The main focus of the book is institutional change in the Scandinavian model, with special emphasis on Norway. There are many reasons to pay closer attention to the Norwegian case when it comes to analyses of changes in the public sphere. In the country's political history, the arts and the media played a particular role in the processes towards sovereignty at the beginning of the 20th century. On a par with the other Scandinavian countries, Norway is in the forefront in the world in the distribution and uses of Internet technology. As an extreme case, the most corporatist society within the family of the "Nordic Model", it offers an opportunity both for intriguing case studies and for challenging and refining existing theory on processes of institutional change in media policy and cultural policy. It supplements two recent, important books on political economy in Scandinavia: Varieties of Liberalization and the New Politics of Social Solidarity (Kathleen Thelen, 2014), and The Political Construction of Business Interests (Cathie Jo Martin and Duane Swank, 2013). There are further reasons to pay particular attention to the Scandinavian, and more specifically the Norwegian cases: (i) They are to varying degrees neo-corporatist societies, characterized by ongoing bargaining over social and political reform processes. From a theoretical perspective this invites reflections which, to some extent, are at odds with the dominant conceptions of institutional change. Neither models of path dependency nor models of aggregate, incremental change focus on the continuous social bargaining over institutional change. (ii) Despite recent processes of liberalization, common to the Western world as a whole, corporatism implies a close connection between state, public sphere, cultural life, and religion. This also means that institutions are closely bundled, in an even stronger way than assumed for example in the Varieties of Capitalism literature. Furthermore, we only have scarce insight in the way the different spheres of corporatism are connected and interact. In the proposed edited volume we have collected historical-institutional case studies from a broad set of social fields (a detailed outline of contents and contributors is attached): * Critical assessments of Jurgen Habermas' theory of the public sphere * Can the public sphere be considered an institution? * The central position of the public sphere in social and political change in Norway * Digital transformations and effects of the growing PR industry on the public sphere * Institutionalization of social media in local politics and voluntary organizations * Legitimation work in the public sphere * freedom of expression and warning in the workplace * "Return of religion" to the public sphere, and its effects

The Nordic model attracts attention in a mixture of applause and disbelief. Among its merits, but also a precondition to its future survival, is its capacity to modify and adapt to changing circumstances. This book scrutinizes Nordic - in particular Norwegian - working life and welfare states from the perspective of institutional change. The analyses range from property rights, boardroom politics and wage formation to old-age pensions, care work and childcare policies. What emerges is a picture of societies characterized by ongoing, often incremental, social and political reform processes. Tripartite relations of coordination and negotiation in the labor market and beyond, give shape to power relations and political processes in particular ways. The close connections between labour market, welfare state, family and gender policies work to create institutional bundles - in an even stronger way than assumed in the Varieties of Capitalism literature. The book is written for students and scholars with an interest in Nordic societies, in corporatism and political processes, as well as readers interested in theoretical debate on varieties of capitalism and institutional change.

After the optimism following the fall of the Berlin Wall, the world has seen more of a democratic backlash. But despite the backlashes, in some societies the stability of democracy does not seem to be threatened. Why is this so? One common answer points to civic culture, a shared feeling of responsibility for the common fate of citizens. An alternative, to be explored in this volume, is that the stability of democratic rule is anchored in its integration in the large set of social institutions with both direct and indirect relationship to politics. These are linked to, give input to and are affected by democratic processes. Where these relations are ubiquitous and strong, democracy is stable. At the same time, institutions are slowly but constantly changing. Hence, in order to understand changes in the functioning of democracy at the level of the state, it is necessary to explore the changes in surrounding institutions and the way they shape a democratic society. The empirical focus of the book is institutional change in the Nordic model, with special emphasis on Norway. There are many reasons to pay closer attention to the Nordic, and Norwegian, case when it comes to analyses of changes in the functioning of democracy. On a par with the other Scandinavian countries, Norway is in the forefront in the world in the quality of democratic governance, as well as social trust and quality of life. As an extreme case, the most corporatist society within the family of the "Nordic Model", Norwegian society offers an opportunity both for intriguing case studies and for challenging and refining existing theory on processes of institutional change. From a theoretical perspective this invites reflections which, to some extent, are at odds with the dominant conceptions of institutional change. Neither models of path dependency nor models of aggregate, incremental change focus on the continuous social bargaining over institutional change. Despite recent processes of differentiation and liberalization, common to the Western world as a whole, corporatism implies a close connection between state, economy, public sphere, cultural life, and knowledge production. This also means that institutions are intimately bundled, in a stronger, subtler and more wide-reaching way than typically assumed in the literature on varieties of capitalism. The volume draws on, but transcends, two prominent theoretical strands: the civil society perspective (a locus classicus being Cohen and Arato 1992), and the more recent work on well-functioning civil service as a precondition for good governance (Rothstein 2011) pointing out the "road to Denmark", (Fukuyama 2014). By embracing more social fields than these two approaches, the institutional approach opens a broader space for democratic reflection. Moreover, institutional-historical case studies situated within Nordic societies as a specific social structural framework, demonstrate the diversity of links between democracy and social life outside of politics in a narrow sense, such as: * Policies of citizenship as a limitation to democracy * Democracy in working life * Democracy and policies of gender relations * Expertise and democratic governance * Social elites - a threat to democracy? * Welfare state institutions as core elements in modern democracy * Institutional perspectives on the emergence of capitalism and democracy A detailed outline of contents and contributors is attached. The book rests on and further develops the former two volumes on institutional change. The first volume is centered on corporatist institutions, with emphasis on negotiations by civil society actors in interplay with the state. Concentrated on the public sphere, the second volume sought to locate processes of social deliberation within the contexts of a public sphere that embraces not only the media, but also fields such as voluntary associations, the arts, and religion. This third volume synthesizes these contributions by bringing them explicitly into the realm of democracy, without mainly focusing on the political institutions as such, but on the surrounding infrastructure.

Focusing particularly upon normative social action, this text is divided into five sections, each with a theme. The first section deals with collective memory with a study of German collective memory. This central theme is explored through examinations of other aspects of society: cultural studies; the university and intellectuals; regional studies and family life. The section on regional studies contains essays on ethnic conflict in Italy and environmental issues in the Basque country.

During the last decade gender equality in business life has become a hot topic. One impetus is the recent reform in Norway, prescribing gender quotas to the boards of directors of public companies. Shortly after the Norwegian reform was enacted, several other European countries have adopted similar reforms. This is the only volume where this gender quota reform is thoroughly discussed from an economic, political and philosophical point of view. It looks at whether the economic performance of companies is influenced, positively or negatively. The reasons why it has been embraced in some countries and rejected in others are analyzed. Moreover, viability of the gender quota reform is assessed by comparisons to other political interventions in business life in Scandinavia, of which some have been a failure whereas others have shown themselves as successful. This specific reform also serves as a backdrop to other themes related to gender and business. This volume provides a broad comparative study of the access of women to top positions in business in Europe. It also gives detailed discussions of gender relations in family businesses both in East Asia and in Europe.

This volume of "Comparative Social Research" emphasizes unsolved issues and new developments within class and stratification analysis, discussing both theoretical and methodological innovations and revisions. Studies of social stratification comprises a range of topics, such as social mobility, economic inequality, labor market inequalities, ethnic stratification, gender inequality, family patterns, educational attainment, and health inequality, the stratification of cultural consumption, life styles, values and attitudes. Comparative analysis has also revealed cross-national differentiation in stratification processes, partly related to welfare state arrangements and national policies. Yet all academic fields move forward, and with its vital research community social stratification research also engages in efforts to improve stratification analysis. This involves discussions on theoretical definitions and conceptual clarifications, social mechanisms and modeling techniques and measurements.

Despite the growing awareness of globalization, the main bulk of empirical work in the social sciences remains within the frames of what Stein Rokkan termed "national empiricism". The yearbook Comparative Social Research aims at furthering the international orientation in the social sciences. Each volume is concentrated on a specific topic, mostly of substantive, but also of methodological character. As a rule, the articles present two or more cases for comparison, be they nations, regions, organizations, or social units at different points of time. The volumes embrace a broad set topics, such as comparative studies of universities as institutions for production and diffusion of knowledge; family policies; regional cultures; and institutional aspects of work and wage formation. Comparative Social Research seeks well-written articles that place the current or historical data in context, critically review the literature of comparative studies, or provide new theoretical or methodological insights. The series recognizes that comparative research is theoretically and methodologically interdisciplinary, and encourages and supports there trends. All papers will be subject to double-blind peer review.

This volume contains an Open Access chapter. Relationships between elites and democracy have always been strained. The very concept of elites - of 'chosen people' - stands in contradiction to democratic ideals of political equality. Simultaneously, they are necessary parts of democratic societies. In any large-scale society, democracy is unthinkable without large organizations, be they political bodies, bureaucracies, enterprises, or voluntary organizations. When power is concentrated at the summit of such organizations the incumbents of the top positions potentially constitute groups that often are termed elite groups. The present volume of Comparative Social Research offers a broad set of comparative studies of elites, stretching from the Arab Spring in Tunisia and Egypt to women's political leadership in Brazil and Germany, via attainment of elite positions among minorities in France and the US. The quality of democratic governance seems to be in decline in many parts of contemporary world. Nevertheless, political elections are still a main source of legitimacy, even when they are far from being free and fair. Developments in the Third Wave democracies established around 1990 both in Europe and in the rest of the world, are treated in several chapters. How do they fare two or three decades later? Another group of chapters sets the focus on elite recruitment and socialization, spelled out against class and gender. The volume concludes by highlighting various entanglements of elites with populism, concerning both underlying reasons for the recent populist expansion and the various images of elites in populist movements.

How can the existence of elites be compatible with democratic governance? Any democratic society is inevitably confronted by this basic question. This book reviews existing research on elites and their interactions with those around them. How the recruitment to elites changes in the long run according to class and gender is one of the core themes of the present volume. Other topics explored include the relationship between elites and the population, collective action and elite cohesion, and elites and democracy. The approach is multinational, with examples provided from countries around the world. This is a valuable book for social science students and researchers of many disciplines, including sociology, political science and psychology. It offers a review on historical and current research on elites in society and includes an extensive discussion of class and gender. Examples from countries in different parts of the world allow for international insights.