Research Programme 1: News

Projects

• BMBF provides funding for GIGA research project on „Ideological Change and Regime Legitimacy in China“ as part of the “Research Network on Governance in China”
  The Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) in April 2010 granted funding for the “Research Network on Governance in China” for a period of four years. Part of the network is the GIGA research project “Ideological Change and Regime Legitimacy in China” under the responsibility of Dr. Heike Holbig. In the project she will be working with Maria Bondes and Sandra Heep as research fellows, who will also participate in the GIGA Ph.D. student programme. The “Research Network on Governance in China” is a research cooperation between the GIGA and the universities of Würzburg, Duisburg-Essen, Tübingen and Trier. The BMBF sponsors the research network as part of the “Strengthening and Advancing Area Studies” initiative.

• German Research Foundation funds project on hybrid regimes in Africa
  The German Research Fundation funds the research project 'Systematic comparison of the causes of hybrid regimes in Africa. The project, which started in April 2009 and is scheduled for two years, investigates the parth dependency of different regimes types in sub-Saharan Africa. The research project is affiliated with research programme 1 of the GIGA and is headed by Dr. Gero Erdmann. Alexander Stroh and Sebastian Elischer also form part of the research team.
  

Conferences/Events/Lectures

• Lecture Series GIGA Forum:

  all arrangements

• Workshop on authoritarian regimes in comparative perspective at ECPR Joint Sessions 2010
  The European Consortium for Political Research (ECPR) has approved a workshop proposal by Dr Patrick Köllner (GIGA) and Dr Steffen Kailitz (Hannah Arendt Institute for Research on Totalitarianism, Dresden) for the ECPR Joint Sessions 2010 in Muenster, Germany (22-27 March 2010). More information on the workshop entitled "Comparing Autocracies: Theoretical Issues and Emprical Analyses of Input/Output Dimensions" will be available on the ECPR's website in due course.

• Presentations at workshop on 'authoritarian consolidation'
  Dr Heike Holbig and Dr Thomas Richter present papers at a workshop at a workshop entitled 'Authoritarian Consolidation' (Duisburg University, 14-15 May 2009) on 'Mechanisms of material legitimation of Arab authoritarian regimes' and 'Internal and external strategies of legitimizing authoritarian rule: Theoretical perspectives'. Dr Patrick Köllner, speaker of the GIGA research team 'Persistence and change of non-democratic regimes' will act as a discussant in the workshop.

• Presentations on authoritarian regimes in 2009
  Dr Marco Bünte and Diplom-Kulturwirt Johannes Gerschewski M.A. present results of their current research on authoritarian regimes in East and Southeast Asia at a workshop entitled "Authoritarianism Reloaded", which takes place in Bad Urach from 11-14 June 2009. Johannes Gerschewski also talks on "What Makes Autocracies Endure? Explaining Breakdown and Persistence of Autocracies in East Asia" at a panel on "The (In)Stability of Authoritarian Regimes" at the ECPR General Conference in Potsdam (10-12 September 2009). PD Dr Patrick Köllner acts as the panel's discussant.

• Presentations at ECPR Joint Sessions 2009
  At the ECPR Joint Sessions 2009 in Lisbon (14-19 April), Dr Bert Hoffmann and Professor Detlef Nolte give talks on 'The Transformation of the Public Sphere in the Digital Era: Options for Civil Society in State-Socialist Regimes' (as part of the workshop on 'Civil Society Dynamics Under Authoritarian Rule') and on 'Institutional Design of Parliamentary Rules in Latin American Presidential Democracies" (as part of the workshop on 'Institutional Design of Parliamentary Rules and Party Politics'), respectively.

• Presentations at German Political Science Association's section on comparative politics
  Johannes Gerschewski, Patrick Köllner, and Detlef Nolte will present papers on new research on authoritarian regimes, theorizing totalitarian regimes, and constitutional changes in Latin America, respectively, at a conference of the comparative-politics section of the German Political Science Association, which will be held in Darmstadt, 22-24 January 2009. Conference programm

• Jorge Gordin and Laurence Whitehead responsible for the section „Latin American Politics“ at the 5th ECPR General Conference
  The European Consortium for Political Research (ECPR) approved the section proposal of Jorge Gordin, PhD (GIGA), and Professor Laurence Whitehead, PhD, (Latin American Centre Oxford) for “Latin American Politics” which in total has been allocated seven panels. The ECPR General Conference, being hosted by the Association annually since 2001 in various European cities, takes place between the 10th and the 12th September 2009 at the University of Potsdam including a broad spectrum of topics and fields.

New publications

• GIGA Working Paper
  Holbig, Heike and Gilley, Bruce: In Search of Legitimacy in Post-revolutionary China: Bringing Ideology and Governance Back In, March 2010, Hamburg

• Schucher, Günter: Liberalisierung in Zeiten der Instabilität. Spielräume unkonventioneller Partizipation im autoritären Regime der VR China, in: ASIEN, Vol.: 111 (April), S. 50-75

• Erdmann, Gero/Kneuer, Marianne) (Hg.): Externe Faktoren der Demokratisierung, Baden-Baden: Nomos Verlag 2009

• Köllner, Patrick ( 2008): Autoritäre Regime - Ein Überblick über die jüngere Literatur, in: Zeitschrift für Vergleichende Politikwissenschaft, 2/2008, S. 351-368.

• Gilley, Bruce/Holbig, Heike (2009): The Debate on Party Legitimacy in China: A Mixed Quantitative/Qualitative Analysis, in: Journal of Contemporary China (i.E.)

• Ufen, Andreas: The 2008 Elections in Malaysia. Uncertainties of Electoral Authoritarianism, in: Taiwan Journal of Democracy, 4 (2008), 1, S. 155-169 (Volltext)

• Marco Bünte und Andreas Ufen: Democratization in Post-Suharto Indonesia, London: Routledge 2008 (Inhaltsverzeichnis / Flyer with discount order form)
  

• Köllner, Patrick (2009): Japanese Lower House Campaigns in Transition: Manifest Changes or Fleeting Fads?, in: Journal of East Asian Studies 9, 1, S. 121-149.

Personnel matters

• Doctoral students obtain scholarships
  Dipl. Kulturw. Johannes Gerschewski, M.A. (IAS/RP 1 and RP 2), Martin Schulz, LL.M. (IAS/RP 1), and Dipl.-Pol. Frank Stengel, M.A. (IAS/RP 2) have been granted scholarships to pursue their respective Ph.D. theses. Johannes Gerschewski joins in October 2008 the Berlin Graduate School of Social Sciences of Humboldt-University Berlin and will continue there to study the stability of the North Korean regime. Frank Stengel joins in September 2008 to the Bremen International Graduate School of Social Sciences to write his Ph.D. thesis on Germany's changing stance on the international use of force. Finally, the Korea Foundation will provide from October 2008 onwards financial support for Martin Schulz' dissertation on the role of the Constitutional Court in South Korea's political system.