PVS Politische Vierteljahresschrift

Political science has only marginally worked on the most recent dynamics of war development in the Middle East and on the African continent. This article suggests an interpretation, based on the „Hamburg approach“ to the study of war, which...

The interpretation of the Donbass conflict is highly controversial - not only in Ukraine, but also among external observers. Two theses are represented particularly prominent: First, the conflict is characterized as a prime example of a “hybrid...

In International Historical Sociology, states and states systems co-constitute each other. While IHS focuses on state formation, this paper argues that state de-formation, and in its extremes, state failure, is also “co-constituted”. In Syria...

This article investigates interdependencies between intervening powers and local dynamics in Afghanistan in general and with a focus on the Kunduz region between 2001 and 2015. Using the concept of „Social Order“ the authors analyse how...

Electoral turnout in Germany has not only substantially declined over the last two decades, but also increasingly grown unequal among social groups. This paper makes use of a new dataset on the local variation in parties’ mobilisation efforts....

Three hopes are associated with the new parliamentary early warnings system: It is hoped that the principle of subsidiarity will gain effectiveness, that the European political system will gain legitimacy, and that the pre-constitutional...

This paper evaluates the effect of an appointed commissioner for developing consolidation strategies for local public finances. So far, the evaluation concentrates on single-case studies of rare deployments of such a commissioner. The synthetic...

Do local contextual factors influence unconventional political participation? As this question has been ignored by previous studies, this work explores economic, sociogeographical and cultural factors of unconventional participation (joining...

In the face of growing migration, the idea that voting rights should be independent of formal citizenship has become more and more attractive. However, critics object that the dissociation of political rights from formal membership in the polity...

Is the success of the Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) a protest phenomenon or the mobilization of a political potential? We test both hypotheses on the grounds of the German National Election Study 2013. The analysis reveals that disenchantment...

We analyze effects of physical appearance on electoral results. Existing work has so far mostly focused on direct effects of perceived attraction and paid little attention to both competence and likability and to the potential conditioning of...

During the last decades the dichotomy of a masculine public sphere and a femi- nine private sphere as well as the strict heteronormative character of the public have blurred. However, these changes have rarely been theorized in feminist political...