Networking Enforced – Comparing Social Services' Collaborative Rationales across Different Welfare Regimes

Collaboration and networking are ubiquitous, versatile features of social service provision in most Western countries. However, it is an open question whether networking means and entails the same across countries. Comparing regulatory frameworks in three jurisdictions representing distinctive ‘worlds of welfare services’ – Germany, Norway and Quebec – this article aims at eliciting the normative rationales that underpin and inform local service networks in child welfare and protection (CWP) systems. In Norway, where services are little diversified and largely insular, networking appears as a way of opening up for greater organizational plurality, within and beyond the public sector realm. In Germany in contrast, where services are highly pluralized and fragmented, networks are seen as an instrument for streamlining complexity. As for Quebec – an intermediate case in some respects – networking is envisioned as a catalyst for aligning two co‐existing service streams and mitigating the child protection–family support divide. Interestingly, in all three places, networking is now being enforced through similar highly formalized, top‐down regulatory provisions, even though the intended directions of change differ markedly. This has implications for CWP policy as well as research on networks at large.     

Handlungszuschreibung und Situationsdefinition

Action as meaningful behavior and action as an attributional category are usually understood to represent competing concepts of action. In contrast, the present paper argues that the sociological theory of action should include both views. One main reason is that the concept of social action does not only rely on the social actor’s own meaningful behavior but requires him or her to interpret the behavior of the other(s) as action and thus implies the attribution of action. Attributed actions are not just imagined actions. Rather, when attributed actions become the social actor’s reference point for his own actions, they gain a reality of their own. Especially when the attribution of action takes place within the frame of reference of intersubjective definitions of the situation, attributed actions tend to gain such a reality of their own. This effect is connected with two different forms of intersubjective definitions of the situations: those who are commonly shared and those who are effectively enforceable. Additionally, the paper distinguishes between two modes of attributing actions: attribution of reasons and attribution of causation. Using these both distinctions, the paper analyses different ways of how attributed actions come into effect within social action.     

Saving the Moral Capital of NGOs: Identifying One-Sided and Many-Sided Social Dilemmas in NGO Accountability

The literature on nonprofit management has embraced the concept of “accountability” to target urgent challenges related to NGO probity and integrity, and there have been attempts in the literature to use rational-choice-based governance approaches to solve them. Although the existing principal–agent frameworks provide important insights, they are limited to the analysis of financial relationships between NGOs and donors. We contribute to the literature in developing a comprehensive rational-choice-based governance approach to analyze all stakeholder relationships of NGOs. Applying the research program of ordonomics, we unpack two fundamental interaction problems: (a) the “stakeholder dilemma” between the NGO and a single accountability holder as a one-sided social dilemma and (b) the “competition dilemma” among rival NGOs as a many-sided social dilemma. We show that improving NGO accountability in relation to intended beneficiaries, peer organizations, and the general public also requires identifying the underlying governance problem as a competition dilemma focusing on collective self-regulation as a solution.     

Sacred sites,biodiversity and urbanization in an Indian megacity

Urban Ecosystems - In an era of rapid urban growth, conserving biodiverse urban green spaces is challenging, especially in developing countries. Culturally protected areas including sacred sites...     

Herbert Sukopp – an inspiring pioneer in the field of urban ecology

Urban Ecosystems - Urban ecology is a well-established integrative discipline with many historical roots. One of the eminent pioneers of urban ecology is the German ecologist Herbert Sukopp, who...     

Erosion handelsrechtlicher GoB durch das Bilanzrechtsmodernisierungsgesetz

The Accounting Law Modernization Act (BilMoG) aims at harmonizing two basic attitudes that are irreconcilable in the first place: On the one hand the local German GAAP, which are driven by creditor protection, the principle of prudence as well as objective limitations; on the other hand international accounting standards (IFRS), which focus on information tasks. The option to capitalise certain intangible fixed assets that have not been acquired from a third party, leads to a de-objectification of the balance sheet that has to be rejected as being too hazardous. Furthermore, the introduction of fair-value accounting for financial instruments acquired for trading purposes has to be rejected due to a breach of the realisation principle. The primary legal purpose of the balance sheet, the prudent determination of distributable profits on the basis of turnover, would be jeopardized. The desire for information on investment in intangible assets as well as the (alleged) increase in value of financial instruments should rather be displayed in the notes to the financial statements.     

Was müssen Führungskräfte können?

Ethics Education complements business administration only if it teaches strategic competencies that help managers to become better leaders. To this end, this article sketches an ordonomic approach to an economic ethics for competitive markets, to a business ethics for firms (corporate citizens), and to a process ethics for new governance. The core idea of this ordonomic approach is the win-win concept of mutually beneficial value creation. Thus, ordonomics is compatible with the market economy and at the same time supplements the management education in business schools: This approach systematically identifies strategic competencies that enable managers to display the kind of entrepreneurial leadership that is necessary for firms to fulfill their social function of value creation—by making use of moral commitments as a factor of production.     

Identity Work and Emotions: A Review

This paper reviews the empirical literature on identity work and identifies two distinct approaches to incorporating emotion. The majority of empirical studies use emotion to describe the experiences of identity work. In doing so, the authors (a) mention the emotions that people feel in situations that trigger identity work, (b) illustrate identity work as an emotional endeavour, and (c) describe the emotional impact of successful and unsuccessful identity work. There is also an emerging literature that examines the mutual constitution of emotions and identity work. These authors address emotional labour, affective social identification, emotional attachment and detachment, and humour when studying identity work. This paper suggests that, to understand better the relation between emotions and identity work, future research should examine the role of emotions in problematizing identity, the emotional constitution of the identity work experience, the intersection of emotions and other ways of knowing the self, and the links between emotions and power in identity work.