Prosjekter ISS

The European Values Study 2008: Extending a Data Base for Comparative Research

Prosjektperiode: 2008-2009

Prosjektleder: Ola Listhaug (ISS)

Oppdragsgiver : NFR

The research questions can briefly be summarized.

1. From the very beginning the main emphasis of the Values Study was to study long term change and it is only now that data allow us to assess the main hypotheses on long term trends and patterns: Variati ons between national cultures, how religiously based civilizations differ, and trends towards convergence of national value systems.
2. The next research issue is formed by questions related to values and violent conflicts. These concerns are primarily linked to events and societal developments that occurred after the project started; the emphasis of globalization and the fall of communism which lead to an interest in the study of democracy and democratization, as well as an emphasis on new causes of co nflict and war. Obviously, in the latter category, the clash of civilizations thesis (Huntington, 1993) is important, but also the question of the role of values for civil war.
3. From research interests that have emerged from the democracy discussion is the question of good governance. We ask why some polities are more successful than others in governing and in establishing a civic morality. The question of good government can be extended to ask what constitutes the good society.
4. Values Study data can shed important light on the cultural basis for political integration - in Europe and in the global community. The cultural basis for European integration has received increased attention with the expansion of EU eastwards and the current discussion of membership for Turkey.
5. The accumulation of data from EVS and WVS has stimulated a recent growth of multi-level research that integrates individual level models with models using contextual data at different levels. The present study will contribute to this evolving research line.
6. The Values study has contributed to a methodological development that unifies macro- and micro approaches and is also starting to provide important data to behavioral economics

Media systems, news content and public perception of political reality

Prosjektperiode: 2007-2011

Prosjektleder: Toril Aalberg (ISS)

Oppdragsgiver : NFR

Public opinion constitutes one of the cornerstones of democracy. Citizens are assumed to hold preferences for particular polices, know where parties and candidates for office are located on the relevant policy dimensions, and cast their votes accordingly. In other words: Democracy functions best when its citizens are politically informed. In order to express attitudes and act according to their self-interest, citizens need relevant and up to date information about current affairs. In many respects, politi cal relevant information is more widely available now then at any time in history. However, several scholars have questioned the quality and the form of information provided by the news media. A central hypothesis in this project is that media systems mat ter for the information available to the public. How commercial and public broadcasting is organised within a country, or the relative importance of newspapers to television, are all factors that can influence the information provided by the news media, a nd thus the potential effect on the public.

The overall purpose of this project is to study the information given by the news media to the public, and how this information influences public's knowledge and perception of political reality. The proposed p roject will contribute to the research agenda in two areas:

1. We want to investigate how the information given by the news media varies between different media systems and types of media within these systems. Does news content vary between media systems in that the amount of information, the focus of information and the use of news frames varies significantly, or is there no significant difference in the information provided by the different news media in different media systems?
2. A second aim is to study how between and/or within system variations in news content may influence political knowledge and public perception of political reality.

HEALTH BY NUMBERS: Statistics as a technology of governance in municipal health services.

Prosjektperiode: 2007-2010

Prosjektleder: Ann Rudinow Sætnan (ISS)

Oppdragsgiver : NFR

This project asks: How do statistics function as a tool of governance in municipal health services? We address this question by

• studying in detail the negotiation, production, analysis, deployment, and assessment of health services statistics
• focusin g especially on three statistics systems
• DRGs currently undergoing development towards usage in municipal health services,
• IPLOS, which municipalities have been instructed to use as of 2006 but which are currently being contested, and
• local systems of similar content and usages.

We will study these both top-down and bottom-up, focusing on five strategically selected municipalities -- one large, three medium-large, and one small. Besides size differences, the municipalities will represent political a nd economic parameters likely to be relevant for statistics practices.
The case study data will be supplemented with national survey data and with studies of academic and mass media discourses and official documents.
The project will collaborate closely w ith the "Storforsk" project, "For Whom the Bell Curves".