"The International Conference of the German Association of Political Economy took place in Nuremberg, Germany, 12-14 October 2006. The Conference provided a forum to present novel approaches analysing the causes and consequences of unemployment and investigating and evaluating recent labour market policies. Keynote speakers at the Conference were Armin Falk (University of Bonn) and Tito Boeri (Bocconi University, Milano, and Fondazione Rodolfo Debenedetti).
The papers in this special issue were selected from papers presented at the Conference. A special focus was given to topics that have not featured very strongly in the scientific community in the past, but deserve more attention in the future. The first section of this special issue gives insights on the functioning of active labour market programs from a microeconometric as well as macroeconometric perspective. The second section contains three papers investigating the labour market effects of labour market institutions. The third part presents a paper exploring the determinants of the self-selection of migrants. Finally, a new panel data set - to which international researchers will have access - with a special focus on long-term unemployment is introduced."