The research area Work, Welfare State, Inequality focuses on the public regulation of market-induced and life situation-related inequalities and the associated conflicts. Our research programme understands social security as a core element of political culture and investigates welfare state regimes as central social norming and relational mechanisms of modern societies and arenas of social opportunity distribution. It thus profiles security and inequality as leading categories of contemporary historical social analysis.

The research focus examines the contemporary history of art and the art business in its democratic-historical, socio-historical and socio-political contexts. The research program analyzes artists, the art trade and art recipients as social and economic actors in the field of tension between aesthetics, market events and public attempts at regulation. It also focuses on the social structure and interest politics of art associations and agents of public and private art promotion.

Globalization has become a catchword that has been used in recent decades to explain many processes of social change, be it liberalization, the rise of populist movements, or the internationalization of areas as diverse as the media or crime. This research area intervenes in this discussion by taking a historical-critical look at the phenomena, actors, problem descriptions, reactions and strategies behind the hype.

The projects in this field of research examine the formation of unequal geopolitical relations between European societies and the states in Africa and Southeast Asia that have become independent since the 1950s. Focusing on expert knowledge, access to raw materials and (post-)colonial production structures, our research examines how and in what form the power asymmetries between Europe and the now sovereign states continued in the context of their partly fragile sovereignty and the genesis of development aid policies.

Migration and mobility have become central topics in the creation of social identity. The question of what distinguishes ‘migration’ from ‘flight’ or ‘mobility,’ and which people are categorized as ‘desirable’ or ‘undesirable’ or as ‘foreign’ or ‘belonging,’ has been (and still is) the subject of fierce debates.

In der ersten Hälfte des 20. Jahrhunderts wurde vieles, was später als „populäre Kultur“ oder „Massenkultur“ galt, noch als Devianz skandalisiert. Um 1956 wurden diese neuen Ausdrucksformen als Jugenddelinquenz skandalisiert und kriminalisiert.

BMBF joint project
ZZF, LMU München and FU Berlin 
Project leader at ZZF: Prof. Dr. Frank Bösch, Dr. Jürgen Danyel (until 9/2024), Christoph Classen 

Economic processes always involve the consumption or conversion of energy. Historically, the composition of primary energy sources has changed significantly. Since the emergence of the environmental movement and mounting concerns about global resource limits in the 1970s, the relation between economy and ecology has become a central social and political concern. Recently, its relevance has become even more pronounced due to the effects of climate change. How did national governments and international organizations try to ensure sufficient energy supplies?