Prof. Dr. Birgit Pfau-Effinger

Professorin für Soziologie des Kultur- und Institutionenwandels
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Birgit Pfau-Effinger is Research Professor for Sociology of Cultural Change and Institutional Change (Senior Research Professor) at the University of Hamburg. She has received her Doctoral Degree and habilitated at the Universität Bremen. She was Professor at Universities in Berlin and Jena before she was appointed as Chair for Social Structure Analysis and Scientific Co-Director of the Centre of Globalisation and Governance (CGG) at the Hamburg University 2003. From 2016-2018 she was also research professor at the University of Southern Denmark. She was visiting professor at the Universities of Tampere/Finland, Aalborg/Denmark and the Universitat Autonòma de Barcelona/Spain.
She has published several books and numerous articles in academic journals. Her article in Work, Employment and Society (WES) was distinguished in 2012 as “Favorite WES article of the last 25 years” by the British Sociological Association, the Editors of WES, and SAGE, articles of her in the Journal of Social Policy and in European Societies are since many years among the top ten most cited articles in the Journal.
She received several awards for her research. She was appointed by the German Research Council (DFG) as “Outstanding Women Academics and Scientists” for AcademiaNet’ 2010 and awarded as “Honorary Professor for Comparative Welfare State Research” at the University of Southern Denmark (2011-2014). The President of the University of Hamburg awarded her the current senior research professorship for “outstanding performance in research and teaching” (2018-2023). She was also ‘Friedlander Lecturer 2018-2019 on International Social Welfare ‘of the University of California, Berkeley, May 2019.
Her main research interests include the relationship between cultural change and welfare state change; the role of culture and institutions for the explanation of cross-national differences in gender, care and the work-family relationship; the explanation of the historical development of the ‘male breadwinner family’; the diversity of development paths of the work-family relationship, and the changing relationship between formal and informal work. She received grants from the German Research Council (DFG), the ESF and the EU and had leading roles in international collaborative research programs like the COST A13 Action, the ESF Research Network GIER and the EU Network of Excellence RECWOWE. She was elected co-editor of “Work, Employment and Society”, and she is member of the Board of ESPAnet. She was Friedlander Lecturer 2018-2019 on International Social Welfare of the University of California, Berkeley.
Her main research focus is on theorizing and research on
- Theorising and research about culture and welfare state change
- Theory of the gender arrangement and gender culture
- Explanation of historical development paths and cross-national differences in the work-family relationship
- Comparative analyses of family policies and long-term care policies
- Change in the relationship between formal and informal work
- Theorising and research about the cultural and institutional framework of the society-animal relationship
- Some of her most recent articles are published in Advances in Climate Change Research, Ageing & Society, American Behavioral
- Scientist, and the Journal of European Social Policy (forthcoming), and she is co-editor of the International Oxford Handbook of
- Family Policy: A Life-Course Perspective (forthcoming).
Main Articles in Academic Journals with Peer Review (selected)
- Eggers, Thurid; Grages, Christopher; Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2023) How culture influences the strengthening of market principles in conservative welfare states: The case of long-term care policy. International Journal of Social Welfare (Online First), https://doi.org/10.1111/ijsw.12612
- Och, Ralf; Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2023) Marketization policies in the neoliberal era: How culture and governance structures affect the introduction of market principles in local care policies, Environment & Planning C, 4, 3: 448–465 , https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/23996544221137959
- Daly, Mary; Leon, Margarita, Pfau-Effinger, Birgit; Ranci, Costanzo & Rostgaard, Tine (2022) COVID-19 and Policies for Care Homes in European Welfare States: Too little, too late? Journal of European Social Policy, 32, 1: 48-59. https://doi.org/10.1177/09589287211055672
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit; Sebastian, Marcel (2022) Institutional persistence despite cultural change: A historical case study of the re-categorization of dogs in Germany, Agriculture and Human Values, 39, 1: 473–485. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10460-021-10272-4
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit; Grages, Christopher (2021) The Sociology of Social Policy―The State of the Art, in B. Hollstein, R. Greshoff, U. Schimank, and A. Weiß (eds.) Sociology in the German-Speaking World”, Sociological Review (Special Issue), 44, 2. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110627275-029
- Eggers, Thurid; Grages, Christopher; Pfau-Effinger, Birgit; Och, Ralf (2020) Re-conceptualising the relationship between de-familialisation and familialisation and the implications for gender equality – the case of long-term care policies for older people, Ageing & Society, 40, 4: 869-895. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0144686X18001435
- Reimer, Thordis; Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2020) Different types of parental leave use by German fathers and their engagement in childcare in subsequent years; Problemy Polityki Społeczne, 48, 1: 7-26. https://doi.org/10.31971/16401808.48.1.2020.1
- Eggers, Thurd; Grages, Christopher; Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2019): Self-responsibility of the ’active social citizen’: Different policy concepts about ’active citizenship’ in different types of welfare states, in The Turn towards Self-Responsibility in Current Societies, ed. by P. Frericks, J. Höppner, American Behavioral Scientist, 63, 1: 43-64. https://doi.org/10.1177/0002764218816803
- von Storch, Hans, Chen Xue-En, Birgit Pfau-Effinger, D. Dennis Bray and Andreas Ullmann (2019) Attitudes of young scholars in Qingdao and Hamburg about climate change and climate policy – the role of culture for the explanation of differences. Advances in Climate Change Research, 10, 3: 158-164. ISSN 1674-9278, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.accre.2019.04.001
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2017) Informal employment in the poor European periphery, International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy, 37, 7/8: 387-399. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJSSP-07-2016-0080
- Yueh –Ching, Chou, Pfau-Effinger, Birgit; Kröger, Teppo; Ranci, Costanzo (2017): Impact of care responsibilities on women’s employment: a comparison between European and East Asian welfare states, European Societies, 19, 1: 157-177.
- Jensen, Per H., Och, Ralf; Pfau-Effinger, Birgit, Møberg, Rasmus Juul (2017) Explaining differences in women’s working time in European cities, European Societies, 19, 2: 138-156.
- Jensen, Per H., Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2016) Explaining Cross-national differences in the gender gap in the employment of older workers, The Gerontologist, 56, Issue Suppl. 3, Nov. 2016: 691.
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2016) Informalisation du travail rémunéré et risques sociaux pour les travailleurs : le rôle des États-providence, Lien Social et Politique Sociale, 76, 2016, 156–177
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2015) “New forms of care work in European welfare states, Policy & Politics, Blog, April 2015, http://policyandpoliticsblog.com
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit; Euler, Torsten (2014) Wandel der Einstellungen zu Kinderbetreuung und Elternschaft in Europa – Persistenz kultureller Differenzen (Change in the attitudes towards childcare and parenthood – persistence of cultural differences), Soziale Welt, 20, 1 175-193.
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2014) Review of Connell, Raewyn: Confronting Equality: Gender, Knowledge and Global Change, Kölner Zeitschrift für Soziologie und Sozialpsychologie, 66, 3, 140-143.
- Flaquer, Lluis; Pfau-Effinger, Birgit; Artiaga Leiras, Alba (2014) El trabajo familiar de cuidado en el marco del estado de bienestar, Cuadernos de Relaciones Laborales, 32, 1, 11-32.
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2014) Nuevas políticas para cuidados en el hogar en los Estados de bienestar europeos, Cuadernos de Relaciones Laborales, 32, 1, 33-48.
- Frericks, Patricia; Jensen, Per H.; Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2014) Social rights and employment rights related to family care: Family care regimes in Europe. Journal of Aging Studies, 29, 66–77.
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2012) "Women's employment in institutional and cultural context", International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy, 32, 9, 530-543.
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2012) Analyses of welfare-state reform policies towards long-term senior care in a cross-European perspective, European Journal of Ageing, 9, 2: 151-154
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2012) Le basi culturali delle politiche per la famiglia negli anni 1950 e 1960 il ruolo die valori religiosi (The Cultural Basis of Family Policies in the 1950s and 1960s and the Role of Religious Values), Sociologia e Politiche Sociali, 15, 3: 75-90.
- Pfau-Effinger, B., Rostgaard, T. (2011) ‘Welfare state change, the strengthening of economic principles and new tensions in relation to care’, Nordic Journal of Social Research, 2, 1-7.
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit; Jensen, Per H., Och, Ralf (2011) ‘Tension between ‘consumerism’ in elderly care and social rights of family carers. A comparison between Germany and Denmark, Nordic Journal of Social Research , 2, 7-22.
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit; Smidt, Maike (2011) Differences in Women’s Employment Patterns and Family Policies: Eastern and Western Germany, Community, Work & Family 14, 2: 217-232.
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2010) L’impatto dei congedi parentali sull’occupazione delle madri nelle società europee, Rivista Politiche Sociali, 1, 2010: 189-209.
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2009) Kulturelle Grundlagen des Wandels von Wohlfahrtsstaaten, Österreichische Zeitschrift für Soziologie, 34,3: 3-21.
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2009) Varieties of undeclared work in European societies, British Journal of Industrial Relations, 47,1: 79-99.
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2009): Entwicklungspfade und Zukunft der Kinderbetreuung, Journal for Family Research, 6: 237-254.
- Eichler, Melanie; Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2009) The “consumer principle” in the care of elderly people - free choice and actual choice in the German welfare state, Social Policy and Administration, 43, 6: 617-633.(reprint in Greve, Bent (ed.): Choice. London: Palgrave).
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2009) Le culture de welfare nella prospettiva Europea, Studi di Sociologia 15, 2: 123-149.
- Hofreuter-Gätgens, K, Bergelt, C, Hergert, A, Koch, U, Melchior, H, Pfau-Effinger, B, Schulz, H, Watzke, B, Morfeld, M (2009) Die Bedeutung sozialer Faktoren für die Rehabilitation onkologischer und psychischer/psychosomatischer Erkrankungen: Ergebnisse einer systematischen Literaturanalyse, DRV-Schriften, 83, 103-105.
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2008) ‚Kulturelle Grundlagen des Wandels von Wohlfahrtsstaaten’, Österreichische Zeitschrift für Soziologie ‘, 34, 3: 3-21.
- Eichler, Melanie; Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2008) Cultural and structural conditions of family care, Zeitschrift für Gerontologie und Geriatrie, 41: 60-60.
- Pfau-Effinger, B. (2007) Culture e strutture innovative nei servizi di cura, Sociologia e Politiche Sociali, 10, 3: 11-30.
- Meyer, Traute; Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2006): Gender Arrangements and Pension Systems in Britain and Germany: Tracing change over five decades", International Journal of Ageing and Later Life, 4: 67-110.
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2007): Review on Welfare and Families in Europe, Peter Abrahamson, Thomas P. Boje and Bent Greve, Aldershot, Ashgate, 2005, International Journal of Social Welfare, 16,1: 95-96.
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2006): Review on the ‚Handbook Women and Gender Research, Theory, Methods, Empirical Research, eds. von R. Becker und B. Kortendiek, VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, Kölner Zeitschrift für Soziologie und Sozialpsychologie, 1: 171-172.
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2005): Culture and Welfare State Policies: Reflections on a Complex Interrelation. Journal of Social Policy 34, 1, pp. 1-18, among the top ten most cited articles of all articles ever published in the journal, last view 23.02.2023.
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2005): Welfare State Policies and the development of care arrangements. European Societies 7, 2, 321-347. among the top ten most cited articles in the journal, viewed 16.12.2016 (reprint in Leira, Arnlaug; Lewis, Jane; Saraceno, Chiara (2012)(eds.) Families and Family Policies, Cheltenham/UK; Northampton/ MA, USA: Edward Elgar Edward Elgar),
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2005): Review article: ‘Working Parents and the Welfare State: Family Change and Policy Reform in Scandinavia’ by Arnlaug Leira. British Journal of Industrial Relations, 2, 335-337.
- Pfau-Effinger, B. (2004), Socio-historical paths of the male breadwinner model – an explanation of cross-national differences. The British Journal of Sociology, 55: 377–399. doi:10.1111/j.1468-4446.2004.00025..
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2004): Umbau der skandinavischen Volksheime ? Geographische Rundschau, 2: 32-36.
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2003): Familienpolitik in Deutschland im Ost-/West-Vergleich. Sociologhicheskye Issledovanya (Sociological Research)
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2003): Review article: 'Careers of Couples in Contemporary Society - From Male Breadwinner to Dual-Earner Families', edited by Hans-Peter Blossfeld an Sonja Drobnic. British Journal of Industrial Relations, 41, 1
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2001): Bereichsbesprechung “Familie“. Soziologische Revue, 2
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2001): Wandel wohlfahrtsstaatlicher Geschlechterpolitiken im soziokulturellen Kontext. Kölner Zeitschrift für Soziologie und Sozialpsychologie 41 (special issue)
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2000): Opyt kross-natsional’nogo analiza gendernogo uklada (Transformation von Gender-Arrangements – Theorie und Soziale Praxis). Sociologhicheskye Issledovanya (Sociological Research), 11. 24-36.
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (2000): Restrukturierung europäischer Wohlfahrtsstaaten – ein Literaturüberblick. Welt Trends, 3
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (1999): Change of family policies in the socio-cultural context of European Societies. Comparative Social Research, 18, 135-160.
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (1999): Development paths of European labour markets. Lifelong Learning in Europe. 3
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (1998): Gender cultures and the gender arrangement - a theoretical framework for cross-national comparisons on gender. Innovation: the European Journal of Social Sciences, 11, 2, 147-166
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (1998): Der soziologische Mythos von der Hausfrauenehe. Entwicklungspfade der Familie in Europa. Soziale Welt, 2,167-182.
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (1996): Analyse internationaler Differenzen in der Erwerbsbeteiligung von Frauen - theoretischer Rahmen und empirische Ergebnisse. Kölner Zeitschrift für Soziologie und Sozialpsychologie, 3, 462-492.
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (1995): Erwerbsbeteiligung von Frauen im europäischen Vergleich - am Beispiel von Finnland, den Niederlanden und Westdeutschland. Informationen zur Raumentwicklung, 1
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (1994): Erwerbspartnerin oder berufstätige Ehefrau? Sozio-kulturelle Kontextbedingungen der Arbeitsmarkt-Integration von Frauen im internationalen Vergleich. Soziale Welt, 3, 322-373
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (1994): The Gender Contract and Part-time Paid Work by Women - A Comparative Perspective. Environment and Planning A, 26, 8, 1355-1376
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (1993): Modernisation, Culture and Part-time Employment - The Example of Finland and Germany, in: Work, Employment and Society. 7, 3, 383-410. (The British Sociological Association has distinguished this article as “favourite WES article from the last 25 years”.)
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (1993) Macht des Patriarchats oder Geschlechterkontrakt. Arbeitsmarkt-Integration von Frauen im internationalen Vergleich, (Power of Patriarchy or Gender Contract? Women’s Labour Market Integration in International Comparative Perspective) Prokla, 4, 93, 633-663,
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit; Geissler, Birgit (1992): Institutionelle und sozio-kulturelle Kontextbedingungen der Entscheidung verheirateter Frauen für Teilzeitarbeit. Ein Beitrag zu einer Soziologie der Erwerbsbeteiligung. Mitteilungen aus der Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung, 3
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (1992): Differences and Similarities: the Position of Women on the Dutch Labour Market from an European Perspective, Bevolking en Gezin, 1.
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit; Geissler, Birgit (1989): Frauenarbeit mittels Arbeitszeitverkürzung- ein Modell der positiven Diskriminierung von Eltern im Erwerbsleben. WSI-Mitteilungen, 7
- Geissler, Birgit; Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (1989): Die Arbeitszeit als Ansatzpunkt zur Frauenförderung. Frauenforschung 2.
- Pfau-Effinger, Birgit (1988): The Impact of the Employment Crisis on the Individual Employment History. Labour and Society, 3, 347-358
- Friedmann, Petra; Pfau, Birgit (1985): Frauenarbeit in der Krise - Frauenarbeit trotz Krise? Korrekturversuch an einem arbeitsmarkttheoretischen Allgemeinplatz. Leviathan, 2