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"Niemann, Arne"
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Synchronous Online-Teaching on EU Foreign Affairs: A Blended-Learning Project of Seven Universities between E-Learning and Live Interaction
Together with 6 universities in Germany, we organised a seminar on the inter-relations between crises in Europe and their effects on European foreign affairs. The seminar was conceptualised with regard to two dimensions: (1) weekly live-interaction between more than 150 students with a clear schedule for discussions and presentations, and (2) an e-learning portal that constituted the main reference for various elements of learning and information exchange. Within this framework, students in working groups across different universities critically developed problem-based assumptions and arguments on EU foreign affairs both live and through the e-learning portal. The projects thus included both synchronous teaching and blended-learning elements. Our aim was to particularly link students from different disciplinary and knowledge backgrounds who discussed current issues of EU studies/ EU foreign affairs. In this paper, we interrogate and reflect on this teaching experience by elaborating on its technical and didactical aspects, presenting its innovative character, outlining its strengths and weaknesses, and providing recommendations for colleagues.
Journal Article
Effect of Leisure Sports on Exercise Capacity and Quality of Life in Patients with a Fontan Circulation
Despite improvement in survival, patients with a Fontan circulation are at risk for numerous complications, and exercise capacity and quality of life are usually reduced compared with healthy controls. However, only a few studies have assessed the impact of the amount of sporting activity on exercise capacity and health-related quality of life. We analyzed cardiopulmonary exercise tests (CPET) in a large cohort of patients with a Fontan circulation. Questionnaires were used to assess health-related quality of life and sporting activity. A total of 79 patients with a median age of 13.0 (6.5 to 34.4) years at CPET were included (female, n = 31). Questionnaires revealed that 80% of patients (n = 63) do leisure sports with 43% (n = 27) exercising more than 2 hours per /week. In a subgroup analysis on pediatric patients (n = 52) we found that nearly all participate in school sports (n = 51) and report good subjective health (n = 48). In the pediatric subgroup, oxygen uptake at the anaerobic threshold and peak oxygen uptake correlated with subjective health (p <0.05) and the amount of leisure sports activity (p <0.01). In the overall cohort, running time and running distance were significantly associated with the hours of sports per week (p <0.01). CPET results did not significantly differ between single right and single left ventricle patients. Furthermore, an open fenestration was not associated with reduced exercise capacity. In conclusion, most patients with a Fontan circulation participate in leisure sports and report good subjective healthiness. In pediatric patients, increased sports activity is associated with better exercise capacity and subjective healthiness.
Journal Article
External Hydrogen Relations of the European Union: Framing Processes in the Public Discourse Towards and within Partner Countries
With the need to decarbonize sectors that have hard-to-abate emissions, hydrogen as an energy carrier has increasingly gained attention. Within the European Union (EU) and its member states, hydrogen is assumed to be key for decarbonizing different sectors in the fight against climate change. Hence, state and private actors have engaged in a variety of attempts, strategies, and interests. However, energy security in Europe cannot be managed by European energy supply alone, despite high targets for the expansion of renewable energies. Rather, the EU will have to continue to rely on energy imports from partner countries. Against this backdrop, this paper seeks to provide an analysis of frame promotion processes generated by the EU’s bet on hydrogen. Drawing on a discourse analysis that is based on more than 32,000 media reports generated through the database Nexis, it conceptualizes the media debate as a carrier of frame alignment efforts by actors with a specific focus on the debates concerning external partner countries. It thus focuses on the discourses on the EU’s hydrogen approach in a complex environment with diverging interests of stakeholders from inside and outside the EU, thereby examining debates that still need further empirical research.
Journal Article
EU External Trade and the Treaty of Lisbon: A Revised Neofunctionalist Approach
This article analyses the EU’s Common Commercial Policy (CCP) at the level of Treaty revision and particularly focuses on the last Treaty negotiations that led to the Treaty of Lisbon. The analysis is based on a revised neofunctionalist framework that the author developed in previous work. It draws on the following concepts: (i) functional spillover; (ii) cultivated spillover; (iii) social spillover; and (iv) countervailing forces. Insights into the dynamics and countervailing forces driving Treaty revisions considerably deepen our understanding of the Common Commercial Policy, as EU external trade policy-making is substantially affected by the parameters set by the Treaty. The analysis indicates that the revised neofunctionalist framework can broadly account for the changes of the Common Commercial Policy during the last Treaty revision. It is further suggested that integration in the area of trade policy cannot be explained exclusively by rational choice dynamics, such as utility maximizing actors with fixed preferences, but that socialization through deliberation also needs to be taken into account.
Journal Article
Introduction: Innovative Teaching on European (Foreign) Affairs
This special section seeks to extent our knowledge on teaching innovative methods in European Union (EU) Foreign Affairs in time of challenges, politicisation, and digitalisation. It shares the experience of established and early career colleagues on how they designed, implemented, and applied specific innovations in their teaching. The section focuses on these experiences and aims to provide guidance on how specific ideas were put into practice in a hand-on and reflective manner. It seeks to tip into what works and why and how we as educators deal with challenges. Contributions engage with teaching EU foreign policy via Problem-based learning (Tonra 2020), research-led teaching by linking policy briefs and employability (Lightfoot 2020), responsive teaching in times of radical change (O´Mahony 2020), and synchronous teaching among 13 universities (Plank and Niemann 2020). They offer insights into increasing the ownership of students, raise awareness of their subjectivity, stimulate critical thinking, or enhance student´s media skills as well as to foster their employability. All contributions showcase the added value of the applied innovations, but also discuss obstacles that need to be considered in the conceptualisation and implementation of the proposed active approaches.
Journal Article
introduction – eu simulations as a multi-dimensional resource: from teaching and learning tool to research instrument
Simulations, understood as complex role plays, are nowadays widely used in (university) teaching to actively engage students and promote content-specific interactive learning, understanding, and communication. There is a growing debate about the functions and benefits of simulations in the university teaching context. Simulating the EU is not yet as common as simulating the UN, but the use of EU simulations gradually increases. In this paper, we discuss several aspects of EU simulations. First, we briefly review the importance of the EU in current European politics, and to its growing complexity, which represents a challenge for teaching and studying European integration. Second, we indicate that simulations address new didactical demands that arose in the context of the Bologna Process and the so-called ‘shift from teaching to learning’. And third, we move beyond the debate of EU simulations as merely an active learning tool, and discuss the (underestimated) role they may play as quasi-experiments, which may constitute a valuable resource both for didactical and European integration research. Together, these three aspects make EU simulations a promising multi-dimensional tool.
Journal Article
Non-elite conceptions of Europe: Europe as reference frame in English football fan discussions
Discursive approaches to Europe usually focus on elite discourses and target a narrow political understanding of Europe. Against the backdrop of rising Euroscepticism and the known elite-mass divide on issues of European identity, it seems important to shift the focus toward non-elite discourses on Europe. Given that club football is largely Europeanised (player markets, continent-wide club competitions and broadcasting of matches), we analyse how fans of the English Premier League club Manchester United discursively construct ‘Europe’ in relation to their sport. Our main research question aims at identifying how identifications of fans have been unconsciously Europeanised in the wake of an ongoing Europeanisation of the game. We explore online discourses on rivalry, competition and player transfers in club football as these areas are strongly influenced by the interplay of national and European inclinations. Preliminary results of our qualitative content analysis demonstrate that Manchester United fans, inasmuch as their club ‘goes Europe’ on a frequent basis, have developed transnational perspectives on football. Distinctions between ‘us’ and ‘them’ are not predominantly based on nationality, even though they remain complex. However, European orientations (not the European Union as such) seem to play more of a prominent role than commonly assumed.
Journal Article
Immigration, anti-immigrant attitudes and Eurosceptism: a meta-analysis
Particularly in the aftermath of the refugee crisis, the relationship between immigration and anti-immigrant sentiment and Euroscepticism has become salient in public discourse in European Union member states. The scientific literature has also devoted increasing attention to these relationships over the past dozen years. In this short research note, we synthesise recent research examining the immigration (attitudes)-Euroscepticism nexus. We find (1) that negative attitudes toward immigration generally trigger higher levels of Euroscepticism and (2) that this relationship does not apply to structural data on immigration. In most cases, higher immigration levels do not trigger more negative attitudes toward European integration. In light of the European refugee crisis, substantial further research could emerge on these issues.
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