News

How often do established parties cooperate with the AfD at the local level? WZB researchers have analyzed this question comprehensively for the first time and found that the political firewall in Eastern and Western Germany is similarly stable.

An innovative new dataset has been released: ParlLawSpeech (PLS) offers machine-readable full texts of legislative documents from eight European parliaments, including 43,582 bills, 28,124 laws, and 3,092,431 plenary speeches. The three document types are linked by a common identifier, allowing researchers to analyze the entire lawmaking process. ParlLawSpeech has been created by a team including WZB researcher Christian Rauh, under the auspices of the OPTED Horizon 2020 project and supported by the WZB, GESIS and poltextLAB.

Conspiracy narratives have a demonstrably negative impact on social relations. People exposed to such narratives develop more negative attitudes towards outgroups.

The ongoing lecture series “Civil Society and Political Conflict,” hosted by the Center for Civil Society Research at the WZB, delves into the evolving dynamics of political conflict and its implications for civil society. Addressing significant transformations in political structures, the series explores how new societal divides—particularly those concerning integration versus demarcation—challenge and reshape traditional political classifications. The upcoming lecture on March 7, 2025 by Andrea L. P. Pirro addresses "Movement Parties of the Far Right".

How do narratives shape economic decision-making? In our interview, WZB researcher Kai Barron discusses how narratives influence investors' interpretations of objective information. Barron delves into the complexities of belief formation and the impact one narrative can have on another's perspective. He also explains how everyday language can provide valuable insights for behavioral economists.

Markets both influence and are influenced by societal norms, politics, and ethics. The 'Morals and the Limits of Markets' workshop focused on these ethical challenges and was hosted by Dorothea Kübler, Director of the Research Department Market Behavior, and WZB-researcher Hande Erkut. Experts from various fields discussed market morality topics such as exploitation, repugnant transactions, paternalism, and commodification.

People with a university degree are more likely to live in central locations with good infrastructure. They can therefore travel in a more environmentally friendly way than people with a lower level of education.