The man in the picture above is a self-proclaimed fan of Monsanto Company’s genetically engineered soybeans. In fact, every year until 2007 Vernon Hugh Bowman – a 75-year-old farmer from Indiana – purchased Monsanto’s Roundup-Ready soy seeds (RR) from a licensed retailer in order to plant his crop of soy. RR is a type of genetically modified seed that has in-plant resistance to glyphosate, the active ingredient in Monsanto’s Roundup herbicides. This means RR soy crops can be sprayed with Roundup weed-killers without any damage being done to the soy.

But despite his loyalty and admiration, in 2007 Bowman was sued by Monsanto for patent infringement, and the farmer has taken on a legal dispute that recently reached the U.S. Supreme Court. The case revolves around whether Monsanto’s patent over RR soybeans grants it control over the reproduction of second-generation seeds. But from a broader perspective it raises the question of what institutional framework is most desirable for regulating the scope of patent rights and points to the tension between protecting competitive markets and promoting innovation through patents. Moreover, it brings to the public sphere discussions concerning transformations of the farming sector resulting from the privatization of its basic input – seeds.

Every time he bought a batch of RR seeds from the licensed retailer, Bowman would agree to a contract – called a Technology Use Agreement – promising not to save or plant seeds from the resulting crop. But in 1997 the Indiana farmer decided he would start planting an additional second crop of soy later in the growing season, and reasoned that instead of paying for RR seeds it would be better to purchase cheaper commodity seeds from a local grain elevator. These elevators sell an undifferentiated, lower-quality variety of soy seeds normally used for animal feed or industrial purposes. Bowman’s choice for the commodity seeds was driven by the risks associated to second cropping, namely due to weather and soil conditions that would make it too risky to invest in RR technology. And since no Technology Use Agreement was signed concerning the commodity seeds, Bowman went on to use them as if no patent protection were applicable.

But this is where things got tricky. Considering that 94 percent of Indiana’s acres of soybeans are herbicide resistant, it was likely that many of the seeds purchased from the commodity elevator would be RR. So Bowman planted them and sprayed them with herbicide, and found out that most of the seeds indeed had in-plant resistance. He kept the seeds and started replanting them, until in 2007 Monsanto discovered these activities and filed suit for patent infringement. Their argument was that even though the company no longer had contractual control over what was sold by the commodity elevator, planting these seeds is equivalent to reproducing the patented product and therefore violates Monsanto’s rights. Bowman’s reply was that the patent had been “exhausted” after the authorized sale, since the patent exhaustion doctrine states that

“[t]he authorized sale of an article that substantially embodies a patent exhausts the patent holder’s rights and prevents the patent holder from invoking patent law to control post-sale use of the article.”

The case poses important problems. For generations, farmers have been going to elevators to purchase soybean and other grains as commodities. What they did with these seeds was their own business. And in a sector where a large fraction of the market is controlled by a small number of companies, these elevators have become one of the few ways farmers could purchase non-patented seed, be it for animal feed, second cropping or whatnot. Public soybean varieties are currently very hard to find, and even universities get patents on their technology. On the other hand, allowing farmers to freely replant patented seeds might seriously reduce the incentives to invest in research and development in the biotechnology industry.

The arguments presented in court have addressed mainly the economic impacts of the Bowman v. Monsanto decision. According to Monsanto, allowing farmers to plant second-generation GE seeds – no matter how they got them – would be catastrophic for investment and innovation in the agrochemical industry. The Supreme Court’s preliminary declarations on the case seem to be aligned with this point of view. During the first hearing, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. asked

“Why in the world would anybody spend any money to try to improve the seed if as soon as they sold the first one anybody could grow more and have as many of those seeds as they want?”

The Federal Government has also sided with Monsanto in its Amicus Curiae, as did the Intellectual Property Law Association, software and hardware technology companies, and other sectors of industry.

On the other side of the dispute, organizations such as the Center for Food Safety, Save Our Seeds and the American Antitrust Institute argued that deciding in favor of Monsanto would lead to a further consolidation of what has become a largely concentrated market, leading to an actual reduction in investments and innovation as well as increased seed prices. According to the AAI,

“If allowed to stand, the Federal Circuit’s exception to the first sale doctrine likely will chill or altogether eliminate competition from commodity seed. Notwithstanding that a given bag of commodity seed actually may contain only a little RR seed or none at all, a purchaser intending to plant, save, and reuse commodity seed will no longer be able to do so unless the purchaser is willing to incur the risk of infringement liability or undertake costly mitigating measures. Whether a commodity seed purchaser’s added costs flow from infringement liability itself, the expense associated with seed sorting, or self-imposed seed-saving restrictions on commodity seed, the net effect is to increase the price of the product to the farmer or to devalue the product sold by the grain elevator.”

Monsanto has a history of aggressively defending its patents in Court. According to a report from the Center for Food Safety, as of November 2012 Monsanto had filed 142 lawsuits involving 410 farmers and 56 small farm businesses alleging seed patent infringement. The Bowman case therefore seemed to present “a microcosm of the problem of farmer prosecution that the current system created and fosters.”

But despite all the talk about “David vs. Goliath”, last week the Supreme Court unanimously ruled that the patent exhaustion doctrine does “not permit a farmer to reproduce patented seeds through planting and harvesting without the patent holder’s permission.” The Supreme Court thus confirmed the Federal Circuit’s decision arguing that there would be a “mismatch between invention and reward” should the replication of seeds be allowed. Concerning the repercussions of this ruling for other self-replicating technologies, like software or viruses, the court stated that the exhaustion doctrine might have to be interpreted differently depending on the circumstances at hand.

All in all, the Bowman case failed to initiate controversies about the broader economic and environmental consequences of seed patents. Especially Monsanto’s patenting practices, like the replacement of Roundup Ready 1 after patent expiration in 2016 through Roundup Ready 2, were not considered. These are questions that simply fall out of the scope of the Supreme Court and would have to be raised before the Patent Office that examines the novelty and non-obviousness of inventions .

The only larger policy issue that was raised seems to be the level of protection patents have to afford in order to incentivize investments in genetically modified seeds; an assessment that is far more difficult to make than is often assumed. Looking beyond the Bowman case, large agrochemical companies are usually not only active in the U.S. or Europe, but also in South America and other regions of the world. In light of their activities, U.S. soybean farmers used to complain that they paid for research and development whose results would be enjoyed for free by their South American competitors. As this is no longer the case and the licensing streams coming from different parts of the world have presumably increased, it might be time to ask how much income is generated due to the transnational expansion of patent protection. Given that cross-border licensing revenues could be measured, it might be possible to determine how many replicated generations of seeds really have to be protected to make further research for Monsanto, Syngenta or Pioneer worthwhile.

These issues were of course not at stake in this case, as Bowman did not even purchase the seeds in question from Monsanto thus making the issue to be decided pretty basic. On the other hand, there are few opportunities to discuss the fact that the opportunity contexts for agrochemical companies have changed since the 1990s, while the assessments of judges and policymakers have not. It might very well be that they are lacking the insights that could be provided by organizations like the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA). This organization has not been extended in light of more transnational challenges, but was abolished in 1995.

(ana/markus)

During the last weeks, the second largest industrial tragedy in history has raised public awareness and debate about global inequality of international labor protection once again. The Rana Plaza complex close to Dhaka, Bangladesh, collapsed on April 24. As the rescue work around the former Tung Hai garment factory is still not completed, the reported death toll moves up to around a thousand people. Yesterday, eight people died in another fire in a garment factory in Dhaka.

Several posts on this blog have reflected on collective action for labor rights in the anti-sweatshop movement, like the The Peoples’ Tribunal in Cambodia (here) and on the reasons and counter strategies regarding low wages in the garment industry in Asia (here). Civil society organizations have also responded to the current incident: Actors like the International Labor Rights Forum and the Clean Clothes Campaign released statements and formulated petitions.

The contributions for the workshop in Freiburg, however, can cover a wide range of issues. Special attention will be paid to questions about highly mobile actors and groups. The organizers, Matthias Möller and Anna Lipphard,

look forward to contributions from historical and contemporary points of view, particularly to those that take into account the different power relations that shape mobile practices and modes of participation. (source)

The event takes place on December 5-6, 2013. The deadline for abstracts (400 words) and a short CV is June 15, 2013.

(jiska)

The incidence was only picked up a couple of months later by the press; however it provoked harsh public criticism against the Catholic Church. The negative publicity fell on fruitful ground. Earlier in the same year there had been an intense media discourse about alleged inappropriate behavior of Catholic welfare providers. A female manager of a Catholic day care facility had been fired after the woman had divorced and moved in with a new partner.  The church argued that “not keeping faith ’til death” was incompatible with the Catholic worldview and hence the woman had to go. The press dug out similar cases where Catholic welfare providers had decided not to employ or to fire people due to their homosexuality or because they had divorced.

The German public was puzzled: how could it be that in a society  in which regular churchgoers barely make up more than 10 percent of the West and 3 percent of the East German electorate, the Church maintains such a strong normative grip on society?

Growth in faith-based employment

Germans have every reason to be surprised. Modernization theory and most social sciences have prophesied since the 1960s that religion would die a silent death in western European societies. It would not only bring secularization to western European countries in terms of lower church attendance and membership, but ultimately also the demise of the Church as a socio-political institution. However, despite the linear and substantial demise of church goers and church members, empirically rather the opposite of the foreseen decline of the church in everyday life seems to happen. As Figure 1 shows, the number of Catholic Church employees has expanded drastically since the mid 1970s.

Figure 1: Employees of the Catholic Church in Germany (1950-2005)

Figure by the Author; data source H. Lührs, Kirchliche Arbeitsbeziehungen: Die Entwicklung der Beschäftigungsverhältnisse in den beiden großen Kirchen und ihren Wohlfahrtsverbänden, WiP Working Paper 33 (2006), p. 38.

The German Churches have become the second largest employer in Germany since the 1970s. The biggest chunk of this employment is in the welfare sector, carried out by the two large religious welfare providers Diakonie (Protestant Church) and Caritas (Catholic Church). Today the Catholic Church alone employs over 600,000 people (figure 2). At least one third of these welfare services are funded by the federal budget. However, the work contracts that the churches give out are not subject to federal labor law; religious employers are exempt. Hence, it is legally possible to fire divorced kindergarten caretakers on the basis of creed and value divergence, if you are a church.

Figure 2: Employees of Caritas Germany (1950-2005)

Figure by the Author; data source H. Lührs (2006) p. 38.

Three hundred years after the French revolution ignited a fundamental secularization process in continental Europe, it seems that the churches have started to recover territory in areas which are key particularly in aging societies. At least in the field of welfare provision, in Germany the church has successfully managed to escape federal jurisdiction and subsume an increasing number of people under the postulates of its world-views. These people (whether employees or beneficiaries) might not go to church anymore or adhere to what the pulpit preaches, but they are in their socio-economic situation directly subject to compliance with the world-view of the Catholic Church. The doctors who refused to treat the raped girl in Cologne did so not because they were strong believers (apparently), but because they feared that their Catholic employer might kick them out for aborting the fetus.

The paradox of secularization and increasing church influence

How can we account for the paradox that, against the trend of secularization, the churches have managed to regain influence in an increasingly important subfield of society?

Two broad explanations are possible: Social Capitalism and Substitution. The Social Capitalism thesis emphasizes that due to the circumstances out of which the continental European welfare models were born, the Churches and other third party actors never ceased to play an important role in welfare provision in continental Europe, in contrast to other parts of the world. The Substitution thesis argues that religion and welfare function as substitutes of one another, since both in their own ways insure against adverse life risks. In its spiritual version, it emphasizes that every human being strives for a feeling of security. Belief secures mentally against everyday life risks through the promise of a better life after death with the possibility of ascendance, afterlife, or reincarnation.

The material version of the substitution thesis posits that in countries where the state does not feature prominently as a provider of welfare, the churches with their auxiliary organizations will step in and substitute for the state. In contrast, in countries where the state is the central welfare provider, it will crowd the churches out of the field of welfare provision. From this follows that wherever the state rolls back welfare, the churches will (re-)surface prominently as welfare providers. While the Social Capitalism thesis emphasizes the idiosyncrasies of national responses to a transnational Polanyian double-movement, the Substitution thesis points to a single transnational phenomenon.

At first glance, the case of Germany seems to be a case for the substitution thesis as the massive expansion of church employment in welfare goes together with the end of the Golden Age and the roll-back of state driven welfare in Germany from the end of the 1970s. On the other hand, the German welfare state model has ever since been classified as a central case of Social Capitalism.  However, the fact that the federal government continues to fund most of the church-run welfare actually points to a far more complex interaction in the German case than either thesis would suggest.

The state retreats, the church returns?

Jiska’s previous post has shown that the the Catholic Church has of course always been a transnational actor par excellence. But it seems that its political and social impact is highly dependent on the numerous national settings in which it operates. However, the potential implications of the affirmation of the substitution thesis would be huge: were this thesis strictly true, the current trans-European age of permanent austerity would inevitably bring a trans-European comeback of religion via welfare provision.

Politically this would mean that the churches as transnational institutions will take back more of those prerogatives which they lost in the state-church conflicts of the late 19th century. The result could be the decline of the modern European state. In any case, further empirical explorations on the issue are needed. You will read them on this blog.

Dr. Josef Hien is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies, who studies the transformation of European Christian Democracy since the end of the Cold War to the present.

Governance crosses and blurs borders: disciplinary, geographical, thematic, conceptual. This collection of 127 articles from fourteen different authors assembles incisive contributions on a variety of urgent questions of our age. What is global and what is local in contemporary capitalism? What makes markets tick? How can we regulate finance? Who owns knowledge? What makes expertise? How can we protect the environment and fight poverty? And many more. Structured around different themes, the book invites readers to browse and delve deeper into the issues researched and analyzed over the course of four years on the governance across borders blog.

For more information and free full-text download visit the blogbook page.

Prizes are US$ 500, US$ 200, and US$ 100 and the three winning pieces will be published in the in-house magazine Dimensions.
The deadline for submissions has been extended to May 15, 2013.

The sustainable development goals can be understood as potential successor to the Millenium Development Goals (MDGs) and are probably one of the most catchy outcomes of the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development held in Rio de Janeiro last year (Rio+20). The MDGs have been established at the United Nations in 2000, with the plan to achieve them by 2015. The First session of the intergovernmental Open Working Group on Sustainable Development Goals convened on March 14-15.

IHDP is a scientific network sponsored by the International Social Science Council (ISSC), the International Council for Science (ICSU) and the United Nations University. Its mission is “to produce, promote and coordinate innovative social science research that informs and improves societal responses to global environmental change.”

(jiska)

The summer school “Sites of Knowledge: Space, Locality, and Circulation between Asia and Europe” in Heidelberg, Germany, addresses this relationship. It focuses on a variety of exemplary places like courts, temples, and academies; discusses actors and practices; as well as suitable concepts.

The event is part of the research cluster “Asia and Europe in a Global Context: The Dynamics of Transculturality” at Heidelberg University. The agenda includes presentations by a great bundle of international speakers.

Invited to apply are graduate students from the humanities and social sciences. The deadline for applications is May 31, 2013.

Date: August 4 to 8, 2013.

(jiska)

We can buy exploitative and corporate items, and the anti-exploitative anti-corporate antidote is already included in the product, like ethical coffee at Starbucks. We can increase our wealth while pursuing sustainability or equity, like SRI. We can lend money for profit and promote virtues like entrepreneurship or “financial inclusion”, as in microfinance.

Žižek’s attack on what he calls “cultural capitalism”, which seeks to assimilate rather than reject anti-capitalist sentiments like anti-consumerism, strikes at a central paradox: many products and services now offer us redemption from the harm we know (or at least suspect) we are doing, via our purchase, as part of the package. Yet this liberates us to go on just as before, questioning anything.

From past dreams of “socialism with a human face” in the Eastern bloc, Žižek says, we have moved on to similarly vain dreams of “capitalism with a human face” in the West. Is this moral rejection of charity and compassion really wise? Perhaps not, but it exposes a problematic – and very limiting – shift in our dreams and strategies for creating a better world.

(phil)

If you’re 28 years old, with two university degrees, and your parents have invested all their money in your education, and you’ve done everything that was expected of you: if society then tells you, ‘sorry, we don’t have a job for you’, then it’s easy to understand why people revolt. We have to give young people hope. In Europe, the world’s richest continent, there has to be a place for young people, damn it!

With these words, Martin Schulz, President of the European Parliament, describes the heart of the problem. Most young, unemployed Europeans are not marginalized, deprived, and lazy, but they live in the centre of society – a society that seems to have no use for them. This is particularly the case in some Soutern European countries such as Greece and Spain where unemployemnt rates for young people are over 50% as compared to currently 8% in Germany. Youngsters from countries outside of the EU face even more severe challenges on the job market.

Recently, I went to the Balkans to gather some impressions from the beautiful, but often-neglected Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia. In the country’s second-largest city, Bitola, situated close to the Greek border on the foots of Pelister National Park, I talked to young people, to officials at the municipality, and to activists at the Business Start-up Centre Bitola, to find out how young people in this region evaluate the situation and what the government and NGOs are doing to change it.

Bitola’s main street – a popular meeting place for young people

During a training course supported by the EU’s Youth in Action Programme and YMCA Bitola, I had the chance to interview 22 young activists, volunteers, youth workers, and students between the ages of 21 and 28 from 10 countries. They mainly came from countries outside of the EU, namely Albania (3), Bosnia and Herzegovina (2), Kosovo (2), Macedonia (3), Serbia (2), and Turkey (3), while seven were from EU countries (Romania, Portugal, Poland, and Slovenia).

Particularly impressive for me was their high motivation and their flexibility to cope with different situations and work with different people. Out of 22 people interviewed, 16 would immediately be willing to move to a different country to take up a job. Another four were willing to move to a different city. This flexibility is probably one of this generation’s greatest assets.

At the same time, I noticed a great deal of pessimism regarding the prospect of working in a Western European country. A majority (65%) thought that in most cases, migrants could only find low-skill jobs and that there was a general lack of respect for foreign workers in Western European countries. One participant from Kosovo readily told the story of his aunt, who had worked as a lawyer in Kosovo before the war and now has a job as a cleaning lady in France. But such a situation not only occurs after migration: The cleaning lady in our hotel in Trnovo had been trained as an architect, but in the face of poor perspectives in the Macedonian job market took up a job as a maid.

One of the main criticisms young people had, irrespective of their nationality, was that the educational system often does not adequately prepare them for the demands of the labour market. They argue that educational systems, both secondary and tertiary, need to be thoroughly changed and adapted. They plead for the integration of more practical experience into education, for better career advice in schools and universities, and for opportunities to improve soft skills, IT knowledge, and foreign languages. They demand that schools and universities provide more detailed information about the situation on the job market, as well as advice on how to write applications and succeeding in interviews. These are things which could be changed by governments and be supported by NGOs.

Remarkably, the participants themselves demand fair assessments of their qualifications (university degrees etc.) in potential host countries. Thus, the widespread argument of Western countries that diplomas from countries outside of the EU are “just not comparable to ours” is invalidated. Young people from all over Europe understand that university diplomas from different countries are not in all cases equivalent and need to be assessed before being accepted.

Bitola – View of city over town hall

What young people do complain about repeatedly, however, are the strict visa regulations of the EU. Youngsters demand more liberal regulations, enabling them to travel and move to other countries without disclosing their entire family history. Another demand came from Macedonian participants: starting your own business should be made easier and supported by the state. In Bitola this is currently being done at the Business Start-up Centre Bitola (BSCB) – a place I am going to talk about later. But first, it was time to ask officials at the municipality what they actually intend to do for young people in the area.

It was election time in Bitola – large portraits of the candidates were everywhere in the city, adorned with the all-too-modern Like-buttons and a Facebook link. The current Mayor of Bitola, Vladimir Taleski, a popular former actor, was re-elected. The young Macedonians I met did not seem to be too interested in the outcome of the elections anyway. They do not believe that change was going to come from the current government, now serving its third term. “It´s like the new Pope – you’d expect change, but it’s more of the same, really”, says one. The unemployment rate in Macedonia has stagnated at over 30% for the past 10 years, according to the IMF reaching 31% in 2012. Among people aged between 15 and 24, the rate is 55% report Index Mundi  and Online Colleges. That excludes many young people’s considerable under-employment.

At the town hall, pictures of the pretty city centre and the flag of the EU decorate the walls. You can tell that it is supposed to look official. While the rooms are clean and tidy, they also seem a bit empty. Mr Pandev of the municipality was very warm and welcoming. Confronted with students’ allegations that a lot of money still disappears under mysterious circumstances, he chuckles, “Of course there are examples of corruption, but the situation has become much better over the last years”. He speaks of successes in recent years and the need for an optimistic view of the future. When asked what exactly the municipality does to empower the youth and to fight the high unemployment rates, he points to organizations the government supports, such as the Business Start-up Centre Bitola.

“But with a collective memory of socialism in people’s minds, it is extremely difficult to manage the tough transfer to capitalism and at the same time avoid damage at the social level.” Too many young people may have too little initiative. While the socialist system severely limited personal freedom, it also meant that many basic needs (e.g. employment and housing) were provided “from above”. Therefore, Mr Pandev suggests, many youngsters lack the attitude and motivation to initiate change themselves.

Bitola – Business Start-Up Centre

Instead, many Macedonian university graduates want to secure a job in public administration – according to one student, these jobs represent long-term financial security and social status in exchange for comparatively little work. Obviously, this spirit is not conducive to vitalizing the economy. During the current Euro crisis, discussions about the decline of capitalism are at an all-time high in Western Europe, but a little more of an unapologetically capitalist spirit would probably help Macedonia come to terms with the post-socialist constitution of its economy. Or, as Mr Pandev puts it, “You are young now! Change something before you get married, get fat, and become a part of the system”. An organization that actively tries to implement this is the Business Start-Up Centre Bitola – our next stop.

The BSCB’s goal is to accelerate economic growth in Southwestern Macedonia by helping young people to find a job or start a business themselves. Their modern, tidy offices, just a few hundred metres from the main square, smell of fresh paint. They also include some shared office space, which young Graphic designers and software engineers use in turns – a cost-effective alternative to renting one’s own place, as well as an opportunity for networking. BSCB is supported by the United States Agency for International Development (US AID). Joe, an American volunteer in his 60s, welcomes us and introduces himself with the words “I am from Atlanta, Georgia, and I started the Coca-Cola company”. His positive, optimistic spirit is contagious. “My wife wasn’t particularly happy when I told her that I was going to the Balkans to volunteer. But in a few weeks she’s coming to visit me. People here are extremely motivated and capable, all they need is some advice and infrastructure. And their English is excellent. I am still struggling with saying hallo in Macedonian.”

Joe goes on to explain why it is important to focus on small and medium-sized businesses. “Many towns think that smoke stack chasing is the way forward.” He means the attempts by cities to attract large corporations, which will then build factories with giant chimneys in the vicinity. Also in Bitola, the single largest employer is the big power plant on the outskirts of the city. But 90% of new jobs in the region, Joe emphasizes, actually come from new start-ups, small businesses and their growth. BSCB therefore facilitates the start-up of new enterprises with micro credits of up to 15,000 Euro. They may also help by refunding registration fees of new companies, assisting with accountancy, setting up a website, and designing logos. They provide business-skills trainings, e.g. about social media marketing or finances, and enable young start-ups to present themselves at trade fairs in Skopje, Sofia, or Belgrade.

BSCB has achieved some great successes in recent years. Between 2011 and 2013, about 180 companies have been supported by the organization, and 378 new jobs were created in Bitola alone. In 2012, more than 1000 young people participated in business-skills trainings supported by BSCB. “We’ve done a lot, but there is much more to be done in the future”, Joe says. While he is going to return to his home in the US at the end of the year, the organization will continue to support young people motivated to take up responsibility and change their situation.

The potential for improvement is there: Macedonia has profited from relatively stable, albeit modest economic growth in recent years.  The fact that the youth, especially outside of the capital Skopje, does not yet benefit from this growth suggests that structural problems are to blame. As youth unemployment rates are twice as high as the overall unemployment rate, it seems that socioeconomic policies have hitherto favoured older generations and focused on maintaining existing jobs, rather than developing new ones. Now, the youth is paying the price.

The fight of organizations such as BSCB is going to be a long one – but at least, they have started.

(Ingo Nordmann)

A common complaint of Google’s competitors in fields such as Internet maps is that Google’s search algorithm favors its own services over those of competitors in its search results. For instance, the FairSearch coalition led by Microsoft, Oracle and others calls for more transparency in displaying search results and harshly criticizes Google:

Based on growing evidence that Google is abusing its search monopoly to thwart competition, we believe policymakers must act now to protect competition, transparency and innovation in online search.

Given Google’s market dominance in Europe with over 90 percent in core markets such as Germany, such allegedly discriminatory practices led to an antitrust investigation by the European Commission (EC). However, providing reproducable evidence for such discriminatory search results is difficult. Google is not only constantly changing its search algorithm (see “Algorithm Regulation #4: Algorithm as a Practice“) but also increasingly personalizing search results; both these characteristics of contemporary search algorithms make it difficult to compare search results over time.

But even if claims of discriminatory practices were sufficiently substantiated, this would pose the question of how to address this problem aside from fines? Would it be possible to directly regulate algorithms or algorithmic practices? And how could compliance with such regulation be monitored given the lack of algorithm transparency?

In a recent package of concessions offered to the Commission, Google still refuses to change transparency of its back-end algorithm (see “Felix Stalder on the Front und Back of the Social Web“) but promises more transparency on its front-end. According to a Guardian report by Charles Arthur, Google offers “to label results where its own properties, such as YouTube or Google Shopping, appear in listings when people perform searches”. According to Arthur,

the move is unlikely to pacify companies that originally complained to the EC. They have complained that Google artificially boosts its own properties and penalises rivals.

I can understand that competitors are not content with more front-end transparency in a case that has its roots in a lack of back-end transparency. Generally speaking, I would plead for more creative forms of antitrust regulation with measures other than fines or company break-ups. In the Microsoft antitrust case, for example, open source mandates would have been much better a tool to reinstate competition than mere billion dollar fines. And in the case of Google, regulation such as compulsory algorithm licensing may be an option. Because the more important algorithm regulation becomes, the more important regulating algorithms becomes, as well.

(leonhard)

We started with the sociological classics of whom many considered the comparative method as a key heuristic of social and political analysis. From that we moved on to post-World War II sociological analysis, world systems theory and the world society approach. Empirical illustrations covered issues such as state building, social classes and inequality, migration and diaspora communities, transnational movements, cross-border policy networks and the Europeanisation of welfare institutions.

Interestingly enough, we discovered that even within transnational analysis focusing on networks, diffusion or multi-level interactions, the comparative method does still have an important role to play. Going back to the classics, we found intriguing combinations of comparison and diffusion analysis in Tocqueville’s and Weber’s work. More contemporary critical approaches, such as world systems theory and world society theory, continue to use country comparison as a reference point. This led us to the conclusion that the comparative method is still very valuable but needs to be adapted and combined with other methodological approaches such as network analysis, process tracing or sequence analysis to encompass the transnational and global realities of contemporary societies.

One of the outcomes of this seminar is a series of very interesting book reviews that the students wrote as an assignment for the course. They were asked to choose a book from a list of comparative and transnational studies which by now can be considered as classics. If students chose a comparative study they were asked to discuss whether and how a transnational perspective could  have enriched the book. If they chose a global or transnational study they were asked to consider whether and how a comparative dimension was present as well, or how it could have improved the study in question. From what I understand from the students’ feedback, they found it challenging but interesting to engage in reviewing an entire monograph. Myself, I was really impressed by the effort and results of my students. While many of the books they choose have been out on the market for a while, and hence have received several reviews in academic journals already, the students nevertheless often brought a new and fresh perspective in with their reviews.

For this reason, we will publish a number of these reviews over the next weeks. Enjoy reading and rediscovering some of the classics of comparative and transnational analysis.

Forthcoming:

The Collapse of Soviet Communism in the Light of Transnational and Comparative Analysis. Book Review of Mark R. Beissinger’s Nationalist Mobilization and the Collapse of the Soviet State (Cambridge University Press, 2002), by André Förster.

Book Review of Margaret E. Keck and Kathryn Sikkink’s Activists Beyond Borders: Advocacy Networks in International Politics (Cornell University Press, 2001), by Ana Carolina Alfinito Vieira.

More to follow.

(Sigrid)

When Daniel Rozas warns, I listen. Rozas forecasted the crisis of microfinance which broke out in India in late 2010, warning as early as November 2009 that Andhra Pradesh was the most saturated microfinance market in the world alongside Bangladesh, and mass defaults could begin any time.

2009:

I can’t predict whether the microfinance bubble I believe exists and continues to grow in Andhra Pradesh and other south Indian states will deflate quietly or burst spectacularly. [...] In their pursuit of growth, many MFIs have continued to add large numbers of new customers in Andhra Pradesh and other highly saturated regions – I believe that is irresponsible. [...] The spark that sets off a large-scale delinquency crisis can be anything and could come at any time – a rapid drop in economic growth, a populist political movement, a religious decree, or a collections effort gone bad.  One can’t control the spark, but one can control how much fuel that spark can ignite.

Since this February, Rozas has been outlining the scenario of a possible further repayment crisis in a series of posts on the Financial Access Initiative Blog. He says self-regulatory efforts over the past years have been important, but perhaps not enough to stem lending excesses in certain countries (I would agree). Looking at indebtedness and lending at the sub-national level, Rozas reveals a fairly alarming picture in the Mexican state Chiapas, which shows similar patterns to Andhra Pradesh in 2009.

But it is Rozas’ attunement to the political economy of microlending which sets him apart from most sector consultants.

2013:

In Andhra Pradesh it was suicides; in Chiapas it may be something else, but the stories will be there. It takes more than just those stories to get people’s attention. Chiapas has it all: high interest rates, large profits, official connections, and finally, the strong multi-level connections between Mexico and the United States. [...] It’s not just interest rates that are high in Mexico. The profits of Mexican MFIs are among the highest anywhere. This is particularly highlighted by Compartamos, which has held the title of the single most profitable large commercial MFI in the world for five of the past six years. [...] To be sure, there’s nothing new here – the argument over Compartamos high interest rates and very high profits has been around since before the company’s IPO in 2007. But these two factors would become downright toxic when juxtaposed with media reports of impoverished and suffering borrowers coming out of Chiapas, where Compartamos has extensive operations. 

Despite being coddled with state money for decades, the microfinance industry is only waking up very slowly to the reality that its operations are as much politics as business. Political favour may swing suddenly, but “political risk” events have not been as arbitrary and exogenous as most in the sector perceive them. These events tend to appear in microfinance “success” locales like Bolivia (2000), Bosnia (2008), Nicaragua (2008) and India (2010): all countries where the success of MFIs at bringing debt to borrowers was so great, many borrowers ultimately could no longer sustain the debt. Then politicians tuned in.

Rozas’ final point about Mexico is how deeply it is linked with the USA. Stories of violence and overindebtedness there would generate bad news at a scale far larger than other, more exotic countries. Yet as in 2009 with India, it isn’t that a crisis in Mexico or elsewhere is predictable or inevitable; but signs are there. The question is whether MFIs will add more fuel before a spark comes, or together take a step back and try to disentangle the webs of debt many clients are entangled in, before the clients and politics finally entangle them.

P.S.: Daniel Rozas is also co-author of the aptly named “MIMOSA Index” which models the capacity of countries to absorb retail credit (including microcredit) and identifies a total of 20 countries which may be at or above their limits.

(phil)

A two day workshop at the University of Sussex titled “Everyday Racism in Transnational Perspective” attempts to widen the scientific angle of vision on the radical construction of race. Suggested topics of workshop contributions include, inter alia, racism and the marketplace, pop culture, religion, family or education.

The workshop takes place from October 31 to November 1, 2013. Deadline for applications is April 30.

Scholars engaged in this topic may also be interested in an older post about the Journal of Comparative Fascist Studies’ call for papers on fascism as a transnational concern – although the two phenomena are distinct.

(jiska)

Who pays and who free rides?

The International Accounting Standard Setter i.e the IFRS Foundation thrives as a non-profit private organization who’s business is to commit its rather limited resources solely to the development and promotion of the use of high quality global financial reporting standards. These resources largely come from the generosity of member countries, international organizations, international accountancy firms, accounting regulators, capital market regulators, multinational firms, transnational and national accounting standard setting bodies, international banks and in rare cases governments. Given these rather limited sources of financing and the lack of obligation on the part of these sponsors, it is hard to say how much funding the IASB actually needs to enable it develop credible global accounting standards. However, a quick look through the financial statements of the IFRS Foundation suggests that majority of its funding turns to come from accountancy practicing firms, national accounting regulatory authorities and accountancy bodies that share the dream of a single global accounting standard. These sources of funding got me thinking about the wide usage of the standards as to the number of user countries and the limited funding the IASB currently has.

As many as 120+ countries currently use IFRS globally. However, very few of these countries actually contribute financially to the development of these standards. What is even more surprising is the number of developing countries (especially countries from Africa, Asia and South America) that continue to use the standards without any financial contribution to the development of the standards. Take Africa for a test case. There are 57 countries in the continent and out of this number; about 21 countries currently use IFRS in one form or another either as full scale adopters or users of modified versions of the standards. Nevertheless, only two of these countries have contributed very small amounts to the overall development of the standards. In 2010, South Africa became the only African country to have contributed 45,112 British pounds sterling representing only 0.27% of the income of the IASB.  This example was followed by Nigeria in 2011 who contributed 62,445 British pounds sterling representing 0.30% of the annual income of the IASB. The table below indicates the sources of funding for the development of International Financial Reporting Standards.

The one who pays the piper calls the tune!

I have often wondered how non-paying users of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) could have influence on the work of the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB). As more countries continue to apply IFRS without contributing to its development, their ability to influence the work of the IASB become weak. Neither can they communicate problems with specific standards nor can they determine the direction or pace of international accounting standards.  Accounting standards by their nature are public goods i.e. the consumption of which by one party can not diminish the consumption of another party of the same good.  Nevertheless, what constitutes how a public good is constructed is on the bases that a common contribution is made by consumers or potential consumers of the same good. But this contribution is only made by a cross-section of the consumers while the others only wait to enjoy the benefits. On this basis, economists define public goods to mean any good from whose enjoyment non-contributors cannot be excluded.  Like many other public goods, the problem of free riding exists where some others pay to finance its construction while others do not pay but enjoy its use as much as those who paid for its construction.

IFRS has come along with such economic problem. IFRSs on this basis have equally come to represent public goods which only a handful of financial contributors make commitments towards the development of the standards while others only apply the standards without any contribution. As many developing countries look to enhance their financial informational needs, they turn to embrace the idea of IFRS and adopt these standards in some cases without the knowledge of the IASB.

The price for free riding the use of these standards is that, actors that contribute the development of these standards turn to dictate the direction of the standards. Non-paying actors will have no influence on how these standards are designed. With little or no voice on the IASB standard setting process by non-paying members, this group of users of the standards stands the chance of applying standards not designed to meet their needs.

(solomon)

Last week, I attended a very interesting conference organized by Jean-Christophe Graz, Christoph Hauert, Marc Audetat and Danielle Büschi at the University of Lausanne in Switzerland. At this conference, the prospects and limits of participation of civil society in international standardization were not only assessed by leading academics working in the field but also by members of various NGOs, including consumer and environmental organizations operating at the national and transnational level. The conference was part of a research programme at the University of Lausanne called “Living together under uncertainty” which has the aim to reinforce the relationship between academic knowledge and civil society. The INTERNORM project is trully transdisciplinary in the sense that Helga Nowotny understands the term: bringing together different types of knowledge from academics and practitioners for democratic problem-solving in the global sphere. The conference was one of the rare moments where academics and pratictioners engaged in really productive intellectual inquiry into how problems of standard-setting are framed, organized and managed in various national and transnational arenas. It also turned out to be a very cross-fertilizing event between the French and English-speaking communities in this field. Discussions revealed the many still persisting obstacles created by technical standard-setting organizations which make it difficult for civil society actors to participate on an equal footing. Yet, discussions also pointed to the strategic capacity of transnational and European NGOs to coordinate effectively across borders and to set their priorities in ways to enhance their leverage and influence. The presentations of the conferences are available on the INTERNORM project website.

(sigrid)

The resolution which introduces the Day of Happiness also tells us that “the pursuit of happiness is a fundamental human goal”. Furthermore, the UN General Assembly recognizes

“the relevance of happiness and well-being as universal goals and aspirations in the lives of human beings around the world and the importance of their recognition in public policy objectives”

And

the need for a more inclusive, equitable and balanced approach to economic growth that promotes sustainable development, poverty eradication, happiness and the well-being of all peoples

The new economic paradigm which the world was supposed to reflect on yesterday is still one of economic growth, one might say – but in addition, there is an International Day of Happiness.

(jiska)

Sidney Paget: Sherlock Holmes

Dave Itzkoff hit the nail on its head with the following opener to his New York Times article on the heirs to Sherlock Holmes in 2010:

“For a 123-year-old detective, Sherlock Holmes is a surprisingly reliable earner.”

In a more recent guest post at the 1709 blog, Miri Frankel reports about a new legal battle with regard to the copyright expiration date of some works of Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of the fictional character Sherlock Holmes:

In February Leslie Klinger, a Los Angeles attorney, filed a lawsuit against the estate of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle — the creator and author of a series of fictional works featuring legendary investigator and crime-solver Sherlock Holmes. Mr Klinger is the author of numerous books and articles relating to the “Canon of Sherlock Holmes” [...] For years, the Conan Doyle Estate has demanded and collected licensing fees from authors who created works drawing from or based on the Sherlock Holmes character or other elements from the world of Sherlock Holmes. […] But Mr Klinger’s view, and the view of other, sympathetic authors who have created new stories based on elements from the public domain works of Sir Conan Doyle, is that these licensing fees are not necessary, and the Conan Doyle Estate should not be allowed to threaten them with lawsuits to extract licensing fees.  The Complaint asserts that only new, original elements first published in the stories that remain under copyright protection are still protectable; copyright no longer protects, however, any elements that had already been published in earlier Sherlock Holmes works, so all such elements are now in the public domain.

Interestingly, Klinger makes his arguments not only in court but has also launched a website entitled “Free Sherlock!“, where he is even asking for donations ”to offset legal fees and expenses of the litigation.”

The core argument of the Conan Doyle Estate is, in turn, that the character of Sherlock Holmes “is a unified literary character that wasn’t completely developed until the author laid down his pen.” In case this interpretation of the law were upheld in court, all copyright elements related to the character of Sherlock Holmes would remain protected until 2023, the date upon which the final story published by Doyle enters the public domain. To underline the willingness to enforce their rights until the bitter end, the Conan Doyle Estate prominently points to “the Sony Bono Copyright Extension Act of 1997″, which extended protection terms to 95 years following the date of publication.

However, what I find even more ‘thrilling’ about this case is the fact that, as explained by Frankel, “the Conan Doyle Estate also asserts trade mark rights in the word mark Sherlock Holmes and the silhouette image of a pipe-smoking Sherlock”. And while there is at least some discussion spanning the fields of copyright and patent law (see, for example, “Private Ordering in Copyright and Patent Law: Property-Preempting Investments“), intersections of copyright and trademark law are rarely debated.  Is it possible to uphold a mark designation, which roots in a public domain work? The answer to this question is important because trademarks theoretically remain valid forever or at least as long as the owner actively uses and defends them.

If the heirs of Arthur Conan Doyle have their way, maybe – in addition to strategic patenting in high-tech markets – we will also observe a rise in ‘strategic trademarking’ by the entertainment industry to make the usage of public domain works more difficult for potential competitors.

(leonhard)

However, the current discourses on the election of a new pope reveal that the affair has more layers than the universal doctrine of the church suggests. Discussions on ‘papapile’ cardinals included strong national allocations. Furthermore, focusing on internal challenges of the organization belittled the external relevance of the decision and the pope’s role as an advocate. With this blog, I want to shed light on those different dimensions of papacy and the Roman Catholic Church against the backdrop of the recent election of Franciscus I.

What the pope is and what he is not

Of course, the pope is the absolute head of a state. Since the Lateran Treaty in 1929, the Vatican is a sovereign state accepted in the international community. The pope is part of political struggles. However, he is no usual head of state. As a non-member permanent observer state since 1964, the Vatican representative has no right to vote at the United Nations (although all other rights of full membership were granted in 2004).

Analytically, the Roman Catholic Church is maybe best described as a unique hybrid on the world stage with state and non-governmental characteristics.

The Church today regards Vatican City as part of the infrastructure for carrying out its true mission. In the language of international relations, the Church understands itself as an NGO, and it additionally employs the benefits of sovereign status in the service of its advocacy interest. (Ferrari 2006: 40)

Whereas debates on the substance of this “true mission” can fill books and blogs, what is important here is that papal positions are never solely secular in any political arena. The head of the state is the head of the church and, explicitly or implicitly, proclaims its doctrines. Unlike other states, the Vatican relies on soft power in international relations. Exceptional for an NGO, the area of interest embraces all aspects of social life – Catholic advocacy influenced the outcome of the Third International Conference on Population and Development, 1994, took position on the war in Iraq in 2003 and sent delegations to climate summits. Compared to many other NGOs, the Roman Catholic Church is also better equipped regarding material resources, privileges, and members and networks.

The pope’s roles, however, reach beyond clear cut functions and engagements. The pope is head of one of the largest transnational communities of about 1.2 billion Catholics (plus informal members of the community). The term “catholic” originates in the Greek word katholikós which means ‘general’ or ‘concerning all’. It therefore already becomes apparent in the language that the community of Catholics understands itself to a large degree as one ‘without borders’ (cf. Brockhaus 2001). All members are morally accountable to the pope.

The pope may or may not be ‘the first citizen of a world society’, but it is certain that he has been staged as a global pop star. Pius IX (1846-78) was probably the first to use the technological innovations in communications and transport of his time to promote his image. The last two popes have elevated this aspect of papacy to a new level (cf. also Schneider 2007). The protests that accompanied Pope Benedict XVI’s visit to the German parliament in 2011 are just one of several indications that the engagement of the pope is always beyond international diplomacy. It is a symbol of religious leadership.

However, the community is largely imagined in Benedict Anderson’s sense and interpretations of doctrines can vary greatly around the globe. While in the 19th Century hierarchies ensured authority to formulate rules and decisions without opposition, things have since changed.  Though highly committed Catholics must think seriously before voicing disapproval of papal positions, in the last century, bottom-up protest  has become more common (Valuer 1971: 499). Applicable strategies today are to ignore or re-interpret positions in local contexts and many members express their opinion more freely. Exit may be another option.

So the pope is a transnational institution. However, a closer look could reveal that he is also not the only voice of a globally heterogeneous community.

What I notice in current discourses

The resignation of Benedict XVI and the election of his successor Franciscus I enjoy great medial interest: Discussions are vital all over the globe. Interestingly, despite the origin of the term ‘catholic’, discourses are not at all free of national rhetoric. As in the elections before, speculations about the outcome of the conclave always include information about nationalities and global regions of the candidates. Where the next pope will come from, seems to be one of the most exciting questions for Vatican outsiders. National identities have been and are omnipresent. Looking at recent German newspaper articles from the region Saarland shows that identities are constructed interpreting potential candidates’ roots: Odilo Scherer, currently archbishop of São Paulo, is a great-grandchild of a tradesman who emigrated from Theley, a village in the federal state of Saarland, Germany. Re-telling a humorous prediction of a Brazilian colleague, German newspapers might have claimed again that “We are the pope” in the case that Scherer were elected as they had done when Ratzinger was chosen in 2005.

(source)

The new pope is from Argentina. Symbolically, this choice is strongly charged: Explicitly or implicitly, the debate on a new pope touches upon a tension of world affairs. It is a strong symbol that no pope had been chosen from the global South before and that cardinals from the global South are still under- (and Italians over-)represented related to the regional distribution of the church’s members. Although the pope is a transnational actor and the church’s doctrine is universal, the election of a candidate is embedded in national and regional discourses and reflects interpretations of identity and global power distribution.

Believing the medial discourses, however, cardinals focused on a different question for the conclave. Prior coalitions seemed to have been formed based on considerations about the seriousness of plans to reform internal areas of concern. Recent scandals about child abuses by priests have crossed borders; leaking information has distressed the core personal at the Vatican. Important may have been what is thought about the candidates’ endeavor to change the organization and the practices of the clergy are therefore expected to guide the decision. The scope of the concern is hence surely beyond national interests and should have large effects on internal developments in the future.

So busy with the discussion on national backgrounds of possible candidates on the one hand and the likelihood of resolute internal changes to prevent more scandals on the other hand, this time discourse mostly disregards the external relevance of the decision and the questions the Roman Catholic Church may pose as the state/NGO-hybrid. Will the new pope fill those roles? It is most likely. But we certainly do not know enough about it yet. Will the decision on the new pope change people’s beliefs, identity, and ultimately practices? We know even less about that.

Institutional arrangements are partly shaped by social mobilization and the agency of individuals. It is therefore an obvious statement that questions about identity and belief systems matter for research on transnational governance. Religion is a basis for both for many people worldwide. It can justify or de-legitimate activities as well as policies (cf. Fox/Sandler 2005) as is also described in the recent post on Carnival.

I take the opportunity of the current “habemus papam” to argue that religion is a theme that is worth to be found on a blog on governance across borders. A series of blog entries will discuss current and historical instances that help us understand the role of religious organizations and religion in processes of institution building and implementation.

(jiska) who thanks Josef Hien for his very helpful comments.

Brockhaus, 2001: Katholisch. Die Enzyklopädie in vierundzwanzig Bänden. . Leipzig; Mannheim: F.A. Brockhaus. Vol. 11. Zwanzigste, überarb. und akt. Auflage.

Ferrari, Lisa L., 2006: The Vatican as a Transnational Actor. In: Paul Christopher  Manuel/Lawrence Christopher  Reardon/Clyde  Wilcox (eds.), The Catholic Church and the nation-state: Comparative perspectives. Washington, DC: Georgetown Univ. Press, 33-50.

Fox, Jonathan/Shmuel Sandler, 2005: The question of religion and world politics. In: Terrorism and Political Violence 17, 293-303.

Schneider, Irmela, 2007: “Wo keine neuen Fakten sind, da steigert man die Adjektive.” Der Tod von Johannes Paul II. und die Medien. In: Irmela Schneider/Christina Bartz (eds.), Formationen der Mediennutzung I: Medienereignisse. Bielefeld: transcript, 159-181.

Valuer, Ivan, 1971: The Roman Catholic Church: A Transnational Actor. In: International Organization 25, 479-502.

The CENDARI Summer School “Historical Sources & Transnational Approaches to European History”, 22 -26 July 2013, in Florence, Italy, and the 3rd Doctoral Summer School “Between International, Transnational and Global History: Information Technologies at Borders, 19th-21st C.”, 23-25 September 2013, in Pleumeur-Bodou, France.

In Florence,

Sessions will apply the concept of ‘transnational moments’ to examine ways in which historical research is complicated by the nature of material records of the past. The Summer School will provide a context for the various collections-level challenges to transnational history, such as how to identify sources that have become ‘hidden’ or lost through accidents of history. (source)

Participants will have the chance to learn about the project CENDARI (Collaborative European Digital Archive Infrastructure) which is a collaboration of computer experts and historians integrating digital archives to facilitate science.

The summer school in Pleumeur-Bodou, on the other hand, attempts to overcome methodological nationalism in the study of the globalization of communications. Both summer schools offer opportunities to present one’s own research.

Deadlines for applications:
CENDARI Summer School, Florence: April 15, 2013
Doctoral Summer School, Pleumeur-Bodou: April 26, 2013

(jiska)