"Ready to lead once more" - American-German Relations under President Obama. 
Christian W. Martin
This article discusses the implications of the Obama presidency on German-American relations. Despite some major disagreements on single policy issues, the fundamentals of the transatlantic relations have, in fact, always been strong. However, the rise of new global players such as China and India will cause German-American relations to become relatively less important. Still, there are issues on the international security agenda that require transatlantic cooperation. Joint action on issues such as the war in Afghanistan, the Iranian nuclear programme, energy independence, and relations with Russia is constrained by possibly conflicting national interests as well as by the necessity for leaders in both countries to stand in electoral contests at home. The future of German-American relations, therefore, lies in keeping their interests in sync.
André Bank
Authoritarianism and with it authoritarianism studies have been experiencing a renaissance since the beginning of the 21st century. In order to specify the insights and limitations of this research strand, the literature review analyzes recent contributions from both Comparative Politics and Middle East Studies. The additional focus on current Middle East Studies thereby allows for drawing on insights from that region which, in global comparison, is characterized by the highest degree of authoritarian regime stability.
Altogether, current authoritarian studies are dominated by institutionalist approaches with their concentration on authoritarian institutions (rulers, regime parties) as well as mechanisms (legitimation, cooptation, manipulation of opposition). As concerns political-economic as well as international and regional explanatory factors for authoritarian regime stability, it is recent contributions from Middle East Studies that move beyond traditional rentier state approaches and that question the too democracy-friendly assumptions about Western foreign policy vis-à-vis authoritarian regimes. The limitations of newer authoritarianism studies lie in the unsettled understanding of political stability, its one-sided regime focus and the related tendency of forgetting the state.
Struktur als Feind? Eine Replik zum Plädoyer für die historische Soziologie von Peter Fischer.
Thomas Kron
Struktur und Kultur. Eine Antwort auf Thomas Kron.
Peter Fischer
Thomas Kron and Peter Fischer continue their academic dispute over the explanatory scope of historical and cultural sociology vs. system and complexity theories. While Kron argues for the possibility of importing theoretical concepts from the natural to the social sciences, Fischer holds that such an undertaking ignores the incommesurable logics of both disciplines. However, the authors agree that the argument is mostly one about the usefulness of different methods. While admitting that the „small-n-problem“ has not been solved thus far, Fischer states that a historical or cultural perspective is indispensable for the understanding of modern society. Kron, however, argues that the complexity of modern social phenomena requires a more systematic approach, such as computer simulations, to be applied. Finally, Kron is more optimistic about a reconciliation of historical/cultural and structural approaches in the social sciences, whereas Fischer considers this an unfulfilled promise.