Open Research Repository
The Open Research Repository (ORR) is the official institutional repository of the Central European University. The repository provides access to the research output of the CEU community by collecting open access versions of scholarly works authored or co-authored by CEU faculty and students.
For more information, please contact us at: scholcom@ceu.edu
Recent Submissions
Item Initialisation and network effects in decentralised federated learning(2025-10-30)Fully decentralised federated learning enables collaborative training of individual machine learning models on a distributed network of communicating devices while keeping the training data localised on each node. This approach avoids central coordination, enhances data privacy and eliminates the risk of a single point of failure. Our research highlights that the effectiveness of decentralised federated learning is significantly influenced by the network topology of connected devices and the initial conditions of the learning models. We propose a strategy for uncoordinated initialisation of the artificial neural networks based on the distribution of eigenvector centralities of the underlying communication network, leading to a radically improved training efficiency. Additionally, our study explores the scaling behaviour and the choice of environmental parameters under our proposed initialisation strategy. This work paves the way for more efficient and scalable artificial neural network training in a distributed and uncoordinated environment, offering a deeper understanding of the intertwining roles of network structure and learning dynamics.Item Can crisis corporatism protect vulnerable workers? Conceptual insights from a European perspective(2025-11-01)Crisis corporatism is conceptualised in this article as a temporary governance strategy involving partnerships between the state, labour and employers to mitigate the impacts of crisis to protect vulnerable workers. Using the COVID-19 pandemic as a case study, the article examines how institutionalised power relations in different industrial regimes enabled corporatist decision-making to safeguard vulnerable workers. It presents a conceptual framework linking crisis corporatism with vulnerability, emphasising social actors’ role in advocating for marginalised groups, drawing on empirical studies from European countries. Findings reveal significant variations in corporatist responses, influenced by institutional frameworks, welfare state traditions, and industrial relations systems. Countries with strong corporatist structures effectively mobilised social partners to protect workers, while those with fragmented institutions relied on state intervention or ad hoc measures, often leaving workers exposed to job or income loss. The article highlights social dialogue’s role in crisis resilience and argues for strengthening corporatist structures to ensure inclusive future responses.Publication Whispers of Dissent? Analyzing the Rhetorical Alignment of the Elites with the Authoritarian Incumbent through Parliamentary Discourse in the Kazakhstani Senate(Taylor & Francis, 2025-10-31)Parliaments are often thought to be key arenas of elite signaling in authoritarian regimes. This paper examines the patterns of rhetorical alignment between individual elite members of parliament and the incumbent in a personalistic authoritarian regime using discourse data. I explore the possible determinants of rhetorical alignment, including the elites’ regional affiliations, policy discussion topics, leadership transitions, and crises. To measure rhetorical alignment, the paper applies LSS-based cosine similarity analysis to the statements of Kazakhstani senators alongside the incumbent’s speeches in 2019–2024. The regression analysis of the variation in rhetorical alignment between the incumbent and the senators suggests that while the 2022 leadership change, the COVID-19 crisis, and regional affiliation are not associated with high levels of alignment, some pockets of rhetorical contestation can be concealed within specific policy topics determined through structural topic modeling. To describe this phenomenon, the paper proposes the concept of “embedded rhetorical contestation.” Methodologically, the paper’s findings show the value of text-as-data approaches in analyzing parliamentary discourses for a better understanding of authoritarian regime dynamics and elite signaling.Item Who would ask whom for health advice? The structural anatomy of health advice networks among middle-aged and older adults(2025-10-24)Social relationships provide opportunities to exchange and obtain health advice. Not only close confidants may be perceived as sources of health advice, but also acquaintances met in places outside a closed circle of family and friends, e.g., in voluntary organizations. This study is the first to analyze the structure of complete health advice networks in three voluntary organizations and compare them with more commonly studied close relationships. To this end, we collected data on multiple networks and health outcomes among 143 middle-aged and older adults (mean age = 53.9 years) in three carnival clubs in Germany. Our analyses demonstrate that perceived health advice and close relationships overlap only by 34%. Moreover, recent advances in exponential random graph models (ERGMs) allow us to illustrate that the network structure of perceived health advice differs starkly from that of close relationships. For instance, we found that advice networks exhibited lower transitivity and greater segregation by gender and age in comparison to networks of close relationships. We also found that actors with poor physical health perceive less individuals as health advisors than those with good physical health. Our findings suggest that community settings, such as voluntary associations, provide a unique platform for exchanging health advice and information among both close and distant network members.Item Crisis corporatism under strain:institutional power and the protection of vulnerable groups in Türkiye and Serbia(2025-10-25)This article examines crisis corporatism during the COVID-19 pandemic in Türkiye and Serbia. It focuses on how institutional power relations shaped policy responses for vulnerable groups in the labour market. These countries are semi-peripheral economies with weak corporatist traditions and centralised administration, but they diverge significantly with regard to labour relations. Türkiye’s crisis management was top-down with limited social partner input, and social policy measures tended to exacerbate existing inequalities. Serbia combined executive dominance with selective post hoc consultation, resulting in broader social protection through universal cash transfers and job subsidies. Our findings indicate that institutionalised social dialogue is crucial for inclusive crisis policy-making. Serbia’s modest engagement with social partners led to more effective support for vulnerable workers. The article underscores the centrality of institutionalised power relations in shaping corporatist responses during crises and calls for structurally embedded social dialogue to ensure equitable policy outcomes in future systemic shocks.
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