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Discourse surrounding healthcare constructs physical activity to be the moral obligation of individuals for preventing illness. Commercial fitness centers are the principle places for doing physical exercise and represent a commercial and relatively standardized socio-material setting aimed at helping to create a fit and healthy body. Despite their success, fitness centers in Germany have a customer turnover rate of 25 % and often appear unable to retain their members over the long term. Why do people who were once motivated to become a member of a fitness center turn their back on it? We argue that these disengagements can be explained to a considerable extent by the non-fulfillment of latent personal expectations. The discourse on health creates manifest normative expectations which actors on the fitness market respond to by providing functional environments (supply) and by developing individual physical exercise projects (demand). Yet, the establishment of personal routines, which is an integral element of the marketized good in question, could fail in the functional setting of a fitness center – a critical moment that brings to light personal latent expectations that are usually difficult to verbalize. This paper focuses on the justification of engagement in, and disengagement from, physical activity by analyzing qualitative interviews with (former) members of fitness centers. Regimes of engagement and orders of worth are two concepts from the sociology of conventions which enable us to disentangle typical tensions in this specific socio-material setting. Our analysis provides access to user experiences that are only rarely explicitly verbalized as a critique of commercial market providers. It also allows us to reflect upon preventive health policies aimed at the promotion of physical activities.

The subject of this analysis is the practice of school closures, since it constitutes a key response to demographic decline and is usually hotly disputed in regional discussions on demographic change. Our research is guided by two questions: How do political and administrative responses to demographic decline emerge? How is the practice of school closure publicly portrayed and discussed in the newspapers? We assume that in democratic welfare regimes, the spatial allocation of school infrastructures is mediated by the use of key administrative indicators allowing the calculation and public deliberation of questions related to education infrastructure policy. However, in transformation societies, a democratic political culture of "governing by numbers" only develops as a result of collective learning processes in which the participants acquire what we refer to as "democratic numeracy". In the stratified German school system, social prestige is conferred unequally among the different school types, with the grammar school (Gymnasium) being the most prestigious school type. It is therefore likely that the elements of the school system are not affected equally by policy responses to demographic decline and public attention, which results in spatial inequalities. Empirically, the article follows a mixed-methods approach, whilst emphasising a quantitative and qualitative content analysis of school closures in the regional press of Saxony-Anhalt from 1990 to 2014. The results show that, in the transformation process, the relevance of indicator-based governance of the school infrastructure increases both in practice and in discourse. However, as the participants gain in democratic numeracy, the use of numbers becomes politicised. With respect to the pattern of school closures, grammar schools receive a disproportionately large share of public attention. This has a positive effect on their survival chances and diminishes differences in spatial distances between grammar schools and integrated secondary schools. ; The subject of this analysis is the practice of school closures, since it constitutes a key response to demographic decline and is usually hotly disputed in regional discussions on demographic change. Our research is guided by two questions: How do political and administrative responses to demographic decline emerge? How is the practice of school closure publicly portrayed and discussed in the newspapers? We assume that in democratic welfare regimes, the spatial allocation of school infrastructures is mediated by the use of key administrative indicators allowing the calculation and public deliberation of questions related to education infrastructure policy. However, in transformation societies, a democratic political culture of "governing by numbers" only develops as a result of collective learning processes in which the participants acquire what we refer to as "democratic numeracy". In the stratified German school system, social prestige is conferred unequally among the different school types, with the grammar school (Gymnasium) being the most prestigious school type. It is therefore likely that the elements of the school system are not affected equally by policy responses to demographic decline and public attention, which results in spatial inequalities. Empirically, the article follows a mixed-methods approach, whilst emphasising a quantitative and qualitative content analysis of school closures in the regional press of Saxony-Anhalt from 1990 to 2014. The results show that, in the transformation process, the relevance of indicator-based governance of the school infrastructure increases both in practice and in discourse. However, as the participants gain in democratic numeracy, the use of numbers becomes politicised. With respect to the pattern of school closures, grammar schools receive a disproportionately large share of public attention. This has a positive effect on their survival chances and diminishes differences in spatial distances between grammar schools and integrated secondary schools.

"The subject of this analysis is the practice of school closures, since it constitutes a key response to demographic decline and is usually hotly disputed in regional discussions on demographic change. Our research is guided by two questions: How do political and administrative responses to demographic decline emerge? How is the practice of school closure publicly portrayed and discussed in the newspapers? We assume that in democratic welfare regimes, the spatial allocation of school infrastructures is mediated by the use of key administrative indicators allowing the calculation and public deliberation of questions related to education infrastructure policy. However, in transformation societies, a democratic political culture of 'governing by numbers' only develops as a result of collective learning processes in which the participants acquire what we refer to as 'democratic numeracy'. In the stratified German school system, social prestige is conferred unequally among the different school types, with the grammar school (Gymnasium) being the most prestigious school type. It is therefore likely that the elements of the school system are not affected equally by policy responses to demographic decline and public attention, which results in spatial inequalities. Empirically, the article follows a mixed-methods approach, whilst emphasising a quantitative and qualitative content analysis of school closures in the regional press of Saxony-Anhalt from 1990 to 2014. The results show that, in the transformation process, the relevance of indicator-based governance of the school infrastructure increases both in practice and in discourse. However, as the participants gain in democratic numeracy, the use of numbers becomes politicised. With respect to the pattern of school closures, grammar schools receive a disproportionately large share of public attention. This has a positive effect on their survival chances and diminishes differences in spatial distances between grammar schools and integrated secondary schools." (author's abstract)

In der deutschen Öffentlichkeit wird der demographische Wandel derzeit als ein Problem thematisiert, das die Leistungen gesellschaftlicher Funktionssysteme zu gefährden droht. Die Darstellung des demographischen Wandels als eine Kraft, die "unser Leben verändert" unterstellt jedoch eine einfache Kausalität im Sinne von Ursache und Wirkung zwischen Demographie und Gesellschaft. Im Kontrast zu dieser "dramatisierenden" Darstellung des Problems gehen die Autoren davon aus, dass der demographische Wandel zwar zu strukturellen Problemen gesellschaftlicher Funktionssysteme führen kann, dass deren Folgen jedoch entscheidend von gesellschaftlichen Umgangsweisen damit geprägt werden. Dazu werden exemplarisch personalpolitische Reaktionen auf demographischen Wandel untersucht. Zunächst wird ein theoretisches Modell von Challenge und Response entwickelt, das die Rolle der kommunalen Personalpolitik als entscheidendes Element zwischen der Bevölkerungsentwicklung und ihren Folgen für die kommunale Daseinsvorsorge erläutert. Vor dem Hintergrund des theoretischen Modells werden Hypothesen bezüglich vermuteter Bewältigungsprozesse formuliert. Abschließend wird am Beispiel einer besonders von Schrumpfung betroffenen idealtypischen Gemeinde dargestellt, welche Herausforderungen der demographische Wandel für die Leistungserstellung dieser Gemeinde konstituiert und welche Personalpolitik sie angesichts dieser Herausforderungen praktiziert. (ICA2)

Der Beitrag thematisiert Aspekte einer spezifischen Strukturkrise: Die Reaktion von öffentlichen Arbeitsmärkten auf den demographischen Wandel. Öffentliche Arbeitsmärkte gelten innerhalb der ohnehin im internationalen Maßstab inflexiblen deutschen Arbeitsmärkte als extrem rigide. Der Ressourcenentzug durch demographischen Wandel stellt in diesem Zusammenhang eine doppelte Herausforderung dar, da öffentlichen Gebietskörperschaften Steuerressourcen entfallen, zugleich findet aufgrund der demographischen Alterung eine Umschichtung der benötigten Dienste des Gemeinwesens statt: Kinder- und jugendbezogene Dienste werden weniger nachgefragt als bisher. Die Autoren untersuchen, wie Gebietskörperschaften mit dieser Herausforderung umgehen. Diese Leitfrage wird in vier Schritten beantwortet. Im ersten Teil wird das zu erwartende Problem dieser Konstellation idealtypisch beschrieben als Resultat der Inflexibilität interner Arbeitsmärkte. Im zweiten Teil wird ein theoretisches Modell von Challenge und Response (CRA) bezogen auf Organisationen und Institutionen entwickelt. Im dritten Teil werden die verwendeten Daten und ihre Gewinnung beschrieben. Im vierten Teil werden aus der Sicht von leitenden Akteuren die empirisch vorfindbaren Typen des Problems und der Reaktion auf dieses Problem in einer Reihe von ost- und westdeutschen Kommunen beschrieben, und daraus resultierende nichtintendierte Folgen werden erläutert. Im letzten Teil erfolgt eine Diskussion der Typen in Hinblick auf das verwendete theoretische CRA-Modell. (ICA2)

Chapter 1. Introduction: The Roots and Fruits of Population Growth and Social Structures: Demographic and Sociological Vistas (Jon Anson) -- Part 1: Demography and Social Structure -- Chapter 2. The Demographic Transition in the Nasa Indigenous People and Black Populations of Northern Cauca (Colombia) (Fernando Urrea-Giraldo) -- Chapter 3. Intermarriage and Assimilation Among Arabs in the United States: Estimates, Causes, and Trends, 1990-2010 (Andrzej Kulczycki) -- Chapter 4. Occupational Classes of Immigrants and their descendants in East-Germany (Oliver Winkler) -- Chapter 5. Violence, Firearms and Life Expectancy In Mexico (Guillermo Julián González-Pérez) -- Part 2: Population Structure -- Chapter 6. Sex ratios in old age: Comparing Countries in Middle Eastern Asia to East and Southeast Asia (Sehar Ezdi) -- Chapter 7. From ageing-driven growth towards the ending of growth: Subnational population trends in New Zealand (Natalie Jackson) -- Chapter 8. Natural Decrease in Semi-Peripheral Nations: County-Level Analyses of Mexico and Turkey (Guadalupe Marquez-Velarde) -- Chapter 9. From Topic to Problem: Organisational Mechanisms of constructing demographic change (Sven Kette) -- Part 3: Social Policy -- Chapter 10. Minorities in Spanish Secondary Education: School Segregation, Between Reality and Official Statistics (Brahim El-Habib Draoui) -- Chapter 11. Small School Closures in Rural Areas – the Beginning or the End of a Downward Spiral? Some evidence from Austria (Sigrid Kroismayr) -- Chapter 12. Maternal outcomes in the context of free maternal healthcare provisioning in North Central and Southwestern Nigeria (Anthony Ajayi) -- Chapter 13. The Association between Household and Community Single Motherhood and Adolescent Pregnancy in South Africa (Sibusiso Mkwananzi) -- Chapter 14. Tobacco use among men in sub-Saharan Africa: Does family structure matter? (Favour L.C. Ntoimo).

Besonders begabte Schülerinnen und Schüler im Fach Sozialkunde finden bisher nur wenig Förderung für ihre Kompetenzen. Dies zeigt sich erstens darin, dass nur wenige Stunden für das Fach Sozialkunde zur Verfügung stehen. Zweitens werden zwar (in Sachsen-Anhalt) etablierte Instrumente der Begabtenförderung für Fächer wie Mathematik, Deutsch, Chemie, Musik, Sport etc. angeboten, spezifische Programme für Sozialkunde existieren jedoch nicht. An diesem Punkt setzt ein Angebot des Instituts für Soziologie der Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg an: Der im Schuljahr 2008/2009 eingerichtete Korrespondenzzirkel Sozialkunde bietet neue Möglichkeiten für die Förderung begabter Sozialkundeschüler. Der Beitrag präsentiert das Konzept des Korrespondenzzirkels Sozialkunde hinsichtlich der Ziele und der Durchführung und berichtet von den bisherigen Erfahrungen. Außerdem erfolgt ein Ausblick auf mögliche Weiterentwicklungen des Angebots. (ICB2).

Besonders begabte Schülerinnen und Schüler im Fach Sozialkunde finden bisher nur wenig Förderung für ihre Kompetenzen. Dies zeigt sich erstens darin, dass nur wenige Stunden für das Fach Sozialkunde zur Verfügung stehen. Zweitens werden zwar (in Sachsen-Anhalt) etablierte Instrumente der Begabtenförderung für Fächer wie Mathematik, Deutsch, Chemie, Musik, Sport etc. angeboten, spezifische Programme für Sozialkunde existieren jedoch nicht. An diesem Punkt setzt ein Angebot des Instituts für Soziologie der Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg an: Der im Schuljahr 2008/2009 eingerichtete Korrespondenzzirkel Sozialkunde bietet neue Möglichkeiten für die Förderung begabter Sozialkundeschüler. Der Beitrag präsentiert das Konzept des Korrespondenzzirkels Sozialkunde hinsichtlich der Ziele und der Durchführung und berichtet von den bisherigen Erfahrungen. Außerdem erfolgt ein Ausblick auf mögliche Weiterentwicklungen des Angebots. (ICB2)

In this special issue of Historical Social Research, indicators are considered epistemic devices that render the world governable by quantification. While endowed with an aura of objectivity, indicators are not neutral devices. Instead they transform the world they claim to describe. Against the backdrop of a global proliferation of indicators, we argue in favour of research that strategically focuses on the processes that lead to the institutionalisation and systematic use of key indicators in politics compared to cases in which these processes fail. This type of research strategy could enhance the accumulation of systematic knowledge as well as the relevance of social studies of quantification. Furthermore, we propose a heuristic for analysing how indicators are involved in shaping imaginations of the future following the three distinct dimensions of meaning (factual, social, temporal) as introduced by Luhmann. We also review diachronic and synchronic approaches to analysing the genesis and use of indicators in order to derive testable hypotheses about the gap between indicator design and policy use. Finally, we introduce the articles of this special issue.

In this special issue of Historical Social Research, indicators are considered epistemic devices that render the world governable by quantification. While endowed with an aura of objectivity, indicators are not neutral devices. Instead they transform the world they claim to describe. Against the backdrop of a global proliferation of indicators, we argue in favour of research that strategically focuses on the processes that lead to the institutionalisation and systematic use of key indicators in politics compared to cases in which these processes fail. This type of research strategy could enhance the accumulation of systematic knowledge as well as the relevance of social studies of quantification. Furthermore, we propose a heuristic for analysing how indicators are involved in shaping imaginations of the future following the three distinct dimensions of meaning (factual, social, temporal) as introduced by Luhmann. We also review diachronic and synchronic approaches to analysing the genesis and use of indicators in order to derive testable hypotheses about the gap between indicator design and policy use. Finally, we introduce the articles of this special issue.