The Cologne Center for Comparative Politics (CCCP) which is part of the Institute of Political Science hosts an international workshop about “Social Policy and Clientelism” on November 7th, 2015. The workshop is organized by Dr. Sarah Berens who works at the chair of Professor André Kaiser, CCCP. The workshop is organized in cooperation with Herbert Kitschelt, George V. Allen Professor of International Relations at the Duke University. Participants of the workshop will deal with deficits and challenges of welfare policies in middle- and low-income countries. The focus will be drawn on an analysis about connections of social policy programs and clientelism in Latin America. The role of the informal sector in order to build universal welfare programs will be added to this analysis. A central phenomenon of party competition in Latin America is political clientelism which is characterized through vote buying and patronage. Consequences of vote buying and patronage manipulates the representation of voters. These consequences and the missing political responsibility will be main aspects of the workshop. The program will focus on incentive structures and the behavior of political parties and voters. The influence of clientelism and the outcome of a welfare state can be characterized as important aspects for the workshop. It will be drawn a comparison between the micro and macro perspective. For this event, the CCCP welcomes international scientist from the field of comparative political economy from the Duke University, the University of Zurich, the Harvard University and the University of Goteborg.

The workshop takes place at the lecture hall at the Institute of Political Science (203 Gottfried-Keller-Str. 6). It will start at 9.00 am and it will end at 5.30 pm. Please contact Dr. Sarah Behrens (sarah.berensuni-koeln.de) to register for the workshop, and in case you have further questions. The program can be reviewed through this link.