Search results

This chapter is partially based on an unpublished Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) background report, titled ‘OECD Research Project on Diversity in the Workplace: Country Report Germany’, which was written by the authors of this chapter. While the OECD country report illustrates how diversity policies and related diversity instruments targeting various diversity dimensions have developed in Germany over recent decades, this chapter focuses solely on the management of ethnic diversity and its related policies. Diversity policies are broadly understood as any policy that seeks to increase the representation of disadvantaged social groups such as migrants and ethnic minorities, women, disabled persons, older workers and lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender/transsexual, intersex and queer/questioning (LGBTIQ) in the workplace, both in the public and in the private sector. The central idea of this chapter is to provide an overview of which policies and instruments have been implemented for migrants and ethnic minorities at the workplace and to evaluate their success or failure where possible. In doing so, this chapter also discusses obstacles, success factors and challenges for policy implementation for the past and for the future.

In this chapter, we evaluate the employment effects of job-creation schemes (JCS) on the participating individuals in Germany. JCS are a major element of active labour market policy in Germany and are targeted at long-term unemployed and other hard-to-place individuals. Access to very informative administrative data of the Federal Employment Agency justifies the application of a matching estimator and allows us to account for individual (group-specific) and regional effect heterogeneity. We extend previous studies for Germany in four directions. First, we are able to evaluate the effects on regular (unsubsidised) employment. Second, we observe the outcomes of participants and non-participants for nearly three years after the programme starts and can therefore analyse medium-term effects. Third, we test the sensitivity of the results with respect to various decisions that have to be made during implementation of the matching estimator. Finally, we check if a possible occurrence of a specific form of ‘unobserved heterogeneity’ distorts our interpretation. The overall results are rather discouraging, since the employment effects are negative or insignificant for most of the analysed groups. One exception are long-term unemployed individuals who benefit from participation at the end of our observation period. Hence, one policy implication is to address the programmes to this problem group more closely.

Chinese foreign direct investments (FDI) to developed countries, such as Germany, seems to follow unique rules, which are different to traditional international business (IB) practices in terms of entry modes, speed of internationalization, and target countries. To shed light on these unique rules, we analyze motivation and location choices of FDI from China to Germany by describing a sample of five companies from the environmental industry.

A multiple case study research design is adopted. The study is based on five Chinese companies investing in Germany in the environmental industry through FDI (Greenfield Investment and Merger and Acquisition). Chinese managers were interviewed on the basis of semi-structured questionnaires.

According to the main findings from the interviews, when investing in Germany, managers take into account a series of factors. Chinese firms go global for traditional motives such as market-seeking purposes and with the aim of improving their production process through skills and know-how acquisition. Additional motives, such as labor cost and fiscal incentives are not considered relevant as factors for internationalizing. Entry mode choices are mainly driven by legal factors in the environmental industry.

The analysis is conducted at industry level with the aim to contextualize the results within the environmental sector. The case studies are focused on Chinese investments in Germany.

Germany has lower posttax income inequality than the United States and hence is doing better according to a strict egalitarian fairness ideal. On the other hand, the United States is doing better than Germany according to a libertarian fairness ideal, which states that people should be held fully responsible for their income. However, most people hold intermediate (responsibility-sensitive) positions, and this paper studies fairness of the income distributions in Germany and the United States according to these positions.

We find that only if peoples’ preferences are characterized by substantial degree of individual responsibility, the United States is considered less unfair than Germany. If we hold people responsible for the unexplained variation, the United States is considered fairer than Germany for all levels of responsibility sensitiveness. If we, on the other hand, demand compensation for the unexplained variation, Germany is fairer than the United States for all levels of responsibility. The latter may be seen as the preferred approach as it follows a “benefit of the doubt” strategy. To the best of our knowledge, this paper presents the first cross-country fairness comparison based on responsibility-sensitive ideals.

How do traditional state interests fit into a new Europe in which globalization may seem to render them irrelevant? Globalization is often thought of as undermining the sovereignty of states. States are forced to work through multilateral institutions in a globalizing world, which may seem to render states largely irrelevant. As this chapter will show, though, some countries are able to use multilateral institutions (such as the European Union, EU) as a new arena to advance their national goals. Germany is a classic example of such a state. Since its history of aggression has left the country distrusted by its neighbors, Germany has found that it can best advance its national goals by embedding them in multilateral processes – such as European integration.

The following chapter will examine this process by focusing on one case: the role of German–Polish relations in the 2004 expansion of the EU. After an introductory section, the chapter will first focus on Germany's goals, showing how it hoped that expansion would further German national interests, including its economic and security needs and the historical necessity of atoning for the Second World War. Yet Berlin also was careful to avoid overt unilateral actions, working carefully through the EU to advance its agenda. Next, the chapter will trace Germany's actions, showing how it worked to support the 2004 expansion and Poland's inclusion in it, often over the objections of some of its EU partners. Finally, the chapter will detail the outcome of the process, showing that the results were positive for both Germany and Poland, as well as for the overall cause of European integration. Thus, for the Germans at least, the seeming dichotomy between “doing good and doing well” can be reconciled. This may offer a model for other countries to follow, showing that a careful use of state power can advance national goals even in a globalizing world.

This chapter reviews the integration experiences and policies in Germany before and after the so-called “refugee crisis’. Chancellor Angela Merkel's famous words ‘wir schaffen das’ (we manage this) have mobilized both policy actions and a massive grassroots engagement. In this context, we discuss the scope, efficiency and impact of German integration and adaptation policies. We review critically how Germany has dealt institutionally with immigration in the past and how it has adjusted its institutional approach to deal with the refugee crisis. Furthermore, in a case study on integration policies in higher education, we highlight the interplay between institutional approaches and grassroots engagement to achieve integration objectives. We argue that to a certain extent, the refugee crisis has acted as a catalyst for Germany to come to terms with its long-denied status as an immigration country.

In recent years, Asian countries have experienced rising rates of premarital cohabitation, mirroring a similar trend that could be observed in many European countries several decades ago. As international differences in these trends are often attributed to institutional and societal differences, this study explores how China’s and Germany’s welfare and cultural regimes relate to national differences in the timing and prevalence of premarital cohabitation and direct marriage.

On the basis of two post-hoc harmonized surveys (pairfam for Germany; CFPS for China), descriptive analyses and logistic regressions were conducted. A higher standardization of partnership trajectories during the transition to adulthood was observed in China; this being probably related to China’s collectivist and Germany’s individualistic culture. While urban–rural differences prevail in China, and are attributable to China’s hukou system, East and West Germans differ considerably in this regard, a finding which can be traced back to regional differences in historical legacy. Discrepancies in economic modernization explain why the likelihood of experiencing these events differs for individuals in the Eastern and Western Chinese provinces.

Besides these differences, the two national contexts resemble each other in the prevalence of educational hypergamy, as well as in greater rates of cohabitation prior to first marriage, in contrast to direct marriage, seen among wealthier individuals and those with higher education. For the first time, the effects of cultural and institutional differences on the transition to adulthood were compared between a collectivistic vs. individualistic cultural regime and a productivist vs. corporatist conservative welfare regime, enabling researchers to draw conclusions about the link between cultural and welfare regime types and partnership patterns.

To describe, analyze, and compare two long-term care (LTC) systems for elders in Germany and Israel.

Secondary analyses of data on LTC beneficiaries, structure of service provision and content analyses of policy documents in a comparative perspective based on the Esping-Andersen welfare state typologies.

Descriptive background of demographic attributes in the two countries; discussion of LTC development laws which in Israel focuses on “aging in place” concept, where in-kind services are geared only to community-dwelling frail elders while in Germany it’s for community and institutionalized elders. Analyses of various service types provided their use, resources invested, and benefits incurred for frail elders and their family caregivers.

The advantages and shortcomings of the two systems were analyzed with recommendations for future developments. Such comparisons across nations can inform social policy debates in Germany and Israel as to how to prepare for population aging. The originality of such comparison can shed light on issues for LTC service development in other countries.

I study state dependence in social assistance receipt in Germany using annual survey data from the German Socio-Economic Panel for the years 1995–2011. There is considerable observed state dependence, with an average persistence rate in benefits of 68 per cent comparing to an average entry rate of just above 3 per cent. To identify a possible structural component, I estimate a series of dynamic random-effects probit models that control for observed and unobserved heterogeneity and endogeneity of initial conditions. I find evidence of substantial structural state dependence in benefit receipt. Estimates suggest that benefit receipt one year ago is associated with an increase in the likelihood of benefit receipt today by a factor of 3.4. This corresponds to an average partial effect of 13 percentage points. Average predicted entry and persistence rates and the absolute level of structural state dependence are higher in Eastern Germany than in Western Germany. I find only little evidence for time variation in state dependence around the years of the Hartz reforms.