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How do European states adjust to international markets? Why do French governments of both left and right face a public confidence crisis? In this book, leading experts on France chart the dramatic changes that have taken place in its polity, economy and society since the 1980s and develop an analysis of social change relevant to all democracies.

AbstractFinancial regulation is often adopted in the wake of scandals and crises. Yet political science has little to say about the political effects of corporate scandals. We break that silence, asking whether exposure to news coverage of bank scandals changes the preferences of voters for financial regulation. Drawing from the literatures on media influence and public opinion, we argue that news coverage of bank scandals should increase voters' appetite for regulation. We test our hypothesis with data from six countries, using original nationally representative panel surveys with embedded experiments (total N = 27,673). Our pooled and country‐specific analyses largely support our expectation that exposure to news coverage of scandals increases regulatory preferences. We reproduce this finding in a separate survey wave, using different scandals than in our original analysis. These results contribute to studies on media influence on public opinion, the political significance of scandals, and the political economy of regulation.

Do narratives about the causes of inequality influence support for redistribution? Scholarship suggests that information about levels of inequality does not easily shift redistributive attitudes. We embed information about inequality within a commentary article depicting the economy as being rigged to advantage elites, a common populist narrative of both the left and right. Drawing on the media effects and political economy literature, we expect articles employing narratives that portray inequality as the consequence of systemic unfairness to increase demands for redistribution. We test this proposition via an online survey experiment with 7426 respondents in Australia, France, Germany, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Our narrative treatment significantly increases attitudes favoring redistribution in five of the countries. In the US the treatment has no effect. We consider several reasons for the non-result in the US – highlighting beliefs about government inefficiency – and conclude by discussing general implications of our findings.

Bull, M.; Rhodes, M.: Introduction. - S. 657-669 Bull, M.; Pasquino, G.: A long quest in vain: institutional reforms in Italy. - S. 670-691 Vassallo, S.: Government under Berlusconi: the functioning of the core institutions in Italy. - S. 692-710 Bardi, L.: Electoral change and its impact on the party system in Italy. - S. 711-732 Diamanti, I.: The Italian centre-right and centre-left: between parties and 'the party'. - S. 733-762 De Cecco, M.: Italy's dysfunctional political economy. - S. 763-783 Culpepper, P. D.: Eppure, non si muove: legal change, institutional stability and Italian corporate governance. - S. 784-802 Molina, O.; Rhodes, M.: Industrial relations and the welfare state in Italy: assessing the potential of negotiated change. - S. 803-829 Della Porta, D.; Vannucci, A.: Corruption and anti-corruption: the political defeat of 'clean hands' in Italy. - S. 830-853 Paoli, L.: Mafia and organised crime in Italy: the unacknowledged successes of law enforcement. - S. 854-880 Hibberd, M.: Conflicts of interest and media pluralism in Italian broadcasting. - S. 881-902 Carbone, M.: The domestic foundations of Italy's foreign and development policies. - S. 903-923 Quaglia, L.; Radaelli, C. M.: Italian politics and the European Union: a tale of two research designs. - S. 924-943