infonet-economy

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With the award of a Nobel prize in 1986 to James M. Buchanan, the time-honoured social contract theory of political philosophy finally (re-)entered the realm of economic theory. The contractarian approach has turned out to be a crucial element in the foundation of what is called now the New Institutional Economics. The new openness of the discipline to contractarian…

Viele Angebote des ethisch-ökologischen Investments arbeiten mit Kriterienlisten, die oft einer kritischen Überprüfung kaum standhalten. Es ist ein Übergewicht ökologischer Kriterien festzustellen, soziale Kriterien werden ob ihrer schweren Fassbarkeit eher vernachlässigt. Vorgeschlagen wird stattdessen ein integrativer Ansatz, der auch auf die Motivation der…

In this paper, we discuss the relation between social movements, public opinion, and political alliances with respect to the impact of movements on public policy. We first discuss the existing literature and sketch three broad models of the role of public opinion and political alliances (or the absence of such role) in facilitating the task of social movements in producing policy…

In this paper we focus on the handling by the police of mass demonstrations in Switzerland during the past three decades. Our aim is to single out the determinants of police intervention during these protest events. We look at three sets of potential causes: (1) the configuration of power (i.e. political alliances and coalitions), (2) face-to-face interactions between protesters and…

Social movements can have an impact on institutions by aiming explicitly at institutional change or by pursuing policy goals. In the former situation, their chances of success depends on factors internal and external to the movements. In the latter situation, the contribution of policy-oriented movements to institutional reform can be seen as a by-product of their action. A process…