Hochschulbibliographie

We analyze short-term media trust changes during the COVID-19 pandemic, their ideological drivers and consequences based on panel data in German-speaking Switzerland. We thereby differentiate trust in political information from different types of traditional and non-traditional media. COVID-19 serves as a natural experiment, in which citizens? media trust at the outbreak of the crisis is compared with the same variables after the severe lockdown measures were lifted. Our data reveal that (1) media trust is consequential as it is associated with people's willingness to follow Covid-19 regulations; (2) media trust changes during the pandemic, with trust levels for most media decreasing, with the exception of public service broadcasting; (3) trust losses are hardly connected to ideological divides in Switzerland. Our findings highlight that public service broadcasting plays an exceptional role in the fight against a pandemic and that contrary to the US, no partisan trust divide occurs.

The coronavirus pandemic has unraveled the nature of the global risk society we live in today, perhaps more than any other event before. The character of this protracted crisis - transboundary and systemic - necessitates a global and comparative perspective on risk and crisis communication. This chapter adopts this global and comparative perspective in charting the historical development of risk and crisis communication research (with insights on the contexts that influence knowledge production in the field). It also explores not only the trends and core findings in the state of research but also the differences between the norms and perspectives from the so-called mainstream “West” (Western Europe and North America) and those originating from Asia. The discussion on these differences covers the empirical research that challenges the dominant assumptions of oft-cited frameworks from the mainstream West. The realities beyond the mainstream West, as reflected in the findings of empirical research, justify the de-Westernization of the research agenda, the elements of which were also described in the chapter. Last, critical issues arising from increasingly sophisticated technologies, such as mis- and disinformation and state surveillance, are discussed, as well as possible research trajectories to keep pace with such developments.

This comment addresses the opinion of the Advocate General (AG) of the European Court of Justice on the pending case European Super League versus UEFA/FIFA. It takes a critical perspective on selected aspects of the opinion’s reasoning from a (sports) economics perspective. Highlighting the special characteristics of sports markets, the assessment of the AG Opinion raises questions such as (i) the (lack of) empirical evidence that the incumbent pursues and/or meets the legitimate objectives while the latter is still used as justifying reasons for anticompetitive conduct and arrangements (section III), (ii) the prohibitive entry barriers raised by the non-existence of a transparent and non-discriminatory authorization system preventing open competition for championships formats and organization by objective and effect (section IV), and (iii) the difficult search for a convincing theory of harm justifying the brutal enforcement of single-homing by the incumbent (section V).