AICGS: ANALYSES : The AICGS Advisor

German Unity Day 2008
On this year's Day of German Unity, Executive Director Dr. Jackson Janes discusses eighteen years of German unification and how over that time - to paraphrase Willy Brandt - what belongs together has been growing together.
To read this essay, please click here.

Bavarian Election Coverage
The Bavarian Landtag election on September 28 resulted in a shocking loss for the Christian Social Union (CSU), the Bavarian sister party of Chancellor Angela Merkel's CDU. Losing an absolute majority for the first time in forty-six years, the CSU will now be forced into a coalition with a smaller party in Bavaria. What impact will this result have on next year's federal elections? And subsequently for transatlantic relations? In light of the election results, AICGS has compiled a page of links, essays, and information addressing these questions and more.
To access the page of links, please click here.

New AICGS Podcast: The Financial Crisis
In the newest AICGS Podcast, Dr. Rüdiger von Rosen of the Deutsches Aktieninstitut talks with Dr. Jack Janes of AICGS about the economic crisis and how the German financial industry is feeling the effects of action in the U.S. financial industry.
To access this AICGS Podcast, please click here.

Why is There No PISA Shock in the U.S.?
DAAD/AICGS Fellow Dr. Kerstin Martens, who is also a professor of International Relations at the University of Bremen, examines the different reactions in Germany and the U.S. to the OECD's most recent PISA comparative education survey results and explains why the reactions were so varied. This essay is the result of Dr. Martens' DAAD/AICGS Fellowship in August-September 2008.
To read this essay, please click here.

Practice Makes Perfect
Doug Bandow, Robert A. Taft Fellow at the American Conservative Defense Alliance and a regular contributor to the Advisor, analyzes the first U.S. presidential debate on foreign policy and assesses the performances of both John McCain and Barack Obama, arguing that the Republican Party has lost its edge over the Democrats in the realm of foreign policy. This interview originally appeared in the September 29, 2008, edition of National Interest Online.
To read this article, please click here.

Großreich Putin
Dr. Jörg Himmelreich, Senior Transatlantic Fellow at The German Marshall Fund of the United States and a contributor to AICGS projects on Russia, writes that Russia's carefully-planned aggression in Georgia shows that it wants to exert its growing influence in Europe, driven by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's nationalistic tendencies. This article originally appeared in the October 2008 edition of Internationale Politik and is available in German only.
To read this article, please click here (PDF).

Issue Brief #25: Campaign Finance in the United States
In AICGS Issue Brief 25, James Griffin, Coordinator of the Humboldt Institution on Transatlantic Issues, examines an important - and often misunderstood - aspect of American political campaigns: campaign finance. The current U.S. campaign finance system is a result of both cultural and legal factors, factors that have created a system of public disclosure, optional public funding and spending limits, and multiple actors, but also one of limitations and concerns regarding undue influence.
To access this Issue Brief, please click here (PDF).

Announcements

Confronted With New Challenges: The German Party System
On Wednesday, October 1, 2008, AICGS and the Heinrich Böll Foundation North America presented a luncheon event titled "Confronted With New Challenges: Developments and Trends of the German Party System in the Light of the Last Elections." The event consisted of a presentation by Professor Dr. Lothar Probst, President of the Institute for Intercultural and International Studies at the University of Bremen, on the impact of the September 27 Bavarian election and the fading strength of the CSU.
For a summary of this event, please click here.

New DAAD/AICGS Fellow: Ute Volz
AICGS would like to welcome its newest DAAD/AICGS Fellow, Ms. Ute Volz. While at AICGS, Ms. Volz will be conducting research on global imbalances. Her project seeks to examine "Global Capital Flows - The Investment Income Puzzles of Germany and the U.S."
For a short biography of Ms. Volz, please click here.

For past issues of the AICGS Advisor, please check the Advisor Archive.

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