The present study opens the new series “Economy and Politics” which combines empirically and theoretically oriented research from the fields of economics, political science, and political sociology. This includes, in particular, the treatment of political issues by means of economic approaches and, conversely, the examination of economic phenomena from the perspective of political science or sociology. The dissertation by Christoph Hindermann is, in a sense, exemplary for the new series, as it examines a topic that was previously reserved for qualitative sociological reflections. In his study, the author applies methods that are used primarily in economic theory and empirical social research. He enters new scientific territory by analyzing the influence of economic freedom on the legitimacy of states. Empirical research on the legitimacy of states is by itself still an emerging branch of research within political science and sociology, which has so far been reluctant to penetrate the disciplines. The author builds on this empirical research and extends it to the question of the influence of economic freedom, thereby abandoning speculative considerations of normative political theory that have long dominated social philosophy or political theory. These qualitative reflections include, for example, the question of whether democracies promote the legitimacy of political orders or whether capitalism undermines or reinforces their legitimacy. Typically, such analyses are characterized by overall considerations, in which the question of legitimacy is discussed from the perspective of a representative citizen. The scientific value of the present study is based on the fact that the author undertakes a well-founded empirical analysis, which aims at explaining state legitimacy based on the characteristics of countries and their individuals. Such an approach already promises a high yield of knowledge. Since data for the measurement of economic freedom are available and the measuring methods have matured in the meantime, the author can combine two strands of empirical research: Surveys to measure economic freedom and surveys to measure the legitimacy of states. Instead of examining the impact of economic freedom on legitimacy directly, the author chooses an indirect approach by first measuring determinants of the legitimacy of a political order and then, in a second step, examining whether indicators or sub-indicators of economic freedom exert an additional causal influence. While some results of the work confirm previous research, the author also comes to surprising and unexpected new findings, such as the negative influence of the Human Development Index on state legitimacy. It is desirable that the result of the present work resonate both in empirical social theory as well as in qualitative political theory.

本研究开创了经济学、政治学、政治社会学等领域的实证与理论研究相结合的新系列《经济与政治》。这尤其包括用经济学的方法来处理政治问题，反之，从政治学或社会学的角度审视经济现象。克里斯托夫·因德曼（christophindermann）的论文在某种意义上是新系列的典范，因为它研究了一个以前只留给定性社会学思考的话题。在他的研究中，作者运用了主要用于经济理论和实证社会研究的方法。他通过分析经济自由对国家合法性的影响，进入了新的科学领域。关于国家合法性的实证研究本身仍然是政治学和社会学中一个新兴的研究分支，到目前为止，这两个学科一直不愿深入。作者在这一实证研究的基础上，将其扩展到经济自由的影响问题上，从而摒弃长期主导社会哲学或政治理论的规范性政治理论的思辨性考虑。这些定性思考包括，例如，民主政体是否促进政治秩序的合法性，或资本主义是否削弱或加强其合法性。一般来说，这种分析的特点是通盘考虑，从具有代表性的公民的角度讨论合法性问题。本研究的科学价值在于，作者进行了一次有根据的实证分析，旨在根据国家及其个人的特点来解释国家合法性。这种方法已经保证了知识的高产量。由于衡量经济自由度的数据是有的，同时衡量方法也已经成熟，笔者可以将两股实证研究结合起来：衡量经济自由度的调查和衡量国家合法性的调查。作者没有直接考察经济自由对合法性的影响，而是选择了一种间接的方法，首先衡量政治秩序合法性的决定因素，然后，在第二步，审查经济自由的指标或次级指标是否产生额外的因果影响。在一些研究结果证实了前人的研究成果的同时，笔者也得出了一些令人惊讶和意想不到的新发现，例如人类发展指数对国家合法性的负面影响。希望本研究的结果能在实证社会理论和定性政治理论中产生共鸣。