Isabelle Stadelmann | Bern University (original) (raw)

Papers by Isabelle Stadelmann

Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research), May 10, 2023

Es gibt keinen direkten Weg von der wissenschaftlichen Evidenz zur sozialen Akzeptanz. Was die Wi... more Es gibt keinen direkten Weg von der wissenschaftlichen Evidenz zur sozialen Akzeptanz. Was die Wissenschaft als sinnvoll und richtig identifiziert, muss von der breiten Bevölkerung noch lange nicht ebenso wahrgenommen werden. Die Sozialwissenschaften können in diesem Spannungsfeld wichtige Übersetzungsarbeit leisten und eine Vermittlerrolle einnehmen zwischen technologischer Entwicklung und Gesellschaft.

Energy Policy, 2017

Recent years have seen a growing interest in the concept of social acceptance, especially in the ... more Recent years have seen a growing interest in the concept of social acceptance, especially in the wake of the transition from non-renewable to renewable energy sources. Social acceptance is thereby studied from very different backgrounds and based on distinct conceptualizations. We argue that the reason for the great variety in the use of 'acceptance' is not mainly its interdisciplinary and multidimensionality, but a missing policy making perspective and its insights and knowledge about processes, actors and (in)formal decision-making. This contribution proposes a framework to refine the concept of social acceptance. Taking into account that the stage and specificity of the policy making process heavily influence the response towards RET and the process triggered, we identify three steps that need to be addressed when defining a research design that includes social acceptance: the object and context under scrutiny, the relevant actors, and the roles they play. Our proposed framework thereby adopts a political science point of view and the main research interest deals with political actors deciding upon and implementing future policies.

Local Government Studies, 2019

The analysis of how weather conditions influence participation at the ballot and whether bad weat... more The analysis of how weather conditions influence participation at the ballot and whether bad weather influences ballot decisions has recently gained momentum. Because most of these studies have focused on ballot votes, very little is known about the influence of rain on open-air citizen assemblies. In the effort to fill this gap, this paper analyses the influence of rain on participation in the Landsgemeinde-the main decision-making body of two Swiss cantons, wherein citizens meet on the main square in order to debate and decide bindingly on political matters of all sorts. We rely on a survey with an in-built conjoint experiment that presents citizens with several hypothetical Landsgemeinde situations. In order to reveal causal mechanisms, we expose survey participants to a randomly varied combination of weather and other conditions such as outcome favorability, the expected closeness of the vote and the company available during the event. Drawing from the literature on political mobilization, we find that rain not only decreases overall participation but it also lowers participation when votes are expected to be uncontested and for individuals who do not primarily attend the Landsgemeinde for political reasons. However, there is one exception: if voters are expected to meet friends, rain does no longer decrease participation.

International Political Science Review, 2020

Recent research and real-world processes suggest that effective climate change mitigation policie... more Recent research and real-world processes suggest that effective climate change mitigation policies are not feasible without at least a certain degree of public support. Hence, we investigate the link between existing domestic energy policies and individual policy instrument preferences in 21 European countries. We assume a policy feedback perspective and, thus, start from the idea that the current domestic energy context influences what future policies are possible and preferred by citizens. High political trust and strong climate change attitudes are expected to strengthen this relationship. Our results do not lend support to a general link between existing policies and future policy preferences. However, we find evidence of a positive policy feedback in individuals with strong climate change attitudes and/or high levels of political trust, which, depending on each country’s current energy policy, either hinders or facilitates the energy transition.

Public Administration, 2018

The rising number of referendums on EU matters, such as the Brexit and the Catalonian independenc... more The rising number of referendums on EU matters, such as the Brexit and the Catalonian independence votes, highlight the increasing importance of referendums as a problem-solving mechanism in the EU. We argue that the Swiss case provides essential insights into understanding the dynamics behind referendums, which are often lacking when referendums are called for in the EU. Referendums in EU member states on EU matters differ substantially from the in Swiss context. Nevertheless, proponents of more direct democratic decision-making regularly cite the Swiss example. Our systematic analysis of why referendums are called, how they unfold and their resulting effects in the EU and Switzerland reveals that the EU polity lacks the crucial conditions that embed direct democracy within the wider political and institutional system. The comparative perspective offers fundamental insights into the preconditions required for direct democracy to function and its limitations in the EU.

Representation, 2018

Unequal participation is a persistent matter of concern both in electoral and direct democracy. I... more Unequal participation is a persistent matter of concern both in electoral and direct democracy. In this contribution, we focus on direct democratic votes and investigate how vote characteristics such as overall turnout, complexity or ballot length affect participation by age and gender and reinforce or mitigate unequal participation. Empirically, the analysis is based on registered panel participation data from a Swiss city, which enabled us to trace individual turnout over several years, allowing observing at which votes citizens chose to participate and at which votes they stayed away from the ballot box, building on the concept of selective participation. The results show that a high turnout is indeed related to a higher equality both with regards to the gender and age gap in participation, and especially complex votes deter young voters from participation. However, the moderating effects do not change the strong overrepresentation of older age groups and men who participate at each vote or even increase overrepresentation.

Land Use Policy, 2019

please cite as Stadelmann-Steffen, I. (2019). Bad news is bad news: Information effects and citiz... more please cite as Stadelmann-Steffen, I. (2019). Bad news is bad news: Information effects and citizens' socio-political acceptance of new technologies of electricity transmission.

UNRISD welcomes such applications. The designations employed in UNRISD publications, which are in... more UNRISD welcomes such applications. The designations employed in UNRISD publications, which are in conformity with United Nations practice, and the presentation of material therein do not imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever on the part of UNRISD concerning the legal status of any country, territory, city or area or of its authorities, or concerning the delimitation of its frontiers or boundaries. The responsibility for opinions expressed rests solely with the author(s), and publication does not constitute endorsement by UNRISD.

... Federalism in Germany : Foundationsof Social Inequality in Education. Freitag_Markus2009_d. p... more ... Federalism in Germany : Foundationsof Social Inequality in Education. Freitag_Markus2009_d. pdf (1.662Mb). Freitag, Markus; Schlicht, Raphaela (2009), Artikel. ... in a single step, electoral results are translated into a left-right position for each region using Gross and Sigelmann's ...

European Union Politics, 2010

Since the publication of the OECD’s Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), schola... more Since the publication of the OECD’s Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), scholarly interest in analysing the effectiveness and performance of education policy has risen again. The present article follows this path and presents the first empirical evaluation of the influence of national education policies on educational inequality in the European Union member states. We examine whether the availability of preschool education, an all-day school tradition, tracking during secondary education, a large private school sector, average class size and education expenditures moderate the relationship between individual social background and educational success. As a main finding, our multi-level analyses show that education policy affects educational inequality very differently, an outcome that is most visible when comparing West European and post-communist countries.

European Societies, 2010

This article evaluates the relationship between welfare state institutions and informal voluntary... more This article evaluates the relationship between welfare state institutions and informal voluntary activity. In particular, we wish to investigate the extent to which welfare state arrangements influence the individual's decision to volunteer informally. Focusing on informal volunteeringa vital, yet often neglected form of social capital-we reinvestigate the hypotheses on crowding in and crowding out. Our subnational multilevel analysis of the Swiss cantons reveals that there is no significant effect of welfare statism on informal volunteering. Cantonal differences in individual propensity to volunteer informally can rather be attributed to different cultural-linguistic backgrounds as well as to the cantonal degree of urbanisation.

Research Policy

Citizens are the target group of sustainability policies, and their acceptance and subsequent beh... more Citizens are the target group of sustainability policies, and their acceptance and subsequent behavioral change are key in transition processes. But what drives citizens to accept new instruments that will be added to a pre-existing instrument mix? To answer this question, we suggest an innovative combination of sustainability transitions and social acceptance research, and examine the case of Swiss energy turnaround. We rely on data from a representative sample of the Swiss resident population. By estimating logistic multi-response models, we disentangle individual and context-related factors that drive instrument preferences in a instrument mix situation. We conclude that it is mainly individual factors (values in favor of nuclear phasing out and climate mitigation) that positively impact the acceptance of instruments that promote the larger energy transitions through renewables. Additionally, the self-contribution of citizens (energy pro-sumers) seems to shape preferences more than current policies of their own jurisdiction.

In recent decades, many studies have examined gender-related differences in paid employment and t... more In recent decades, many studies have examined gender-related differences in paid employment and the reconciliation of family and employment. Considering perceptions of time conflicts with regards to work at home and leisure activities, this paper contributes to a more encompassing understanding of attitudes towards reconciliation problems. Special attention is given to the role of external childcare services. The use of an original data set from 60 Swiss municipalities and of hierarchical multi-response regression models enable an analysis of the various aspects of time conflicts simultaneously, and a consideration of how different policy contexts shape these attitudes. This study provides evidence that the communal provision of external childcare is related to gender-specific perceptions of time conflicts. Most interestingly, men seem to be affected most strongly by communal policy conditions, whereby the provision of external childcare is related to systematically higher levels of...