and assesses claims about both instability and nongovernability in Israel.