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Welcome to the Summer 2019 Issue of the
Max Weber Programme Newsletter |
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 The June Conference and the close of the academic year is usually a time when I wish farewell to the current cohort of Fellows and console them with the prediction that they will almost certainly return soon. As my term as Director comes to an end, it is now my turn to be a little sorrowful about leaving, if also excited about what lies ahead as I return to UCL. It has been an enjoyable five and half years. As for the Max Weber Fellows, it has been the intellectual stimulus and collegiality of all the Fellows and the support of the wonderful MWP team as much as the beautiful setting of Florence and the Institute that has made my time here so rewarding. So, my heartfelt thanks to all of the Fellows I have had the privilege to get to know since 2014. It is a global network of brilliant scholars of which I am proud to have become an honorary part. Like a number of other Professors at the EUI, I am in my third incarnation here, having previously been a researcher and, some years later, a Jean Monnet Fellow, and have probably returned at least once a year for the past 40 years. As a result, I am confident you too will regularly return here and that we will have plenty of opportunities to see each other again in Florence, and no doubt in London and at international conferences around the world as well. It remains for me merely to thank all the team members for their exceptional support over my time as Director, and to wish all the best to my successor, Professor Dorothee Bohle. I hope she has as good a time directing the Programme as I have had.
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 In the last few years, migration has been at the centre of attention of the European public and policymakers, sparking an unprecedented debate on responsibilities and rights. Building on the framework of the H2020 Horizon Project GLOBUS, the Special Issue ‘Talking Migration: Narratives of Migration and Embedded Justice Claims in the European Migration System of Governance’ forthcoming for The International Spectator presents a collection of European case studies analysing narratives of migration and their embedded justice claims. It does so by focusing on the way national newspapers have covered and discussed key political events related to European politics and migration dynamics between 2014 and 2018. Authors of this Special Issue include: Anna Lavizzari, Espen Daniel Olsen, Michela Ceccorulli, Attila Melegh, Martón Hunyadi, Dorottya Mendly, Cinzia Bevitori and Antonio Zotti. As Guest Editors of the Special Issue, we summarise here the aims and key contributions of the Issue as we presented in the Introduction of ‘Talking Migration’.
The initial interest for this issue was motivated by the observation that, having been forged historically by centuries of migration, being characterised by areas of free transnational movement of people (the Single Market and Schengen), and going through a threatening demographic decline (Ceccorulli et al. 2015; Eurostat 2018), Europe in principle should be home to socio-political systems that are open to human mobility. The European Union (EU), in particular, is the area in the world in which the most significant transformation of state sovereignty has taken place. It has introduced a common, albeit secondary, European citizenship in the absence of a federal European state and has the most advanced system of international protection in the world. In addition, EU foreign policy has been largely characterised by a specific attention to cosmopolitan claims, considering for instance, the efforts to abolish the death penalty to support for the International Criminal Court, or assistance to the creation of areas of free movement of goods and people in other parts of the world. This would lead one to expect Europe to have a stance on the migration phenomenon able to recognise the movement of people as a fact on earth, to be governed at the regional and global level through long-term structural measures – and never to the detriment of human rights.
Yet, many have observed, this ideal-type migration policy of the allegedly “distinctive power Europe”, clashes strongly with the performance of the EU and the states party to the European Union Migration System of Governance (EUMSG).Several works have shown, for instance, how the so-called refugee crisis of 2015-16 actually reinforced processes of securitisation of migration (Huysmans 2006; Kaya 2009) while also triggering new dynamics of collective securitisation (Moreno-Lax 2018; Ceccorulli 2019; Zotti forthcoming). In the process, the European Union adopted measures to “save Schengen” - to use the telling name of the Commission communication (European Commission 2016) - by strengthening border control, establishing selective hotspots (Ceccorulli and Lucarelli 2017a), and externalising migration policies and border control to third countries (CINI and Concord Europe 2018). The EU-Turkey ‘Deal’ of 2016, the Italy-Libya agreement of 2017 and the EU’s prioritising of anti-smuggling over Search and Rescue (S&R) (Cusumano 2019) are only few examples of this dynamics. Moreover, it has been discussed how the resulting transformation of the modalities of functioning of the EUMSG largely clash with the EU’s (and indeed Europe’s) core values (Murray and Longo 2018, Bauböck 2018), while the attention has shifted from the migrants who need to be saved (as in the S&R operation Mare Nostrum) to the border that needs to be protected (Ceccorulli and Lucarelli 2017b).
From a scholarly perspective, several attempts have been made in the past to account for discourses on migration in Europe (Boswell et al. 2011; Scuzzarello 2015), also from a comparative perspective (Chouliaraki and Stolic 2017; Krzyzanowski et al. 2018). Yet, despite exceptions (Helbling 2014; Georgiou and Zabarowski 2016; Caviedes 2015, 2018), these studies rarely analyse news coverage with both a cross-time and cross-national perspective, and seldom look at the same political events. Such a perspective, we argue, is crucial for capturing and accounting for differences across apparently similar political contexts. Moreover, we feel that this Special Issue makes indeed a valuable contribution as, to our knowledge, leading accounts on the topic lack a due attention to narratives’ embedded understandings of global political justice. Hence, the purpose of ‘Talking Migration’ is to analyse the way in which migration has been addressed in the European national presses, as well as, to study what king of understanding of global justice -non-domination, impartiality or mutual recognition- such narratives convey.
In particular, we are interested in exploring similarities and differences within the countries themselves, and between countries. Eventually we would like to assess the embedded justice claim of such narratives, which also constitutes the normative argument through which specific migration policies are legitimated. In this sense, by focusing on linguistic patterns and trends in narratives of migration across the EUMSG, this work investigates what kind of ‘communicated’ and potentially ‘filtered’ knowledge on migration European citizens have been exposed to. Therefore, each article in the Special Issue addresses a case study of narratives of migration and justice claims within the EUMSG. Specifically, the Issue contains the following case studies: Italy, France, Hungary, Norway and the United Kingdom. The case selection was grounded on the interest to assess and account for the variety of meanings, narratives and senses of justice in Europe within and outside the EU, therefore of EU members inside (France, Italy, Hungary) and outside the Schengen System (the United Kingdom), as well as, non EU-members included in the Schengen area (Norway).
As mentioned, the analysis concerned key political events related to European politics and migration dynamics between 2014 and 2018. However in order to observe similarities and differences in the talking of same events data was collected from two weeks before to one week after three key political moments between January 2014 – January 2018. The events were the 2014 European Parliament elections (22-25 May 2014); the EU-Turkey Statement (‘Agreement/Deal’), 18 March 2016 and; one key ‘national moment’ related to migration within the designated timespan. To these, for better evaluating the politicisation of migration, we added a control “eventless week”.
In terms of findings, other than differences in the use of narratives and justice claims, this Special Issue reveals an important correlation between the issue of migration and ideas on the EU in the European political debate of the last five years. In particular, we highlight how so-called migration crisis has increased the salience of the ‘EU’ across European countries’ political debate. Hence, it is fair to say that migration has served as a pivotal issue for rethinking European integration and its political meaning as well as its practical usefulness. Such a rethinking, as the articles in this Special Issue confirm, has mostly taken the shape of political opposition to – and contestation of – the normative framework and political order that the EU represents. The main beneficiaries of this connection appear to be the Eurosceptical and nationalist parties which, since the 2014 European Parliament elections have increasingly gained space and relevance in national media. Indeed, all contributions point to a similar dynamic at play in Europe. In terms of narratives, for instance, there has been a process of normalisation of what once would have been defined as populist claims. Linguistic registers used to speak about migration and related interpretations of justice that only a few years ago were the prerogative of right-wing populist parties such as the Front National (National Front) in France, Lega (League) in Italy or Fidesz in Hungary, are today largely also employed by mainstream parties. As such, they have increasingly appeared in centre, or even traditionally left-wing, newspapers and media. As a result, various shadows of Westphalian justice claims have legitimised restrictive migration measures and even overshadowed a disregard (when not open violations) of the rights of migrants.
Moreover, in the process of normalisation of extreme and anti-immigrant claims, European national media have not been able to develop alternative narratives. In fact, despite some minor attempts to oppose dominant anti-migrant sentiments, all the cases analysed show that national media did not grant particular coverage to counter narratives and pro-migrant claims above and beyond the classic humanitarian approach portraying migrants as victims of an unjust crisis. This point puts the findings of this Special Issue in line with that part of the literature that highlights a general lack of agency when portraying migrants, usually framed through aid interactions as ahistorical and anonymous victims (Musarò and Parmiggiani 2017; Little and Vaughan-Williams, 2017).
In summary, in light of the recent success of key nativist and anti-immigrant parties like Fidez in Hungary or the Lega in Italy at the 2019 European Parliament elections we believe this Special Issue makes a particularly timely contribution. It offers fresh empirical insights to understand the state of national public debates on a crucial topic that have put the EU under serious strain in the recent years.
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 A key headline in the recent elections held in Spain on 28 April was the victory of the far-right party Vox. Some pre-election polls predicted up to fifty seats for this party although it finally obtained only twenty-four. This result, nonetheless, is important because it is the first time since 1982 that most conservative voters have not coordinated their vote around a single party.
The fragmentation of the party system observed in Spain after 2011 appeared at first to affect only the centre and centre-left side of the electorate. However, the recent elections have shown that, actually, the effect was perhaps also present on the right of the ideological spectrum and those voters were just waiting for a party like Vox to emerge. So, when the conservative PP lost much of its credibility, Vox became salient and received ten percent of the total vote.
But who are the supporters of this new far-right party? Where are they coming from? I propose to answer this question using the exposure to various forms of agriculture practiced in certain provinces in Spain as a key element in the explanation. Looking at whether and how land is used for agricultural purposes can be a useful way to approximate relevant socio-economic conditions faced by some voters for whom the discourse used by Vox can be attractive.
Likewise, the analysis of the agricultural use of the land can be useful for inferring the support for certain traditional values signposted by Vox and endorsed by typical voters in these regions. The main finding from this analysis is that being exposed to agriculture translates into greater support for Vox than living in a region where most of the land is not used for agricultural activities. In particular, this is due to two related explanations.
Greenhouses
The first explanation has to do with the exposure to intensive agriculture such as greenhouses. Provinces like Almeria, Huelva, Granada or Murcia in the South and South-East of the country show a share of land occupied by greenhouses above the national mean. Given the labour-intensive activity of greenhouses but also the low salaries and high temporality that characterises its labour market, most of the workers employed in this industry are immigrants (and frequently undocumented) and from a wide range of nationalities.
The co-existence of this precarious and culturally-diverse group of workers with the most reactionary part of the local population is not easy. The probability of observing clashes among groups is high and these provinces have experienced violent episodes driven by xenophobia in the past. One could explain the success of Vox in these areas precisely as a reaction from the more conservative and reactionary groups of the local population to these low-skilled and culturally distinct immigrants.
A key message from Vox during the electoral campaign was precisely the sponsorship of an anti-Muslim agenda promoting the superiority of Christian values and the rejection of multi-culturalism. These are claims that could easily be assumed by local voters directly exposed to the socio-economic dynamics observed in regions with a high concentration of greenhouses.
Bull-fighting
A second explanation relates to a defence of traditional moral values and, most notably, a strong preference for preserving the unity of the country. Provinces in Spain with large prairies of pasture used to breed livestock also correspond with areas where conservative feelings are higher than in the rest of the country.
Provinces like Caceres, Salamanca, Sevilla and Badajoz are the home of, for example, some of the most famous bull breeds used in bullfighting, a tradition typically associated with conservative voters. Other provinces like Asturias, Avila or Leon are characterised by historically strong conservative sentiments. In fact, survey data shows that citizens in these areas position themselves to the right of the average ideological position of the country. Given the socio-economic composition observed in these rural provinces, some conservative voters may feel attracted by Vox’s messages defending the unity of the nation and the firm defence of traditional family structures.
Support for Vox
I test these explanations using an original dataset which contains the number of hectares used for different type of agriculture at the provincial level. The agricultural data is merged with electoral data from the 2014 European elections, the 2018 Andalusian regional elections, and the 2015, 2016 and 2019 general elections. I create three groups of provinces and I compare them with those provinces where the use of land for agricultural purposes is below the national mean.
The different comparisons are performed using the year 2016 as the reference point. In this year, the PP, the historical conservative party, faced increasing public contestation following a number of corruption scandals. It was also a year that signalled the incapacity of the conservative government to solve the Catalan crisis. This was, perhaps, enough for the more right-wing voters to see the PP as no longer their preferred option.
Figure 1 below shows how the vote for Vox has evolved since 2014 – the first year this party competed in an election – to date in provinces exposed and not exposed to agriculture. Exposure to agriculture implies that a province uses an extension of land which is above the national mean in either intensive agriculture, prairies, irrigation or extensive agriculture. As the two lines in the figure show, the differences between provinces exposed to any form of agriculture and those provinces not exposed to agriculture at all was practically identical up until 2016. The pattern, however, changed in 2019 when a larger increase in support for Vox was observed in agriculturally exposed provinces only.
Figure 1: Support for Vox and levels of exposure to agriculture
Source: Compiled by the author.
The size of the effect reflected in Figure 1 can be estimated. Figure 2 shows the magnitude of the effect observed in the different comparisons performed. Firstly, the “agricultural effect” referred to above is positive and shows that support for Vox is larger in provinces exposed to any form of agriculture than in provinces with no exposure. This general effect can be disaggregated into a “Greenhouse effect” and a “Prairie effect”. These two effects are also positive but the “Greenhouse effect” is larger than the “Prairie effect”.
In substantive terms, support for Vox, as a share of the number of votes for this party over the electoral census, increases by two percentage points in provinces exposed to greenhouse agriculture compared to provinces that were not exposed to agriculture. The “Prairie effect” is also important albeit smaller than the “Greenhouse effect”: Vox obtained a vote share over the electoral census slightly above one percent compared with provinces with no agricultural exposure.
One note of caution. Given that the effect is calculated over the total number of voters as shown in the electoral census, these effects actually mean large numbers of voters. Considering that the district magnitudes of these provinces are relatively small, such differences may, indeed, imply winning a seat in parliament.
Figure 2: Effect of agriculture on support for Vox
Source: Compiled by the author.
This empirical analysis illustrates how political preferences can be linked to the economic activity of a region. In the case of Spain, there seems to be a clear connection between regions exposed to intensive agriculture like greenhouses and regions with large prairies. This exposure explains why there was a surge in support for a far-right party in Spain once the traditional conservative PP party was no longer perceived by most right-wing voters as being a credible party.
Vox is appealing to voters in these agricultural regions through two different mechanisms. First, the party’s anti-Muslim and anti-multiculturalism agenda attracts voters exposed to contexts with large numbers of immigrants working in precarious conditions, as typically observed in the labour markets generated in provinces using intensive forms of agriculture like greenhouses. Vox is also successful among the most conservative voters living in regions with a large extension of prairies that are used to breed livestock. Voters in these provinces have strong feelings about traditional family structures and, especially, strong preferences for preserving the unity of Spain which make them ideal voters to the new Spanish far-right party.
Rubén Ruiz-Rufino – King’s College London
Rubén Ruiz-Rufino is a Senior Lecturer in Comparative Politics at King’s College London.
(*) this blog is a reprint of a LSE Europp blog
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 The call for the Max Weber Fellowships is open! Please find the application on line at:
eui.eu/ServicesAndAdmin/AcademicService/Fellowships/MaxWeberFellowships/HowToApply
The Thematic Research Groups for the 2020-2021 Fellowships are:
Democracy in the 21st century
In the first two decades of the 21st century, the broad, public identification with democratic values and practices – seen as unassailable since the Second World War– has been challenged in profound ways. While apparently still supreme as a political principle, democracy is seen to be eroded by new economic disparities, by pressures to circumscribe the perimeter of rights, and by the weakening of its societal roots. There are widespread fears that democracy has been hollowed out, with the meaning of democracy, which always been a contested concept, being questioned and mistrusted.
The tension between democratic representation and technocratic governance is unprecedented, while decisions are made by sheltered elites who pursue economic and functional imperatives. At the same time, various forms of illiberal democracy, authoritarianism, and oligarchy induce many to think that they can perform better than classical liberal democracies. With the decline of most forms of political intermediation, processes of individual empowerment and mobilization—also sustained by new technologies that reshape the context and the dynamics of political persuasion—point to the privatization of political socialization and participation. Combined, these factors nurture the perception that representative democracy should no longer be accepted as the gold standard for good governance.
In response to these challenges, we propose an interdisciplinary inquiry on the making and conditions of democracy in the 21st century. We believe that only a multi-disciplinary assessment can provide the vital insights that European society will need to re-build the legitimacy of democratic representation, the credibility of political institutions, and the social contract that underpins its sustainability.
We will focus on several sub-themes, to be studied across the four EUI disciplines, both as a long-term perspective and in the present day. These themes include: the spaces and divisions of democracy; democratic participation and institutions; the rule of law; the development of populisms; and the role of, and consequences for, the European Union in the making of democratic institutions and society.
Inequality, welfare and social justice
The steady increase in economic inequality since 1980 in most EU countries and North America is today widely acknowledged as a major challenge for equal opportunities, democratic stability, economic prosperity and social cohesion at the national and supranational levels.
After the postwar era of welfare state expansion, which helped to eradicate old-age poverty, and institutionalized universal access to health care, education and social insurance against unemployment and sickness as a matter of social citizenship rights since the 1959s, progress in social have seemingly come to a halt. In some parts of the OECD-world, earnings and benefits have stagnated while the macro economy continued to prosper. Income and wealth inequalities has grown continuously.
What has changed in terms of the life chances of citizens, also in terms health and life style, gender and wellbeing between the 1980s and today? How did we fare before and after World War II. How come the modern welfare state has not been able to catch up with imbalances in family demography, skill-biased technological change and economic internationalization? What are the implications for 21st welfare provision and democratic politics?
To address all of these questions and more, we link the long history of (in-)equality to their (historical) economic, social and political causes and consequences, drawing on a wealth of data and multi-disciplinary analyses, including theories of justice and solidarity, ultimately to engage in a wide debate over policy ideas and solutions to contain and overcome the inequality conundrum in rich democracies.
Crisis of expert knowledge and authority
Even after years of study and practical experience the consequences of policies are uncertain. Agreement among experts on the soundness of many policy interventions is greater than realized by the general public, still there is legitimate disagreement. Furthermore, it is not sensible for an individual to invest years of effort in hopes of deciding what the best policies are. Because we cannot sensibly know ourselves what constitutes good policy we must rely on experts.
Following the financial crisis of 2008, we have witnessed an erosion of citizens’ trust in intellectual elites. The role of experts has been questioned. At the same time those who denounce academic expertise and pretend unwillingness to rely on experts follow their own (often self-proclaimed) “experts”. Unfortunately, the reliance on charlatans rather than experts often has profoundly negative consequences.
These issues are of importance to Europe and the EU. We have seen political parties denying expert knowledge on a range of issues from debt, growth, migration, and trade to medicine. These movements have strong popular support indicating that people are fed up with experts, and we must recognize that they are right to distrust experts as many have misbehaved.
The theme group on the crisis of expert knowledge aims to investigate why are experts under siege and what should be done. We seek MWP fellows of all specialties who have an interest in these questions.
Technological change and society
Technologies across areas such as information and communication technologies, biotechnologies, robotics, and artificial intelligence present a series of challenges for modern societies: “smart” technologies changes the workplace, the division of resources in society, the formation of social attitudes and opinions, the patterns and dynamic of social interactions, the allocation and exercise of power. This theme group aims to assess the novel social, economic, ethical, and legal questions that arise
Technological change in the workplace has already contributed to automation in manufacturing, and advances in AI and robotics are likely to exacerbate this and extend it beyond manufacturing. Digital technologies change interactions in society: on the one hand they allow for greater ability to share, acquire and process information, but also enable increased surveillance and manipulation. New technologies also raise ethical and legal issues, concerning how to prevent both misuse and underuse of technological developments.
This requires the assessment of opportunities and risks related to transformation induced by technologies, and research meant to translate legal/ethical requirements into prescriptions for the design of human-centred technologies or even directives addressed to intelligent artificial system.
The challenge is to ensure that highly developed technologies remain under human control, contribute to human well-being and autonomy, and are responsive to human values —while their development is also driven by economic, political and military interests. This research requires us to learn from the historical perspective on the connection between science, technology, and society, and to use economic, legal and sociological perspectives to provide insights for the future.
Eastern Europe as a laboratory of change
After the dramatic events of 1989, Eastern Europe has frequently been called a laboratory of change. Within a short period, the region experienced the collapse of Empire, war, genocide, the birth of new states, the vanishing of others, the breakdown of socialism, deep economic crisis, massive emigration and the embrace of capitalism and democracy. Its countries have also become part of broader European and global changes, as members or aspiring members of the European Union and through integration in globalizing capitalism. More recently, some East European countries have become laboratories for illiberal change, while others have been experimenting with radical neoliberal reforms.
1989 was by far not the first time that Eastern Europe has undergone such sweeping changes. The resulting unsettled nature of Eastern Europe’s borders, identity, economic, social and political orders have often led to its negative stereotyping and orientalising from without, and self-orientalising from within. Yet, the propensity for frequent and often radical change is inextricably linked with the region’s peripheral status, and its location between two influential powers, Russia and Germany.
Peripherality has given rise to repeated and often frustrated attempts of catching up with the West. The region’s location has destined it to become the plaything of Russian and German ambitions. At the same time, being a crossroad and place of exchange, also attests to Eastern Europe’s capacity to innovate, and influence events beyond its borders. As such, rather than its “other”, Eastern Europe is very much part of Europe, sharing the best and worst legacies of the continent.
Despite the rich propensity for change and innovation and its centrality for European history, economy and politics, academic interest in Eastern Europe is on the wane. In some countries in the region, academic freedom has come again under attack, while in Western Europe’s social science there is declining interest in substantive area specific knowledge. The research group seeks to stem this tide. It invites fellows who are interested in exploring aspects of East European specificities, also in a comparative perspective. It is interested in the changes the region has gone through in its recent and more remote history and these changes’ lasting legacies; the challenges it faces, and its importance beyond its borders. It also encourages to explore methodological aspects of studying change within the region and beyond from a multidisciplinary perspective.
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The Max Weber Programme is proud to announce the incoming Max Weber Fellows 2019-2020.
Check them out here:
 ALVAREZ NAKAGAWA, Alexis Javier (LAW)  AVRIL, Lola (LAW)  BANKS, Elizabeth (HEC)  BATTU, Balaraju (SPS)  BRIGHT, Claire (LAW)  BUCCA OLEA, Mauricio Esteban (SPS)  CRETU, Doina Anca (HEC)  D'AMATO, Silvia (RSC)  DESCHEPPER, Julie (HEC)  DÍAZ CEBALLOS, Jorge (HEC)  FARGUES, Emilien (RSC)  GOLD, Meira (HEC)  GREINER , Andreas (HEC)  GREVENBROCK, Nils (ECO)  GROCHOWSKI, Mateusz Fabian (LAW)  HATHAWAY, Ian (HEC)  JAKOVAC, Gasper (HEC)  KNIESS, Johannes Eduardo (SPS)  LAFUENTE MARTINEZ, Cristina (ECO)  LARSEN, Signe Rehling (LAW)  LIM, Misun (SPS)  LOPES, Marta (ECO)  LOTT, Gaia (HEC)  MARTYSHEVA, Lana (HEC)  MAVROPOULOS, Nikolaos (HEC)  MCNAMEE, Lachlan Andrew (SPS)  MOLONEY, David (RSC)  MÜLLER, Viola Franziska (HEC)  MURPHY, Karl (LAW)  MUSHÖVEL, Fabian (SPS)  ONODA, Takuya (SPS)  PANIAGUA, Maria Victoria (SPS)  POPIC, Tamara (SPS)  PROCTER, Caitlin (RSC)  PROKIC, Milica (HEC  QUEIRÓS, Francisco Vitorino (ECO)  RAY, Ari (SPS)  REIJERS, Wessel (RSC)  SIGILLÒ, Ester (RSC)  SOYEMI, Eniola Anuoluwapo (SPS)  SPIGANTI, Alessandro (ECO)  SPIRIG, Judith (SPS)  SUN, Junze (ECO)  TAGIURI, Giacomo (LAW) TASSINARI, Arianna (SPS)  THOMAS, Anja (RSC)  TONDINI, Alessandro (ECO)  TROUILLARD, Pauline Isabelle Sylvie (LAW)  TSIARAS, Stylianos (RSC)  VASEL, Johann Justus (LAW)  VRANCEANU, Alina (SPS)  WANG, Xiaoren (LAW)  WILHELM, Lola (HEC)  WITTELS, Annabelle (SPS)  WOODHOUSE, Eleanor Florence (ECO)  ZEITZ, Alexandra Olivia (SPS)  ZIÓŁKOWSKI, Michał (LAW)  ZSCHIRNT, Eva (SPS)
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 The Max Weber Programme is proud to announce the line-up for the Max Weber Lectures 2019-2020:
- 16 October 2019
Valerie Jane Bunce – Cornell University
Valerie Bunce is the Aaron Binenkorb Professor of International Studies and Professor of Government at Cornell University. Her primary field is comparative politics, but she also teaches and does research in the areas of international relations and American politics. She is particularly interested in democratization (the rise, design, sustainability and collapse of democratic systems); authoritarianism (transitions to and from dictatorship, political leadership and institutions); U.S. foreign policy (and its support of democratic and authoritarian regimes); and state-building and state collapse.
Her geographical focus is eastern and central Europe, Russia, Ukraine, Georgia and Azerbaijan. She also addresses the politics of other countries for purposes of comparison: for example, the contemporary United States with respect to issues regarding the sustainability of democracy.
She is the author of Subversive Institutions: The Design and the Collapse of Socialism and the State (Cambridge University Press, 1999) and Do New Leaders Make a Difference? Executive Succession and Public Policy Under Capitalism and Socialism (Princeton University Press, 1981). She is a co-author (with Sharon Wolchik) of Defeating Authoritarian Leaders in Postcommunist Countries (Cambridge University Press, 2011) and a co-editor (with Michael McFaul and Kathryn Stoner-Weiss) of Democracy and Authoritarianism in the Postcommunist World (Cambridge University Press, 2009).
- 20 November 2019
Richard Whatmore – University of St Andrews
Richard Whatmore was born in Newcastle-upon-Tyne and brought up in Durham. He read History at Cambridge, spent a year at Harvard after graduation, and returned to Cambridge to complete a PhD on eighteenth and nineteenth-century political economy under the supervision of Istvan Hont. He was appointed to a lectureship in Intellectual History at Sussex in 1993, working with Donald Winch, Brian Young, John Burrow and later Knud Haakonssen. At Sussex he was Head of History for three years and Director of the Sussex Centre for Intellectual History. He has also undertaken administrative duties for the publishers Elsevier, as chair of humanities journals for SCOPUS, and for Taylor and Francis, as editor for the journal of the History of European Ideas for more than a decade. At St Andrews Richard has helped to establish the Institute of Intellectual History, which he currently directs. The Institute is already home to several research projects and the expectation is that it will become a home for intellectual historians across St Andrews and beyond.
In terms of his research, Richard has written about the consequences for European political thought of the rise of commercial empires such as Britain and France from the end of the seventeenth century. He thinks that political thought becomes dull when it does not encompass issues of theology, political economy and international relations. Accordingly he is interested in the decline of the Calvinist trading centres that were too small to thrive in a world of aggressive economic imperialism. He has argued that, among other things, the decline in such places contributed to the development of the French Revolution. His most recent book is titled Against War and Empire. Geneva, Britain and France in the Eighteenth Century (Yale University Press, 2012).
- 15 January 2020
Nadia Urbinati – Columbia University
Kyriakos Tsakopoulos Professor of Political Theory
Nadia Urbinati (PhD, European University Institute, Florence, 1989) is a political theorist who specializes in modern and contemporary political thought and the democratic and anti-democratic traditions. She co-chaired the Columbia University Faculty Seminar on Political and Social Thought and founded and chaired the Workshop on Politics, Religion and Human Rights. She is co-editor with Andrew Arato of the journal Constellations: An International Journal of Critical and Democratic Theory. She is a member of the Executive Committee of the Foundation Reset Dialogues on Civilization-Istanbul Seminars.
She is the winner of the 2008-9 Lenfest/Columbia Distinguished Faculty Award. In 2008 the President of the Italian Republic awarded Professor Urbinati the Commendatore della Repubblica (Commander of the Italian Republic) “for her contribution to the study of democracy and the diffusion of Italian liberal and democratic thought abroad.” In 2004 her book Mill on Democracy received the David and Elaine Spitz Prize as the best book in liberal and democratic theory published in 2002.
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- 19 February 2020
Marie-Janine Calic – Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität Munich
Marie-Janine Calic is Professor of Eastern and Southeastern European History at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität in Munich. She served as a political adviser to the Special Coordinator of the Stability Pact for Southeastern Europe in Brussels and for the UN Special Representative for the Former Yugoslavia in Zagreb. She also worked for the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia at The Hague, and the Conflict Prevention Network of the European Commission and Parliament in Brussels. Calic has published and lectured extensively about the Balkans and is a regular commentator on Balkan affairs for the German media.
- 18 March 2020
Ruud Koopmans – WZB Berlin; Humboldt University Berlin
Prof. Dr. Ruud Koopmans is director of the research department “Migration, Integration, Transnationalization” at the WZB Berlin Social Science Center and Professor of Sociology and Migration Research at Humboldt University Berlin. He is also a member of the Academic Advisory Board of the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (BAMF), Nuremberg and of the Board of Trustees of the German Center for Integration and Migration Research (DeZIM). His current research focuses are migration and integration, religious fundamentalism and extremism, and majority and minority rights.
- 15 April 2020
Waltraud Schelkle – London School of Economics and Political Science
Waltraud Schelkle is an Associate Professor in Political Economy at the European Institute and has been at LSE since autumn 200. She is an Adjunct Professor of economics at the Economics Department of the Free University of Berlin where she did a post-doctorate degree (Habilitation) in 1999 with a thesis on "The new theory of monetary integration" (published in German in 2001). Dr Schelkle is also a (non-resident) Senior Fellow at the American Institute for Contemporary German Studies (AICGS), Johns Hopkins University, Washington D.C. and Chair of the Advisory Board of the Centre for Social Policy Research (Zentrum für Sozialpolitik) in Bremen.
She has previously worked as a development economist, from 1989-2002 as a staff member of the German Institute of Development in Berlin with a research focus on the financial system in development and doing her first PhD on India's development as a monetary economy since Independence (London 1994). Other earlier appointments include two Research Fellowships at Johns Hopkins University, Washington, DC, and Visiting Professor of International Economic Relations at the Free University of Berlin before coming to London. Her research interests are the evolving economic governance of EMU and social policy reforms directed at financial markets.
- 20 May 2020
Mariana Mazzucato – University College London
Mariana Mazzucato (PhD) is Professor in the Economics of Innovation and Public Value at UCL, and is Founder and Director of the UCL Institute for Innovation & Public Purpose (IIPP). She is winner of the 2014 New Statesman SPERI Prize in Political Economy, the 2015 Hans-Matthöfer-Preis, and the 2018 Leontief Prize for Advancing the Frontiers of Economic Thought. She was named as one of the “3 most important thinkers about innovation” by the New Republic.
Her highly-acclaimed book The Entrepreneurial State: debunking public vs. private sector myths (Anthem 2013; Public Affairs, 2015) was on the 2013 Books of the Year list of the Financial Times. It investigates the role of public organizations in playing the “investor of first resort role” in the history of technological change, and the danger of ignoring this in economic theory and policy. She is co-editor of Rethinking Capitalism: Economics and Policy for Sustainable and Inclusive Growth (Wiley Blackwell, July 2016). Her new book The Value of Everything: making and taking in the global economy was published in April 2018 in the UK by Penguin (Allen Lane), and was launched in the USA in September 2018 by Public Affairs. It was shortlisted for this year’s Financial Times and McKinsey Business Book of the Year prize
- 27 May 2020
Axel Honneth – Columbia University and Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main
Professor Honneth is Jack C. Weinstein Professor for the Humanities in the Department of Philosophy at Columbia University; Director of the Institute for Social Research, Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main (since 2001); and C4-Professor of Social Philosophy, Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main (since 1996).
From 1992 to 1996, Professor Honneth was C4-Professor of Political Philosophy at Freie Universität Berlin; from 1991 to 1992 he was C3-Professor of Philosophy, University of Konstanz. From 1983 to 1989 he was Hochschulassistent (scientific assistant) to Prof. Dr. Jürgen Habermas, Dept. of Philosophy, Goethe-Universität Frankfurt/M.; from 1982 to 1983 he had a Research Grant with Prof. Dr. Jürgen Habermas, Max-Planck-Institute for Social Sciences, Starnberg. From 1977 to 1982 he was Wissenschaftlicher Assistent (scientific assistant), Institute of Sociology, Freie Universität Berlin.
In November 2015, Professor Honneth received the Ernst Bloch-Preis from the City of Ludwigshafen (Germany). In April 2016, Professor Honneth received the Bruno-Kreisky Prize from the Karl-Renner Stiftung in Vienna. In June 2016, Professor Honneth was awarded the Ulysses Medal, University College Dublin’s highest honour, for his lifetime contribution to social philosophy and critical theory.
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For updates on the lecture series please refer to our website:
www.eui.eu/ProgrammesAndFellowships/MaxWeberProgramme/Activities/MWLectures
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 A Dean of Postdoctoral studies has been appointed at the EUI to direct the Max Weber Programme. Dorothee Bohle, professor of Political Science in the SPS department will be in charge of the Programme from the beginning of the next academic year, 2019-2020.
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There is something truly new at the European University Institute this Summer: EUIdeas was born!
EUIdeas publishes short articles (800-1000 words) or brief multi-media content by EUI members shedding light on topical issues, or bringing to the forefront subjects which the authors convincingly argue deserve more notice. The Blog is aimed at a general, informed audience broadly interested in social, political, legal, and economic issues.
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This year, once again, the June Conference brought together MW Alumni and current Fellows at the Badia. The 90 conference participants engaged their intellectual might in twenty-two panels and two keynote lectures over three days. Deservedly the EUI June Ball lavishly crowned the occasion.
Drivers and Consequences of Transformation
13th Max Weber Fellows June Conference
Badia Fiesolana, 12-14 June 2019
Organizing Committee: Veronica Corcodel (LAW), Mirjam Dagefoerde (SPS), Andra Roescu (SPS), Pascale Siegrist (HEC), Alina Vranceanu (SPS), Aydin Yildirim (RSC)
Keynote Lectures
13 June 2019, 16:30-18:00, Badia, Refettorio
Prof. Per Krusell
(Professor of Economics – Stockholm University)
‘The Role of Economics Analysis in Combating Climate Change’
Introduction given by Alessandro Spiganti (MWF ECO)
14 June 2019, 11:00-12:30, Badia, Refettorio
Baroness Onora O’Neill
(Emeritus Professor – University of Cambridge)
‘Ethics Without Justice: A 20th Century Innovation?’
Introduction given by Eniola Soyemi (MWF SPS)
This conference aims at creating a cross-cultural and cross-disciplinary dialogue on historical and contemporary social, economic, legal and political transformations.
The goal is to reflect on the driving forces and actors of past or current events shaping societal developments and their effects. Various dimensions of change were explored, such as political transitions, social contestations, economic integration, cultural disjunctures, technological advancements, and socio-legal reforms.
Full programme (pdf)
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 20 February 2019, 17:00-18:30
Badia, Refettorio
Chair: Miriam Dagefoerde (SPS)
Introduction: Stefano Bartolini (SPS Professor)
Abstract:The rise of what is often called ‘populism’ constitutes the biggest challenge to liberal democracy since the 1920s or 1930s.
The voices of populist dissent speak in different languages but mostly convey similar messages—against globalization and free trade, immigration and open borders, Europeanization and the euro. They draw from the same range of sources—the economics of those feeling ‘left behind,’ the sociology of those worried about the ‘changing faces of the nation,’ and the politics of those who want to ‘take back control.’ And they employ rhetorical strategies via social media to create ‘post-truth’ environments that reject experts, demonize conventional political elites and parties, and excoriate mainstream media while using them to amplify their messages.
The question is: Why and how have populists had such success today in channeling public fear and anger? Scholars often respond by focusing on the sources of discontent—economic, social, or political—and trigger moments.
But a complete answer demands an investigation of what populists say, meaning the substantive content of leaders’ ideas and discourse; how they say it, involving the discursive processes of interaction via activist social movements, party networks, and direct links with ‘the people;’ and what they do, in opposition and/or in power in their differing national contexts.
About the speaker: Vivien A. Schmidt is Jean Monnet Professor of European Integration and Professor of International Relations and Political Science in the Pardee School at Boston University, where she has also served as the Founding Director of its Center for the Study of Europe. Her latest honors and awards include decoration as Chevalier in the Legion of Honor, a Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship, and the European Union Studies Association’s Lifetime Achievement Award (to be received in May 2019). She has held visiting professorships and fellowships at a wide range of European institutions, including LUISS University in Rome, the Free University of Brussels, the Copenhagen Business School, the Free University of Berlin, Sciences Po Paris, the European University Institute in Florence, and Oxford University. Her recent books include the forthcoming Europe’s Crisis of Legitimacy: Governing by Rules and Ruling by Numbers in the Eurozone (Oxford 2019), Resilient Liberalism in Europe’s Political Economy (co-edited, Cambridge 2013), and Democracy in Europe (Oxford 2006; French trans., La Découverte 2010)—named in 2015 by the European Parliament as one of the ‘100 Books on Europe to Remember.’ Her latest project, supported by the Guggenheim Fellowship, focuses on the ‘rhetoric of discontent’ through a transatlantic investigation of the populist revolt against globalization and Europeanization.
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Badia, Refettorio
20 March 2019, 17:00-18:30
Chair: Per Andersson (MWF-SPS)
Introduction: Ellen Immergut (SPS Professor)
Abstract: In this lecture I look at the relationship between the state, advanced capitalism, democracy, technology regime change, populism and globalisation. My recent book with Torben Iversen, Democracy and Prosperity: Reinventing Capitalism through a Turbulent Century (Princeton 2019) argues that from a long term perspective the performance of advanced capitalist democracies has been highly effective – certainly compared to any other political economic system. From the perspective of the hundred years since the end of the First World War – arguably the most turbulent in recorded history (apart from the C5th CE) – living standards have increased massively, and extreme poverty eliminated. By 1920 all the early industrialisers had become democracies, and most remarkably remained so (absent 35-45 and Czechoslovakia). Why such resilience? We argue that advanced capitalist systems are embedded in advanced democracies; that those in the advanced sectors and aspirational electorates only vote for governments promoting advanced capitalism; thus normally advanced democracies drive advanced capitalism, promoting competition and providing infrastructure. From modern economic geography, knowledge is increasingly embedded in skill clusters and agglomerating cities; hence advanced capital, whose profitability depends on knowledge, is politically weak being tied down and not footloose. Electoral backlash occurs as a result of technological regime change (I explain why); but populist parties are only durably successful when they can deliver desired change. Embedded knowledge by increasing specialisation promotes globalisation; and globalisation in the advanced world, operating through multinationals with knowledge based subsidiary networks, reinforces the autonomy of the advanced nation state. Thus we argue for a symbiosis between the autonomy of the advanced nation state, advanced capitalism and democracy – in opposition to the great theorists of capitalism and the state, from Schumpeter, Hayek and Lindblom, Marx and Poulantzas, to Streeck and Piketty.
About the speaker: David Soskice has been School Professor of Political Science and Economics at the LSE since 2012, where his responsibilities include the promotion of interdisciplinary research. Before that he taught economics at University College Oxford, and was Director of the political economy research division at the WZB in Berlin, 1990-2001. In 2016, he chaired Crossing Paths, Report of the British Academy Working Group on Interdisciplinarity. With Wendy Carlin (UCL) he published Macroeconomics: Instability, Institutions and the Financial System (OUP, 2015). He gave the 2013 Federico Caffѐ lectures in Rome on Knowledge Economies: Winners and Losers. With Peter Hall (Harvard) he edited Varieties of Capitalism (OUP 2001). With Niki Lacey he has written several recent articles on the comparative political economy of crime and punishment, with particular reference to the US. And with Torben Iversen he has just published Democracy and Prosperity: Reinventing Capitalism through a Turbulent Century (Princeton UP). He is a Fellow of the British Academy (Politics, Economics and Management sections); was President of the European Political Science Association 2011-14; and is an Honorary Fellow of Trinity College, Oxford.
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17 April 2019, 17:00-18:30
Badia Refettorio
Chair: Alessandro Bonvini (MWF-HEC)
Introduction: Martin Ruhs (Professor at the RSC)
Abstract: The politics of immigration and the history of (social and political) citizenship are important ways of examining how the state defines the Other. However, beyond the cultural implications of inclusion and exclusion, it is time to take another look at the history of the economics of migration.
While the discourse on migration today emphasizes otherness, the economic factors of mobility have been forgotten. Yet the supply and demand of labour have historically underpinned movement, and immigrants have always been a bellwether of the political economy and historically important additions to national economies: industrial workers yesterday (more men), workers in the service and care industries today (more women). A new economics of mobility needs to re-examine (gendered) labour markets while understanding the choices and costs of migration to individuals, families, and states, from the family economy to the cost of credit to the “business” of migration (the intermediaries along the route), the costs of closure to the state (walls are expensive!), and the subcontracting of detention.
Finally, the literal costs of citizenship can also be explored in a period in which citizenship is increasingly “for sale.”
About the speaker: Nancy L. Green is professor (directrice d’études) of history at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales in Paris, where she is a member of the Centre de Recherches Historiques. She received her doctorate from the University of Chicago in 1980 and a doctorat d’état from the Université de Paris VII in 1996. A specialist of migration history, comparative methods, and French and American social history, her major publications include: Ready-to-Wear and Ready-to-Work: A Century of Industry and Immigrants in Paris and New York (Duke University Press, 1997); Repenser les migrations (Presses Universitaires de France, 2002); Citizenship and Those Who Leave (co-ed. with François Weil) (University of Illinois Press, 2007); Histoire de l’immigration et question coloniale en France (co-ed. with Marie Poinsot) (La documentation française, 2008); The Other Americans in Paris: Businessmen, Countesses, Wayward Youth, 1880-1941, 2014 (University of Chicago Press, 2014); and A Century of Transnationalism: Immigrants and their Homeland Connections (co-ed. with Roger Waldinger (University of Illinois Press, 2016). The Limits of Transnationalism will appear this May with University of Chicago Press.
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15 May 2019, 17:00-18:30
Badia, Refettorio
Chair: James Lee (MWF-SPS)
Introduction: Oliver Westerwinter (MWF-RSC)
Abstract:
Globalization has grown much since 1980s. What political trends have been associated with this growth? This paper examines two aspects of the political consequences of globalization.
Economic globalization, according to some economic theories, has adverse consequences for labour, especially less skilled labour, in the rich democracies. If these voters are the median, then we might expect parties to respond to this by turning against globalization and the openness to flows of goods, services, people and capital that it brings.
Have parties turned against economic openness? And have parties, especially extreme right-wing ones, that oppose openness advanced in terms of their electoral strength as a result?
First I explore whether political parties in the advanced industrial countries have adopted more anti-internationalist platforms as globalization has advanced. Second, I examine whether parties have been affected deferentially by globalization; in particular, have extreme, right-wing extremist parties gained vote share as globalization has proceeded, while mainstream left ones have lost.
The evidence suggests that globalization, especially trade, is associated with a political turn to anti-internationalism and to extremist parties.
About the speaker: Helen V. Milner is the B. C. Forbes Professor of Politics and International Affairs at Princeton University and the director of the Niehaus Center for Globalization and Governance at Princeton's Woodrow Wilson School. She was the chair of the Department of Politics from 2005 to 2011. She was president of the International Political Science Association (IPSA) from 2012-14. She has written extensively on issues related to international and comparative political economy, the connections between domestic politics and foreign policy, globalization and regionalism, and the relationship between democracy and trade policy.
She is currently working on issues related to globalization and development, such as the political economy of foreign aid, the "digital divide" and the global diffusion of the internet, and the relationship between globalization and democracy. Her research in these areas concerns Africa, in particular the politics of foreign aid in Uganda and Ghana and the resource curse associated with non-tax income in such countries. She also looks at how globalization interacts with political change in Tunisia in another branch of research.
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5 June 2019, 17:00-18:30
Badia, Emeroteca
Chair: Anna Knaps (RSCAS).
Abstract: In this lecture, Dr Suttle will address, without claiming to comprehensively answer, three linked questions. First, what does justice demand in the regulation of international trade? Second, what implications does our answer to that question have for thinking about the existing positive law of international trade? And third, what implications might the existence and content of that positive law in turn have for how we answer the question of justice?
Claims of justice in trade are not new. As political slogans, they featured prominently in post-colonial campaigns for a New International Economic Order, in the post-Cold War anti-globalisation movement, and in the (very different) post-financial-crisis attacks on the liberal trading system. In the past few years political theorists have begun to take these claims seriously, engaging analytically and critically with the distinctive moral features of international trade and its regulation. However, to date there has been limited engagement between political theorists working on trade justice, and more applied scholarship and practice on the trade regime, including in particular by international economic lawyers. This lecture, and Dr Suttle’s wider research agenda for the past few years, contributes towards bridging that gap.
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 On 2 May 2019 the MWP organized two side events at the EUI State of The Union 2019 under the banner of the Festival D’Europa co-organized with a number of other Florentine institutions
In this panel, Max Weber Fellows from the Departments of History and Civilization and Political and Social Sciences, who are scholars of political theory and intellectual history, ask what we can learn from the European tradition of democratic theory to think about the future of democracy in Europe. In particular, how far are our inherited democratic norms compatible with an EU committed to the norms of the single market and the four freedoms, on the one hand, and ever-closer political as well as economic integration, on the other?
As we shall see, most past thinkers have been critical of elements of one or other or both, suggesting that we must either rethink democracy or rethink the Union if we wish to combine the two. The panel develops chronologically through three linked steps:
On the Liberty of the Ancients
Eniola Anuoluwapo Soyemi, Max Weber Programme, Department of Political and Social Sciences Fellow: Aristotle
Jared Holley, Max Weber Programme, Department of History and Civilization Fellow: Rousseau
On the Liberties of the Moderns
Bruno Leipold, Max Weber Programme Department of Political and Social Sciences Fellow: Marx
Alessandro Bonvini, Max Weber Programme, Department of History and Civilization Fellow: Mazzini
On Combing the Liberties of the Ancients with that of the Moderns in the EU
Jens van ‘t Klooster, Max Weber Programme, Department of Political and Social Sciences Fellow: The Rawls-Van Parijs Debate
Chair: Richard Bellamy, Director of the Max Weber Programme, EUI
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On 2 May 2019 the MWP organized two side events at the EUI State of The Union 2019 under the banner of the Festival D’Europa co-organized with a number of other Florentine institutions
Since the 1980s, within and beyond Europe we have witnessed widespread delegation of powers from governments directly elected by citizens to Non-Majoritarian Institutions (NMIs) that are neither directly elected nor directly managed by elected politicians (Thatcher and Stone Sweet 2002: 2). The institutional forms taken by NMIs include independent regulatory agencies tasked to oversee and facilitate competition (Thatcher 2002a; Coen and Thatcher 2005), central banks charged to conduct monetary policy (McNamara 2002), specialized constitutional courts (Stone Sweet 1989, 1992, 2000, 2002), and supranational bodies such as the European Commission (Wilks and Bartle 2002; Pollack 1997, 2003) and other international organizations (Nielson and Tierney 2003). Functional rationales for explaining delegation centered on the outcomes that these unelected bodies were expected to deliver better than elected politicians, and which included providing long-term commitments credible to investors, enhancing the efficiency of policymaking, and better dealing with highly technical areas (Levy and Spiller 1994; Majone 1996, 1997; Thatcher and Stone Sweet 2002). However, rather than technical, Pareto-efficient decisions (where some benefit and no one is made worse off), NMIs have increasingly taken political decisions with clearly distributive implications and both winners and losers. Furthermore, today, NMIs are commonly accused of having failed to deliver on their promises, having frequently led to rather unpopular outcomes (e.g., price rises, fiscal costs due to supervisory failures).
This project takes these pressing, present-day political pressures as an opportunity to take stock of two or three decades of experience since the initial delegations. It focuses on post-delegation politics, which has been studied less than the design of delegation. It asks questions related to the ‘zone of discretion’ (i.e., discretion granted, minus controls set up), looked at both synchronically and diachronically. The project addresses these questions by engaging with three perspectives offering different theoretical expectations. The first is principal-agent, the dominant framework for studying delegation (Epstein and O’Halloran 1999; McCubbins et al. 1987). In line with rational choice approaches more generally, actors’ preferences are assumed to be stable and defined ex ante; changes therefore tend to be explained by referring to external shocks, such as events unexpected at the time of the initial delegation. An alternative is offered by more sociological logics (DiMaggio and Powell 1991). Here, the reasons why NMIs were set up in the first place had more to do with appropriateness than with expected functional advantages (McNamara 2002). Accordingly, NMIs largely created for symbolic reasons may then actually lead to unexpected functional outcomes or material impacts (Wilks and Bartle 2002). Moreover, subsequent alterations tend to be more endogenous, and relate in particular to changes in trends and fashions. Still another perspective, also more focused on endogenous change, is provided by historical institutionalism (Thelen 1999; Pierson 2000; Streeck and Thelen 2005). From this viewpoint, context, traditions and history matter, both in making similar formal structures operating in different ways (Thatcher 2002a, 2002b) and in conditioning subsequent institutional change (Thatcher and Coen 2008; Thatcher 2011).
In sum, this project aims at stimulating discussion about contemporary urgent problems and more subterranean long-term dynamics, in the light of different theoretical perspectives and the contributors’ respective empirical interests and expertise, which in turn offer a wide sample of NMIs across various polities.
Chair:
David Coen, Professor of Public Policy and founding Director of Global Governance Institute, University College London
Speakers:
Eugenia de Conceicao-Heldt, Reform Rector, Bavarian School of Public Policy at the Technical University of Munich, Chair of European and Global Governance and Founding Dean of the TUM School of Governance
Erik Jones, Professor of European Studies and International Political Economy and Director of European and Eurasian Studies, Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies
Bernardo Rangoni, Max Weber Fellow, Law Department, EUI
Mark Thatcher, Professor of Political Science, LUISS Guido Carli and of Comparative and International Politics, LSE
Anna Tzanaki, Max Weber Fellow, Law Department, EUI
Lucia Quaglia, Professor of Political Science, University of Bologna
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12th April 2019
EUI, Badia Fiesolana, Emeroteca
Organizers: Silvia D’Amato (MWF-RSC) & Caterina Paolucci (Director James Madison University in Florence)
The Max Weber Programme and the James Madison University’s M.A. Program in European Union Policy Studies are pleased to announce the 12th Joint Graduate Symposium. The symposium gave JMU’s MA students in European Union Policy Studies an opportunity to present and discuss their own research with Max Weber Fellows and the wider EUI community in anacademic setting.
This year, the symposium highlighted ever diverging problems in the EU, including economic, social, political, and security issues.
The conference culminated with a keynote lecture by Dr. Federica Bicchi, Professor of Political Science at London School of Economics and Political Science.
Conference programme (PDF)
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29 April 2019, 9:00-17:00
30 April 2019, 9:30-12:00
Organizers: Margot Dazey (SPS), Mathilde Zederman (RSCAS)
Abstract: The Arab revolutions of 2011 have strikingly reconfigured Islamic movements’ mobilisations. Their electoral successes in some countries, their renewed participation in institutional politics, their deployment as social movements in other contexts, and finally the resurgent state repression in Egypt and elsewhere, have all reshaped the organisational and ideological identities of these movements. Islamism has undergone both (out-ward) pluralisation and (in-ward) fragmentation, with new lines of division arising between competing factions. Internal debates have grown in intensity, over issues of political programs, social outreach and self-labelling strategies (“Muslim democrat”, “Islamist”, “Salafi”, etc). Tactical choices have been vividly discussed both at the grassroots and leadership levels of the movements, and new, unexpected behaviours have been adopted in the face of disrupted states. Considering these transformations, this workshop aims at updating the paradigms, method designs and data collection procedures used for investigating Islamic movements and capturing their evolving role in the politics of North Africa and the Middle East. Such endeavour will be carried out in the course of three panels, each of them tackling a core methodological challenge.
Programme (pdf)
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 3 May, 9:30-18:00
Badia, Sala del Capitolo
Organizers: Bernardo Rangoni (LAW), Anna Tzanaki (LAW)
Abstract: Since the 1980s, within and beyond Europe we have witnessed widespread delegation of powers from governments directly elected by citizens to Non-Majoritarian Institutions (NMIs) that are neither directly elected nor directly managed by elected politicians (Thatcher and Stone Sweet 2002: 2).
The institutional forms taken by NMIs include independent regulatory agencies tasked to oversee and facilitate competition (Thatcher 2002a; Coen and Thatcher 2005), central banks charged to conduct monetary policy (McNamara 2002), specialized constitutional courts (Stone Sweet 1989, 1992, 2000, 2002), and supranational bodies such as the European Commission (Wilks and Bartle 2002; Pollack 1997, 2003) and other international organizations (Nielson and Tierney 2003).
Functional rationales for explaining delegation centered on the outcomes that these unelected bodies were expected to deliver better than elected politicians, and which included providing long-term commitments credible to investors, enhancing the efficiency of policymaking, and better dealing with highly technical areas (Levy and Spiller 1994; Majone 1996, 1997; Thatcher and Stone Sweet 2002). However, rather than technical, Pareto-efficient decisions (where some benefit and no one is made worse off), NMIs have increasingly taken political decisions with clearly distributive implications and both winners and losers.
Furthermore, today, NMIs are commonly accused of having failed to deliver on their promises, having frequently led to rather unpopular outcomes (e.g., price rises, fiscal costs due to supervisory failures).
Programme (pdf)
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6 May 2019, 9:15-18:00
Badia, Theatre
Organizers: Per Andersson (SPS), Rémi Dewière (HEC), Benoît Maréchaux (HEC), Corina Mavrodin (HEC), Andrea Papadia (RSCAS), Christopher Roberts (LAW)
Abstract: Successful state-building and the development of state capacity are key challenges for today’s developing countries. However, we still only partially understand how modern states arise and obtain their administrative capabilities, including the ability to tax and provide high-quality social services. In particular, the political, social, institutional, and economic factors that influence these processes are still widely debated.
While there is a wealth of research on democracy and state-building, we know much less about state building in non-democratic settings. This workshop will bring together scholars from different disciplines – using a range of scientific methods and empirical case studies with a wide geographical and temporal scope – to discuss recent work related to past and present state building in non-democratic states. The purpose of the workshop is to start a cross-disciplinary conversation (including history, political science, law and economics) about the academic challenges in the literature on state-building, and some of the problems facing today’s developing countries. The workshop will be of interest to anyone concerned with state-building and institutions in a broad sense.
Programme (pdf)
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9 May 2019, 13:00-17:30
10 May 2019, 10:15-17:00
Badia, Emeroteca
Organizers: Tatyana Zhuravleva (ECO)
Abstract: This interdisciplinary conference targets the effectiveness of children's education around the globe.
The aim of this conference is to reach a better understanding of the contribution of schools, parents, society to the development of children's cognitive and non-cognitive skills, the role of policies (such as maternal and paternal leave, childcare availability etc.) in child development and how (and why) results differ around the globe. In particular, the conference pays special attention to the effectiveness of maternal care versus other forms of childcare arrangements in terms of cognitive and non-cognitive outcomes.
Programme (pdf)
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17 May 2019, 10:00-17:00
Badia, Emeroteca
Organizers: Silvia D’Amato (RSCAS), Athina Sachoulidou (LAW)
Abstract: This workshop will focus on threats that do not originate in and are not confined to a single country.
Terrorism, organised crime, severe human rights violations such as human trafficking are representative examples of the so called transnational threats and appear to be at the top of the European political and jurisprudential agenda since they affect entire regions and ultimately the European community as a whole.
Against this backdrop, the first part of the workshop will be dedicated to the strong linkages between transnational threats like the terrorist one, freedom, justice and security. The notion of national security and the collective responses to transnational challenges that cut across the political and economical dimensions of security will be found at the centre of this session.
In the second part of the workshop, the focus will shift onto the European regulatory efforts to address transnational threats. Recent European measures on combating terrorism and human rights violations as well as on the use of personal data in the field of law enforcement will offer a number of examples to understand and evaluate the changing landscape of European criminal law policies and sanction regimes as well as to explore whether those changes and policies are still in accordance with fundamental freedoms, democracy and the rule of law.
To facilitate the understanding of the practical impact of the European strategy to counter transnational threats, the third part of the workshop will provide an insight in the European agencies’ perspective using the example of Europol and its efforts to enhance cross-border law enforcement authorities’ cooperation.
Programme (pdf)
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28 May 2019, 14:00-17:00
Villa Schifanoia, Sala Triaria
Organizers: Oliver Westerwinter (RSCAS), Mette Eilstrup-Sangiovanni (Jean Monnet Fellow)
Abstract: Global governance structures are increasingly described as highly complex, fragmented, andpolycentric. In many issue areas, the creation, design, evolution, and effectiveness of individualgovernance institutions are fundamentally shaped by how these institutions relate to and interact withother institutions operating in their domain.
A large swathe of recent work in international relationsand international law acknowledges the importance of institutional complexity for understandingglobal governance. However, much existing work focuses on developing typologies to better grasp thephenomenon and, empirically, are often based on the study of single cases, or limited to particularissue-areas.
Thus, despite a fast proliferating literature on institutional complexity, major conceptual,theoretical, and empirical questions remain.
The papers presented at this workshop address thisresearch gap. Using new data and innovative methods, they map institutional complexity in a broadrange of issue areas of world politics and develop new theoretical arguments to explain theemergence, development, and consequences of institutional complexity. Together, they makeimportant theoretical and empirical contributions to the study of global governance and open upavenues for future research.
Programme (pdf)
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31 May 2019, 9:30-17:30
Badia, Seminar Room 4
Organizers: Rémi Dewière (HEC), Igor Rogelja (SPS), Pascale Siegrist (HEC)
Abstract: The workshop reflects on the use of maps by social sciences in studying relations between power, space and societies.
This leads us to critically review what we as researchers do when we map and fix non-state people in writing, and to think about a usage of maps in the study of societies that would not erase marginals, nomads, migrants or subalterns.
We want to look at how maps were themselves an expression of mobility, and how ‘static’ techniques could be appropriated for subversive purposes. Broadly speaking, these follow the cycle of maps as tools of the state, their criticism, subversion, and relapse, all the while interrogating their particular mobile-immobile ontology.
Programme (pdf)
The workshop were preceeded by two preparatory master classes in coordination with the Department of History and Civilisation at EUI.
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We are glad to receive and announce former and current MW Fellows’ publications. Due to restricted space this is but a selection of publications received in the last few months.
- Antonio Aloisi (LAW 2018-19): “Workers without workplaces and unions without unity. Non-standard forms of employment and collective rights” (with Elena Gramano), forthcoming, Bulletin of Comparative Labour Relations.
- Antonio Aloisi (LAW 2018-19): “Fundamental labour rights, platform work and protection of non-standard workers”(with Valerio De Stefano), forthcoming in Bellace J. R. and Ter Haar B. (Eds.), Labour, Business and Human Rights Law, Edward Elgar Publishing Ltd.
 Gregorio Bettiza (SPS 2012-14): Finding Faith in Foreign Policy: Religion and American Diplomacy in a Postsecular World (Oxford University Press, 2019). - Mauricio Bucca (SPS 2018-20): (with Mario Molina and Michael Macy) “It's not just how the game is played, it's whether you win or lose”, accepted for publication at Science Advances.
 Agustin Casas (ECO 2011-12), “Distributive Politics with Vote and Turnout Buying”, American Political Science Review, Volume 112, Issue 4, November 2018 , pp. 1111-1119. Emmanuel Comte (HEC 2014-16): "Xénophobie en mer: Marins français contre étrangers dans la Communauté européenne, 1971-1975." Le Mouvement Social No. 3 (July–September 2018): 41–59. - Emmanuel Comte (HEC 2014-16): Interview, “The history of the European migration regime: Germany’s strategic hegemony,” In The Long Run, Blog of the Department of Politics and International Studies (POLIS) at the University of Cambridge.
 Ayça Çubukçu (SPS 2009-10): open-access symposium on her book For the Love of Humanity has been published by the Humanity Journal. Muriam Davis (HEC 2015-16), (with Thomas Serres), North Africa and the Making of Europe Governance, Institutions and Culture, Bloomsbury 2019. Silvia D’Amato (RSCAS 2018-20): Cultures of Counterterrorism. French and Italian Responses to Terrorism after 9/11, Routledge. - Silvia D’Amato (RSCAS 2018-20): Islamization of criminal behaviour: The path to terrorism? Terrorist threat and crime in French counterterrorism policy-formulation”. European Journal of Criminology. doi.org/10.1177/1477370819828955.
- Tina Freyburg (SPS 2011-12) has co-authored “Who is behind internet shutdowns?”, the video explains the role of telecom companies in politically-motivated disruptions [Freyburg, Garbe & Wavre 2016-2018]. Swiss Network for International Studies (SNIS), "Telecommunications Politics in Authoritarian Developing Countries", see snis.ch/project/telecommunica.
 Rasmus Hoffmann (SPS 2008-09): (with), Kröger H, Tarkiainen L, Martikainen P 2019, “Dimensions of social stratification and their relation to mortality - A comparison across gender and life course periods in Finland”, Social Indicators Research, published online first. Alexander Katsaitis (RSCAS 2016-17) (with Coen D.,) (2019) “Legislative Efficiency and Political Inclusiveness: The Effect of Procedures on Interest Group Mobilization in the European Parliament”. Journal of Legislative Studies 25 (2): 278-294.  Iakovos Iakovidis (RSCAS 2017-19) and Johannes Galariotis (RSCAS 2017-18), “The formation of the EU negotiating strategy at the UN: the case of human rights”, Cambridge Review of International Affairs Volume 31, 2018 - Issue 5. Zoe Lefkofridi (SPS 2013-15), (with Nathalie Giger and Anne Maria Holli): "When All Parties Nominate Women: The Role of Political Gender Stereotypes in Voters’ Choices." Politics & Gender (2018): 1-27.- Zoe Lefkofridi (SPS 2013-15), and Alexia Katsanidou (SPS 2009-10): "A Step Closer to a Transnational Party System? Competition and Coherence in the 2009 and 2014 European Parliament." JCMS: Journal of Common Market Studies 56, no. 6 (2018): 1462-1482.
 Sophie Lemiere (RSCAS 2015-17): Minorities Matter: Malaysian Politics and People Vol.3 published by Gerakbudaya (Malaysia) and ISEAS (Singapore).- Sophie Lemiere (RSCAS 2015-17): “The Downfall of Malaysia's Ruling Party”, Journal of Democracy, Vol 29(4), 114 - 128 October 2018.
- Sophie Lemiere (RSCAS 2015-17): “Malaysia: Gangster Boogie, Bosses And Politics” In F.Allum and S.Gilmour, Handbook of Organised Crime and Politics, Chapter 26, Edward Elgar Publishing, March, 2019.
- Stéphanie Novak (SPS 2010-11), (with Maarten Hillebrandt): "Analysing the trade-off between transparency and efficiency in the Council of the European Union." Journal of European Public Policy (2019): 1-19. tandfonline.com.
 Elsa Clara Massoc (SPS 2018-19) “Power and Institutions: the divergent priorities of European states towards “too-big-to-fail” banks - The cases of competition in retail banking and the banking structural reform”, Business and Politics, Forthcoming 2019.  Andrei Poama (SPS 2016-17), with Tom Theuns: “Making Offenders Vote: Democratic Expressivism and Compulsory Criminal Voting”, American Political Science Review, 1-14. doi:10.1017/S0003055419000297.-
 Ignacio de la Rasilla del Moral (LAW 2011-12): Experiments in International Adjudication. Historical Accounts Cambridge University Press (2019).
- Ignacio de la Rasilla del Moral (LAW 2011-12): “The World Court of Human Rights: Rise, Fall and Revival?” Human Rights Law Review (2019).
- Ignacio de la Rasilla del Moral (LAW 2011-12): “The Problem of Periodization in the History of International Law”, Law and History Review (2019).
 Clara Rauchegger (LAW 2016-18) and Anna Wallerman (LAW 2017-18) The Eurosceptic Challenge: National Implementation and Interpretation of EU Law, Hart Publishing, forthcoming in September .  Line Rennwald (SPS 2016-18) (with Mosimann, and L., A. Zimmermann) (2019): “The Radical Right, the Labour Movement, and the Competition for the Workers’ Vote”, Economic and Industrial Democracy 40(1): 65–90. - Line Rennwald (SPS 2016-18) (with Giger, N., and A. Tresch) (2018): Special issue “The 2015 Swiss National Elections”, Swiss Political Science Review 24(4).
- Julija Sardelic (SPS 2014-16): "Roma In Times Of Territorial Rescaling: An Inquiry Into The Margins Of European Citizenship". Ethnopolitics, 1-15. doi:10.1080/17449057.2019.1584495.
- Julija Sardelic (SPS 2014-16): The Politics around Romani Migration”. In The Routledge Companion to Migration Communication, and Politics (Eds. S. Croucher, J. Caetano & E. Croucher). London & New York: Routledge. Available at: taylorfrancis.com.
- Julija Sardelic (SPS 2014-16): “Reading Too Much or Too Little into the Matter? Latent Limits and Potentials of EU Freedom of Movement”. In Debating European Citizenship (Ed. Rainer Bauböck). SpringerOpen. Available at: link.springer.com.
- Gemma Scalise (SPS 2017-19): (with) Burroni, L., Gherardini, A., 2019, “Policy failure in the triangle of growth: labour market, human capital, and innovation in Spain and Italy”, South European Society and Politics, 24, 1, pp. 29-52.
 Aris Trantidis (SPS 2016-18): forthcoming in Polity, “Hayek versus Trump: The Radical Right’s Road to Serfdom”.  Justin Valasek (ECO 2011-12): “Dynamic reform of public institutions: A model of motivated agents and collective reputation”, Journal of Public Economics Volume 168, December 2018, Pages 94-108. Inés Valdez (SPS 2011-12): 2019 Transnational Cosmopolitanism. Kant, Du Bois, and Justice as a Political Craft (New York: Cambridge University Press). Eva Zschirnt (SPS 2018-20): (2019) “Evidence of Hiring Discrimination against the Second Generation: Results from a Correspondence Test in the Swiss Labour Market”, Journal of International Migration and Integration (Online first) 1-23. - Eva Zschirnt (SPS 2018-20): (2019) “Research Ethics in Correspondence Testing: An Update”, Research Ethics. 15(2) 1-21.
 Antonio Aloisi (LAW 2018-19) will join the faculty of IE University – Madrid where he has been appointed Assistant Professor in European & Comparative Labour Law.  Shreya Atrey (LAW 2016-17), as of the Autumn 2019, will be Associate Professor of International Human Rights Law at the University of Oxford. Stephane Beaulac (LAW 2006-07) has started a new job as counsel (avocat-conseil) with the litigation group at the Montreal office of Dentons S.E.N.C.R.L., a global law firm with over 10,000 lawyers world-wide. His practice concentrates on public law, especially cases involving constitutional law and public international law, as well as issues pertaining to regulation, both domestic and international. Stéphane remains a full-time law professor with the University of Montreal.  Leonardo Carrio Cataldi (HEC 2017-18) has been awarded a Newton International Fellowship by the British Academy, based at UCL. (thebritishacademy.ac.uk)  Chris Colvin (HEC 2011-12) is Senior Lecturer in Economics at Queen’s Management School, Queen’s University Belfast.  Aitana Guia (RSCAS 2015-16) has been promoted to Associate Professor at California State University, Fullerton. Heather Jones (HEC 2007-08) is now Professor of Modern and Contemporary European History at University College London. Sophie Lemiere (RSCAS 2015-17) will be a visiting scholar at the Center for Southeast Asian Studies (CSEAS) at Kyoto University in the autumn of 2019, and in February 2020 she will be one of the International Visiting Scholars at the Humanities Center at Stanford University. She has also been awarded the Reagan-Fascell Democracy Fellowship at the International Forum for Democratic Studies (National Endowment for Democracy-NED), in Washington, D.C (March to July). Zoe Lefkofridi (SPS 2013-15) became Associate Professor of Comparative Politics (tenured) in February 2019. Brigitte Le Normand (HEC 2007-08) was promoted to Associate Professor at the University of British Columbia, Okanagan.  Robert Lepenies (SPS 2013-15) was elected to the executive committee of the Global Young Academy at the Academy of Sciences Leopoldina in May 2019. globalyoungacademy.net  Nathan Marcus (HEC 2010-12) is Senior Lecturer with the Department of General History at Ben Gurion University of the Negev in Beer Sheva. Elsa Clara Massoc (SPS 2018-19) will join the Foundation for Law and Finance of the Goethe University in Frankfurt as an Assistant Professor in September 2019. Paolo Pin (ECO 2008-09) was named Full Professor at the University of Siena.  Inés Valdez (SPS 2011-12) was promoted to Associate Professor (Department of Political Science, Ohio State University), starting June 2019. She was also named Director of the Latina/o Studies Program (Ohio State University), starting this autumn.
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 Julian Garritzmann (SPS 2018-19) was awarded the Swiss Political Science Association’s (SVPW) Best Paper Prize (Nachwuchspreis) 2019 for a paper on the power of oppositions, published in the Journal of Legislative Studies: tandfonline.com  Steven Klein (SPS 2016-17) was awarded a Berlin Prize fellowship for 2019-2020: americanacademy.de  Ignacio de La Rasilla (LAW 2011-12) has been selected for the 'One Thousand Talents Plan’ in China, a high academic honour awarded by the State Council of the People's Republic of China.  Robin Markwica (SPS 2017-18)’s Emotional Choices was awarded the book prize of the American Political Science Association's International Security Section and the Christiane Rajewsky Award of the German Association for Peace and Conflict Studies.  Elsa Clara Massoc (SPS 2018-19) was awarded an Honorable Mention in this year's competition for the Ernst B. Haas best dissertation award of the European Politics and Society section of the American Political Science Association for her dissertation "Banking on States? The Divergent Trajectories of European Finance after the Crisis".  Gemma Scalise (SPS 2017-19) was awarded the Premio Alessandro Pansa by the Feltrinelli Foundation for her research project on the impact of digitalization on the labour market, job quality and employment security: feltrinellieditore.it  Danilo Scholz (SPS 2018-19) was awarded the Heinrich Mann Prize 2019 by the German Academy of Arts for his essays on Europe and articles on French intellectual life, which appeared in various German magazines and broadsheets: adk.de  Pascale Siegrist (HEC 2018-19) was awarded an important Fellowship for next year, Fung Global Fellows Program at the Princeton University, Institute for International and Regional Studies. The Program will focus on “Thinking Global” and will explore ‘how ideas framed the understanding of interests and the making of institutions that have yielded commonness and conflict across and within borders’.  Giulia Tura (ECO 2017-19) won the EIEF (Einaudi Institute for Economics and Finance) 2018 grant for a project titled “Matching Refugees: Economic and Socio-Cultural Integration Perspectives”. Anna Tzanaki (LAW 2018-19) was awarded a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowship for her project titled “The dark side of partial ownership and financial investment in Europe: What price to pay for consumers and society? (PARTOWNEU)”, hosted at Lund University, Sweden (Lunds Universitet) as of 1 September 2019. -
 Inés Valdez (SPS 2011-12)’s article “Non-Domination or Practices of Freedom? French Muslim Women, Foucault, and the Full Veil Ban,” in the American Political Science Review (2016) was awarded the Stanley Hoffman Award for best English language, peer-reviewed article on French Politics by the French Politics section of the APSA (American Political Science Association). She also received a Faculty Award for Service (2018-2019) from the Latina/o Studies Program (Ohio State University).
 Oliver Westerwinter (RSCAS 2018-19) was awarded a grant by the Swiss National Science Foundation to pursue his project titled “Gauging Global Governance: The Effectiveness of Transnational Public-Private Governance Initiatives and Intergovernmental Organizations”. The project examines the conditions under which formal and informal global governance institutions are effective. It uses a multi-method research design to investigate why some transnational public-private governance initiatives perform well while others do poorly, and whether the pathways to good performance differ across and between transnational public-private governance initiatives and intergovernmental organizations. The project will provide the first large-n comparative analysis of the effectiveness of different forms of global governance and one of the first applications of a big data approach to the study of global governance. The grant runs from October 2019 to October 2022.  Aydin Yildirim (RSCAS 2017-19) was awarded a 2 years Marie Curie grant for his project based at the World Trade Institute in Bern, Switzerland. The project mainly aims to understand the role of multinational companies (MNCs) in trade governance. It will examine the ways in which global firms politically mobilize and reach their policy objectives.
 Julija Sardelic (SPS 2014-16) married Michael Winikoff on 25th May 2019.  Sebastian, son of Leen Vandecasteele (SPS 2011-12), was born on 31 January 2019 to the joy of Christian (dad) and Louisa (sister).
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The MWP Newsletter is a platform for current and former Fellows to share their news and short articles about their academic experience. Please send them to mwp@eui.eu |
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