D_04 - Youth as a Generation of Crisis? Socialization in Conflict and Transformation

06/2024-05/2029

This work package (WP) develops both a foundational and a knowledge-transfer-oriented profile for the relationship between youth and social cohesion. Within Priority Area 2, it identifies key socialization dynamics in the youth-cultural production and reproduction of social cohesion. It…

A_02 - Trust in Democracy, Populism, and Voting Behavior in Times of Transformation

06/2024-05/2029

The aim of this work package (WP) is to determine, through analytical and empirical methods, the effects of social cohesion on trust in the institutions of a pluralistic and liberal democracy under conditions of crisis. Of particular interest is the question of how the effects of…

D_02 - Transnational Ideological Transfer of the Populist and Extreme Right

06/2024 – 05/2029

This work package (WP) seeks to contribute to an understanding of the worldviews, images of others, and identity-based self-interpretations of the populist and extreme right. It undertakes a transnational analysis of the circulation of values, ideologies, and policies that are grounded in…

D_06 - Transformation of the Societal Order of Deliberation

06/2024 – 05/2029

The aim of this work package (WP) is to contribute theoretical and conceptual groundwork that helps address the guiding questions of Research Area D concerning the foundations and conditions of societal debates over knowledge, values, and identities. Using the concept of a “deliberative…

B_02 - The Social Integration Paradox: Gender-Specific Forms of Social Integration

This work package (WP) addresses core questions of the research focus “Effects of Status and Distributional Orders on Social Cohesion,” namely (1) social cohesion among unequal groups as reproduced by men and women in household and employment contexts, and (2) the tension between…

B_07 - Solidarity Practices in Processes of Societal Transformation

While responses to (actual or perceived) marginalization are often characterized by withdrawal or regressive revolt (exit), this work package (WP), situated within Research Focus 2 of Research Area B, centers on solidarity practices within and alongside marginalized milieus. The core…

C_02 - Social Infrastructures in the Neighborhood Nexus: Perceptions and Practices of Social Cohesion in Urban Space

06/2024 - 05/2029

This work package (WP) examines how social infrastructures influence social cohesion in neighborhoods and how differing state and municipal frameworks for infrastructure provision affect cohesion at the local level. Through an international comparison between the city of Hanover and the…

C_07 - Social Cohesion in the Europe-Wide Energy Transition

By examining public participation procedures as institutionalized options of voice , this work package (WP) makes an important contribution to RISC’s overarching research question concerning social cohesion in democracies. The focus lies on social cohesion in cross-border regions in the…

A_10 - Social Cohesion in Times of War: The Effects of Military Conflicts on Politicization and Polarization

Research Area A analyzes the relationship between politics and social cohesion, with a particular emphasis on the conflictual dimension of political negotiations. Violent conflicts constitute a particularly relevant field in this regard, as they directly affect people’s sense of security…

A_05 - Social Cohesion in China – Traditions and New Challenges

The Communist Party of China (CPC) claims that one of its greatest achievements lies in securing social cohesion within the Chinese nation of 1.4 billion people. Not infrequently, the concept of democracy is invoked in the same breath, even though, from an external perspective and…

C_01 - Social Cohesion as a Local Question of Power

06/2024 – 05/2029

The aim of this work package (WP) is to examine social cohesion as an expression of local power relations. These power relations manifest themselves in the form and design of public goods and infrastructures and are shaped in particular by the capacity of individual local actors to assert…

B_08 - Segmentation of Social Milieus and Their Mutual Evaluation

This work package (WP) is situated within Research Focus 3 and aims to expand the existing data from the project BRE_F_03 through an additional mixed-methods study with a particular focus on marginalized groups and migrants. Within the research area and its focus, the WP makes a…

D_08 - Representation in Public Space: Inclusive and Diversity-Oriented Memory Culture in Museums

06/2024-05/2029

This work package (WP) explores the cultural dynamics of hegemony and counter-hegemonic practices by examining struggles over the representation of marginalized queer biographies within the museum as a site of memory culture. It investigates the reciprocal relationship between…

C_08 - Regional Panel

06/2024 – 05/2029

This work package (WP) continues the quantitative Regional Panel (RP) in the twelve study locations from the first funding phase. As a repeated survey, it enables causal analyses of changes in local social cohesion within a regionally contextualized multilevel design and serves as the…

D_03 - Racist West and Antisemitic Rest? Global Cohesion at the Tension between Postcolonial Critique and Critiques of Antisemitism

06/2024 – 05/2029

The relationship between postcolonial critique and critiques of antisemitism has long been marked by tension. In recent years, however, the two approaches appear increasingly irreconcilable. This is evident in memory-political controversies over the relationship between colonialism and…

B_10 - Qualitative Panel: Milieu-Specific Practices of Endangering and Safeguarding Social Cohesion

06/2024 – 05/2029

This work package (WP) has been conducted since June 2020 in close cooperation between the sections Bremen and Göttingen and is being continued in the second funding phase of RISC with the inclusion of the Hamburg section. Building on international research on political polarization and…

D_07 - Prototypes of Social Cohesion

Digital platforms and social media are typically perceived as problematic when it comes to questions of social cohesion. Facebook, X/Twitter, and TikTok are associated with radicalization and hate speech and are therefore considered a threat; platforms such as Airbnb, Deliveroo, and Uber…

A_09 - Politicized Gender Issues Between Voting Behavior and Online Communication

06/2024 – 05/2029

The work package (WP) investigates processes of politicization and polarization surrounding gender issues on three levels: individual attitudes, social media discourses, and party positions. It examines whether divergent political attitudes give rise to societal conflicts and polarization…

A_04 - Policies of Social Cohesion in Africa: Entangled Governance in Post-Trauma Societies and the Role of International Organizations

06/2024 – 05/2029

As part of the focus area on cohesion policies and the conditions of political legitimacy, this work package (WP) empirically examines top-down and bottom-up governance strategies and practices for producing social cohesion in Ethiopia, Rwanda, and South Africa. In all three countries,…

A_03 - Polarization and Political Legitimacy

06/2024 – 05/2029

By addressing the relationship between polarization and political legitimacy, this work package (WP) subjects the widespread thesis that tendencies toward polarization inevitably endanger the legitimacy of political institutions to critical scrutiny. Its aim is to specify more precisely…

A_11 - Polarization Dynamics on Social Media

06/2024 – 05/2029

This work package (WP) examines current dynamics of politicization and polarization on social media, their emergence, and their effects. It is based on the observation that digital media in particular function as opportunity structures for politically extreme actors and, due to their…

C_05 - Planning for Climate-Neutral Cities as a Factor of Social Cohesion

This work package (WP) addresses the pressing societal challenge of planning climate-neutral cities and examines the role that social cohesion plays in urban development planning, as well as the effects that the implementation of such plans has on social cohesion. In doing so, the WP also…

B_01 - Milieu Conflicts and Social Cohesion

06/2024 – 05/2029

Within the context of the first research focus of Research Area B, this work package (WP) examines the effects of socioeconomic and cultural divisions on social cohesion using the concept of social milieus. It subjects the hypothesis of a “drifting apart of society” to a systematic…

D_10 - Migrant and Minority Conceptions of Social Cohesion: Transnational and Translocal Dimensions

06/2024-05/2029

This work package (WP) investigates which cohesion-relevant identities and imaginaries migrants and members of minority groups develop and how these shape their understandings and practices of social cohesion. Closely related to this are questions about the role of perceived and actual…

A_06 - Local Protests and Cohesion in a European Comparison

06/2024 – 05/2029

Protests are a form of political participation that has increasingly become part of everyday political life in Western democratic societies. They can function both as expressions of voice — and thus as signs of lived democracy—and as exit -reactions in the sense of a withdrawal from…