Körper-Kunst in der Kinderklinik – ein interdisziplinäres Projekt zwischen Pädiatrie, Tanztheater und Psychosomatik

On the basis of the deconstructive idea of dance as a means to experience inner coherences as well as dehiscences within the body, an interdisciplinary project between psychosomatic medicine, pediatrics and dance is outlined. Social processes between dancers, adolescents and trainer within a single clinically more in detail described workshop are presented and related to the situation of chronically ill children. Hereby, a reintegration of the rejected and negatively charged body in chronic conditions is initialized.     

From intergovernmental negotiations to (sub)national change

In the last thirty years, a process of global norm creation in the field of gender equality has taken place. The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women marks a milestone in this process: it emerged as the first legally binding international instrument for the protection of women's rights. The 180 states that have ratified the Convention have interpreted their treaty obligations in diverse ways, ranging from reluctance to active incorporation. Beyond its original mandate, CEDAW has increased attention on gender issues within the UN human rights framework. Further, it has motivated transnational NGO activism that uses the Convention to connect local understandings of women's rights with global standards to influence national policy developments. Taking these global, national and transnational dynamics together, the article argues that CEDAW has been transformed from a ‘classical’ intergovernmental regime to a transnational network enforcing women's rights. Based on these findings, a theoretical view on global norm creation and enforcement is developed that stresses the reciprocal interrelation between global, national and local spheres. Instead of assuming a ‘trickle-down’ dynamic as a consequence of global agreements, it is argued that the legitimacy and authority of global norms depends on their active interpretation and appropriation within national and local contexts all over the world.     

Vive la France! Vive la République? The Cultural Construction of French Identity at the World Exhibitions in Paris 1855–1900

Abstract

This article analyses how the world exhibitions were instrumentalised for national identity-building in 19th-century France. It argues that they probably strengthened a broadly consensual conception of a superior French culture and civilising mission. In contrast, it is doubtful whether the Second Empire and the Third Republic succeeded in hijacking them to sustain their political visions of the French nation. The exhibitions crystallised criticism of the two political systems, and vociferous debates about their nature and ideological content took place in the Republic. They also helped to strengthen other, sometimes conflicting identities, such as region and class, emphasising the cultural and political diversity of France.     

Unemployment Protection and Family Policy at the Turn of the 21st Century: A Dynamic Approach to Welfare Regime Theory

This article contributes to the welfare state regime literature from a substantive and methodological perspective. At a very abstract level we confirm the relevance of the welfare state regime theory and stability for the period from 1971 to the end of the 1990s. However, by analyzing family policy and unemployment protection, we observe a dual transformation of the welfare state, consisting of a trend towards a ‘socialization’ of family policies and a retrenchment in unemployment insurance benefits. Our Multiple Correspondence Analysis (MCA) of the two policy domains captures the multi‐dimensionality of the decommodification and defamilialization concepts and visualizes welfare state developments over time in a Cartesian space. This dynamic analysis provides us with a nuanced understanding of welfare state regime stability and change.     

Othering the rural: About the construction of rural masculinities and the unspoken urban hegemonic ideal in Swedish media

Studies within the field of rural geography have lately to a noticeable extent enriched the theme of the creation of masculinities and femininities focussing on social constructions of the rural, as well as social constructions of gender. In this study I aim to discuss some expressed discourses of the rural in order to illuminate the power relation between the urban and the rural and the spatial implications of the construction of masculinities and femininities.Taking three Swedish television productions as a point of departure, I will argue that an urban hegemony exists and that the programmes reveal how rural masculinities are constructed. The aim is firstly to add a spatial dimension to the constructions of masculinities, and secondly to show how media builds up and emphasises a gap between the rural and the urban in these constructions. Cutting-edge media is of interest, as it is active in reproducing certain practices and also in identifying who is following the norm and who is deviating from it. The three television productions highlight the construction of rural masculinities in terms of seeking help and being ‘backward’; that rural men are unequal and traditional as well as deviating and out of place.     

On the trail of the global green bean: methodological considerations in multi‐site ethnography

The need to demystify and ‘ground’ globalization has spurred many calls for multi‐site fieldwork. This article discusses how such fieldwork was used to examine the contemporary restructuring of fresh food commodity chains between Africa and Europe, at a time of increasing European concerns about food safety and quality. Drawing on convention theory and actor‐network theory for conceptual guidance, qualitative fieldwork was conducted at sites of production, import and export in ‘anglophone’ (Zambia–London) and ‘francophone’ (Burkina Faso–Paris) commodity chains. The article also discusses the challenges posed by multi‐site research, especially in realms where secrecy and deception are standard tools of the trade.     

A new approach for disclosure control in the IAB establishment panel—multiple imputation for a better data access

For micro-datasets considered for release as scientific or public use files, statistical agencies have to face the dilemma of guaranteeing the confidentiality of survey respondents on the one hand and offering sufficiently detailed data on the other hand. For that reason, a variety of methods to guarantee disclosure control is discussed in the literature. In this paper, we present an application of Rubin’s (J. Off. Stat. 9, 462–468, 1993) idea to generate synthetic datasets from existing confidential survey data for public release.We use a set of variables from the 1997 wave of the German IAB Establishment Panel and evaluate the quality of the approach by comparing results from an analysis by Zwick (Ger. Econ. Rev. 6(2), 155–184, 2005) with the original data with the results we achieve for the same analysis run on the dataset after the imputation procedure. The comparison shows that valid inferences can be obtained using the synthetic datasets in this context, while confidentiality is guaranteed for the survey participants.     

Instrumental Variable Estimation of Nonlinear Errors‐in‐Variables Models

This paper establishes that instruments enable the identification of nonparametric regression models in the presence of measurement error by providing a closed form solution for the regression function in terms of Fourier transforms of conditional expectations of observable variables. For parametrically specified regression functions, we propose a root n consistent and asymptotically normal estimator that takes the familiar form of a generalized method of moments estimator with a plugged‐in nonparametric kernel density estimate. Both the identification and the estimation methodologies rely on Fourier analysis and on the theory of generalized functions. The finite‐sample properties of the estimator are investigated through Monte Carlo simulations.     

Relatioinships between economic and statistical price indices

In the following, the economic counterparts of Eichhorn's and Voeller's tests for statistical price indices will be studied. We will see that replacing the statistical Commensurability Axiom in the economic price index theory by a property which is only concerned with price changes leads to similar relationships between this one and several other tests as in the statistical price index theory.