Beyond Essentialist and Functionalist Analyses of the "Politicisation of Religion": The Evolution of Religious Parties in Political Catholicism and Political Islam

The debate about “politics and religion” has already rejected essentialist claims of fundamental differences in the impact of religion on politics in different cultures. This article will argue that political Islam in Turkey and political Catholicism in Italy and Germany adopted remarkably similar patterns of cross-class coalitions and policies for a “reconciliation of capitalism and democracy”. First, religious parties developed as mass integration parties which already encompassed cross-class coalitions. Second, in the aftermath of political and economic crises these parties transformed into catch-all parties with a pronounced neo-liberal agenda which was given a religious justification. Third, at the same time these parties continued to sponsor policies and organizations which cushioned and supplemented an uneven economic development. Fourth, the parties kept traditional family policies which helped attracting a significant female electorate. “Organized religion” provided religious parties with a potential electorate, ancillary organizations and ideological concepts; however, their role in this political evolution changed. The conclusion will discuss whether these findings can be generalized

The Domestic Use of European Policies: European Regional Policies in Eastern Germany and Southern Italy

Although network governance and multi-level governance approaches have had to revise some of their claims, comparative empirical research and revised conceptualisations of the impact of European regional policies are rare. This paper conceives of European regional policy as a process of policy diffusion in which the supply side of (European) policies and the demand side of the domestic arena can be linked in different ways. The paper will present, firstly, an analysis of the opportunity structures European regional policies provide for domestic actors; and, secondly, a typology of different domestic constellations which lead to a different use of European policies. The empirical cases of eastern Germany and southern Italy, two of the most important underdeveloped areas in western Europe, demonstrate that the use of European policies for the empowerment of the regions and for a transformation of policies and polity are two of the possible results of the impact of European regional policy, but they are bound to very specific domestic preconditions

Beyond Essentialist and Functionalist Analyses of the "Politicisation of Religion": The Evolution of Religious Parties in Political Catholicism and Political Islam

The debate about “politics and religion” has already rejected essentialist claims of fundamental differences in the impact of religion on politics in different cultures. This article will argue that political Islam in Turkey and political Catholicism in Italy and Germany adopted remarkably similar patterns of cross-class coalitions and policies for a “reconciliation of capitalism and democracy”. First, religious parties developed as mass integration parties which already encompassed cross-class coalitions. Second, in the aftermath of political and economic crises these parties transformed into catch-all parties with a pronounced neo-liberal agenda which was given a religious justification. Third, at the same time these parties continued to sponsor policies and organizations which cushioned and supplemented an uneven economic development. Fourth, the parties kept traditional family policies which helped attracting a significant female electorate. “Organized religion” provided religious parties with a potential electorate, ancillary organizations and ideological concepts; however, their role in this political evolution changed. The conclusion will discuss whether these findings can be generalized

Beyond Essentialist and Functionalist Analyses of the "Politicisation of Religion": The Evolution of Religious Parties in Political Catholicism and Political Islam

The debate about “politics and religion” has already rejected essentialist claims of fundamental differences in the impact of religion on politics in different cultures. This article will argue that political Islam in Turkey and political Catholicism in Italy and Germany adopted remarkably similar patterns of cross-class coalitions and policies for a “reconciliation of capitalism and democracy”. First, religious parties developed as mass integration parties which already encompassed cross-class coalitions. Second, in the aftermath of political and economic crises these parties transformed into catch-all parties with a pronounced neo-liberal agenda which was given a religious justification. Third, at the same time these parties continued to sponsor policies and organizations which cushioned and supplemented an uneven economic development. Fourth, the parties kept traditional family policies which helped attracting a significant female electorate. “Organized religion” provided religious parties with a potential electorate, ancillary organizations and ideological concepts; however, their role in this political evolution changed. The conclusion will discuss whether these findings can be generalized.<br /

"The impact of European regional policy: Sociological institutionalism and 'policy learning"'

The paper will argue that a combination of sociological institutionalism with theories of social learning is better suited to explain the varieties of the impact of European regional policy than generalization based on historical and rationalists intuitionalist approaches. It will distinguish three modes of interaction between the European and the domestic arena: policy learning, policy experimentation and policy conflict. European regional policy encompasses the two areas of structural funds and state aid control, and follows the paradigm of "endogenous development," the principles of partnership and competitiveness and a certain set of procedures. Whilst in Southern Italy policy learning took place with regard to both European policy areas, in Eastern Germany structural funds induced a process of policy experimentation, but state aid control led to intense policy conflict between all the actors in Germany and the European Commission

The europeanisation of national institutions reassessed : a comparison of regional policies in Germany and Italy

This article explores an aspect of Europeanisation which notions of ‘adaptive pressure’ and ‘usage’ of European policies have tended to neglect: in a complex policy field such as regional policy it is the evolving nature and heterogeneity of (different) domestic institutional arrangements which will shape and determine the opportunities for domestic actors to exploit European policies. The article explains the differential impact of European regional policies in eastern Germany and southern Italy by focusing on the different domestic institutional settings and the competition between domestic actors for the position of gatekeeper in relation to the Commission. Despite similar exposure to European regional policies, the existence of ‘parallel institutions’ in German regional policy proved to be the basis for an empowerment of the regions through the reinforcement of one institutional arrangement at the expense of the other whilst limiting change within the institutions. By contrast, the dichotomous nature of formal and informal rules and institutions in Italian policies for the south resulted in the exploitation of European regional policy by a national actor in order to drive through change in governance and administration