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“I never planned for it”—Exploration of expectations about caring for older parents Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-04-22 Chiara De Poli, Raphael Wittenberg, Amritpal Rehill, Madeleine Stevens, Nicola Brimblecombe
The projected increase in older dependent adults will continue straining formal care services whilst increasing the reliance on unpaid carers, in England and internationally. While motivations and willingness to care among unpaid carers have been explored, expectations around the caregiving role remain under‐researched. This article delves into expectations of middle‐aged individuals around providing
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Active representation and equal treatment: The influence of bureaucrats' social background on discrimination Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-04-18 Nadine Raaphorst, Tanachia Ashikali, Sandra Groeneveld
Drawing on street‐level discrimination literature and representative bureaucracy literature, we theorise that bureaucrats from social groups that have a lower status in society are less inclined to discriminate in evaluating citizen‐clients than bureaucrats from higher status groups. We conducted a 2 × 2 vignette survey experiment among bureaucrats in Dutch street‐level organisations (N = 3109) in
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Indentured: Benefit deductions, debt recovery and welfare disciplining Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-04-13 Daniel Edmiston
The UK social security system performs an important role as a creditor and debt collector for many benefit claimants, with more affected by deductions than formal welfare conditionality or sanctions. Deductions, then, are central to understanding low‐income life in the UK. With that in mind, this paper draws on a mixed‐methods project to explore the policy rationale, administration and effects of benefit
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Labour market gender gaps and childcare policies in countries with different social investment strategies Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-04-13 Agnieszka Chłoń‐Domińczak, Irena E. Kotowska, Iga Magda, Magdalena Smyk‐Szymańska, Paweł Strzelecki, Karolina Bolesta
We study the role of formal and informal childcare within the ECEC policies for gender employment and pay gaps, considering the life course stages distinctive for childcare tasks. The ECEC policies are framed within the types of social investment strategies identified in the EU countries to picture developments in social investments after 2005. The aggregated EU‐SILC data from 2005 to 2019 for 27 European
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The ‘two lives’ of Esping‐Andersen and the revival of a research programme: Gender equality, employment and redistribution in contemporary social policy Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-04-11 Emanuele Ferragina
This article makes two conceptual contributions to social policy literature. First, we summarise key concepts and insights from Gøsta Esping‐Andersen's major books, tracing his work in ‘two lives’: ‘the foundations, or the welfare state between states and markets’ and ‘the demographic turn’. Analysing the ‘first life’, we revisit the centrality of the decommodification and social stratification concepts
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Revisiting the role of social work in the substantial realization of social rights in local welfare systems: Transforming and changing the rules of the institutional game? Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-03-30 Lore Dewanckel, Tineke Schiettecat, Koen Hermans, Rudi Roose, Wim Van Lancker, Fabian Kessl, Griet Roets
Although diverse European welfare states have institutionalized an extensive infrastructure of public welfare services to redistribute resources, governments have been confronted with barriers in realizing the social rights of certain groups of citizens. Decentralization and increasingly local welfare provision has been promoted as a strategy to substantially realize social rights. In that sense, the
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Verification of policy information and citizen attitudes toward government under COVID-19 pandemic: Evidence from survey experiment in South Korea Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-03-27 Junmo Song, Jeong-han Kang, Yoon Jik Cho
This study examines how citizens' attitudes toward government are affected by verifying or correcting their prior knowledge of governmental policy concerning the COVID-19 pandemic. Using a survey experiment, we asked respondents about their knowledge of the stimulus check provided by local governments in South Korea. We then provided the correct answer to half of the respondents at random. For outcome
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Welfare service reforms: Arab minority welfare bureau managers assess the outcomes Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-03-22 Ibrahim Mahajne
Welfare bureaus constitute a safety net for the dispossessed Arab minority in Israel who are partially excluded from the state social services. The welfare bureau reforms discussed in this article are consequently crucial to improve welfare services for the underprivileged minority service users. This article partially fills a lacuna in the relevant literature by adopting a critical approach to assess
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Looking beyond the workplace: Trade unions and the politics of poverty in Italy Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-03-21 Luca Cigna, Bianca Luna Fabris
There is ample literature to suggest that labour's interests are at odds with the extension of income protection to ‘outsiders’. Until recently, Italian unions were reluctant, if not outright obstructive, towards the introduction of a minimum income scheme (MIS). After the 2008 financial crisis and its dramatic social and economic consequences, however, the three major labour confederations supported
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Innovation in practice: A deviant case analysis of a locally developed assessment tool used in a psychiatric and addiction clinic in Sweden Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-03-20 Sofia Härd
This article analyses the use of a locally developed assessment tool designed to generate aggregated data to evaluate the work of a psychiatric and addiction clinic. The use of tools, methods and interventions in the Swedish social services is usually based on recommendations in national guidelines established by the National Board of Health and Welfare (NBHW). Thus, a locally produced and systematically
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A history of the intermediate tier in the English NHS: Centre, region, periphery Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-03-18 Michael Lambert
Centre‐periphery relations have constituted a paradox for the English National Health Service (NHS) since its creation in 1948. Is it a top‐down national service organised locally, or a bottom‐up arrangement of local health systems managed nationally? North West England provides a regional case study which traces the changing organisational, relational and spatial dimensions of the intermediate tier
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Critical juncture and historical legacies: Insights and methods. By Collier, D., & Munck, G. L. (Eds.), London: The Rowman & Little-field Publishing Group, Inc. 2022. pp. 1–473. $92.70 (Hardcover). ISBN: 9781538166147 Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-03-06 Tauchid Komara Yuda
CONFLICT OF INTEREST STATEMENT The authors declare no conflict of interest.
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Health systems in the COVID‐19 crises: Comparative patterns of NHS satisfaction and preferences for public health action in Scotland and England Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-03-05 Christopher Deeming
It is often claimed Scotland is more social democratic in outlook compared to England, if this is the case then we might expect to find differences in public attitudes towards health and social justice, reflecting the growing health policy divergence between the two nations. Comparative attitudes towards healthcare in Scotland and England are worthy of close scrutiny here, given the different reform
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Trajectories among recipients of social assistance in Norway: A local approach Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-02-21 Espen Dahl, Thomas Lorentzen, Åsmund Hermansen, Andreas Roaldsnes
1 INTRODUCTION A local perspective on individual work and welfare careers has become more urgent in the past decades due to recent political, economic and social developments (Heidenreich & Rice, 2016). In general, the Nordic welfare regime is more service oriented than other welfare regimes. To state the obvious, service provision and use take place at the local level. As Andreotti and Mingione (2016)
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Variations in Social Europe? National political parties' positions on EU‐level social regulations Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-02-19 Zhen Jie Im
How do national political parties vary in their views on Social Europe? I focus on an aspect that has received less attention despite its growing prevalence—EU regulations with ambitions to diminish social inequality to encourage social convergence among Member States. Since the Juncker Commission, the European Commission has become increasingly active in pursuing this aspect of Social Europe. Thus
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European long‐term care marketisation: A political economy framework Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-02-19 Julien Mercille
The study of European long‐term care (LTC) marketisation is dominated by institutional and ideational perspectives. In contrast, political economic theoretical frameworks have received little attention. This is paradoxical, because marketisation is an inherently political economic phenomenon. The financialisation of LTC systems, the growth of private for‐profit providers and the rise in cross‐national
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The politics of social policies in Portugal: Different responses in times of crises Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-02-13 Jorge Caleiras, Renato Miguel Carmo
Portugal has been confronted with a succession of crises in recent years. This article explores the differences in the way that, in Portugal, the welfare regime tackled the Great Recession context (financial, euro, sovereign debt, structural adjustment crises) and COVID-19 crisis through very different policy responses. The fact that the governments in office acted differently when faced with realities
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In search of a job—But which one? How unemployed people revise their occupational expectations Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-02-06 Didier Demazière
Conducting a job search implies the identification of a target—an intended job. However, this assumption has been little studied, and just two main conclusions have been drawn, namely: jobseekers have an incentive to adjust their targets to the jobs available, and returning to work tends to lead to occupational downgrading. This article explores how job search experiences shape and alter targets. Biographical
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Spaces of subsidiarity: A comparative inquiry into the social agenda of Cohesion Policy Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-02-01 Steven Ballantyne, Lorenzo Mascioli
Cohesion Policy—the European Union's (EU) policy platform for regional and local development—represents a major yet often neglected instance of Social Europe. In this article we inquire into the delivery of Cohesion Policy projects concerned with social policy objectives. Specifically, we ask: how are these projects delivered? Building on the literature of subsidiarisation in social policy, we theorise
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Does employment assistance promote employment of the impoverished in China? Evidence from a mixed methods approach Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-01-31 Shencheng Wang, Yongzheng Yang, Baochen Liu
The issue of employment is extremely significant, and employment assistance programs work for special social assistance and employment support for the impoverished in China. Are employment assistance programs, particularly those providing job recommendations and free vocational training, effective in promoting employment in China? This study answers this question using a mixed methods approach. Logistic
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Crisis? What crisis? Social policy when crises are and are not crises in Czechia, Hungary and Slovakia Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-01-30 Steven Saxonberg, Tomáš Sirovátka, Eduard Csudai
In this article, we analyse how different governments have dealt with situations, labelled as ‘crises’ in the international and national discourses. More specifically, we analyse how the Czech, Hungarian and Slovak governments framed and dealt with their social policies during the 2008 ‘financial crisis’, the 2015 ‘refugee crisis’, and the 2020 ‘Covid crisis’. We argue that sometimes governments and
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Crisis in the UK National Health Service: What does it mean, and what are the consequences? Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-01-25 Ian Greener, Martin Powell
There have been more-or-less continual suggestions that the UK National Health Service (NHS) has been suffering from one kind of crisis or another since its creation in 1948. If we are to understand the problems the NHS faces, then we need to empirically investigate what kinds of crises it has faced, if such crises have patterns to them, and whether or not they tend to lead to policy change. This article
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Quantity over quality? How economic factors and welfare state interventions affected job insecurity and job quality before, during and after the economic crises Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-01-25 Lorenza Antonucci, Hyojin Seo, Martin Strobl
This article uses multilevel analysis of 24 European countries to examine the effects of macroeconomic variables (GDP and unemployment) and welfare state interventions (active and passive labour market policies) on job insecurity and job quality in Europe from the mid-1990s until the last 2021 COVID crisis. The paper makes a distinction between the crisis of the welfare state and the reaction of welfare
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Once again: Are welfare states in crisis? Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-01-19 Bent Greve
Welfare state crises have long fascinated researchers. This introduction distills the special issue's insights on this enduring topic. Overall, the articles indicate that future debates surrounding crisis types and responsive policies will remain important. Simple or singular crisis explanations prove elusive. Uncertainty persists regarding whether crises are episodic or constant and occur on macro
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The moral, the political and social licence in digitally-driven family policy and intervention: Parents negotiating experiential knowledge and ‘other’ families Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-01-15 Rosalind Edwards, Val Gillies, Hélène Vannier-Ducasse, Sarah Gorin
The article provides a conceptually informed empirical critique of the pursuit of social licence as a warrant for data linkage and predictive analytics in the field of family policy intervention. It draws on research focusing on parental views of digitally-driven family governance in the United Kingdom. We identify the notion of consensus that undergirds the concept of social licence that acts to obscure
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Modern welfare in the United Kingdom is a universal (dis)credit to Beveridge. Is it time for a basic income? Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-01-11 Dave Beck, Remco Peters, Gemma Bridge, Francis Poitier, Ben Pearson
Universal Credit signalled a revolution in the delivery and costs of welfare provisioning. UC aimed to reduce spending on welfare, but in doing so now threatens the stability of a functioning and cohesive society. Over recent years, and most notably during the COVID-19 pandemic, it has become ever clearer that adequate social security is vital to the functioning of society, as well as to the health
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It's a wonderful NHS? A counterfactual perspective on the creation of the British National Health Service Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-01-07 Martin Powell, Ian Greener
While there have been some studies of counterfactual analysis in history and other academic disciplines, there are very few studies in social policy and health policy. This paper explores a major critical juncture and counterfactual in the creation of the NHS. In particular, it explores the critical juncture of the discussion in the Labour Cabinet involving Bevan's proposal for nationalising the hospitals
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Crises of the welfare state, resilience, and pessimism of the intellect Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-01-09 Kevin Farnsworth, Zoë Irving
The crises faced by welfare states have now endured for significantly longer than the counter-period of stability, calm and cooperation between the 1940s and 1970s. Systemic crisis of welfare states tied to the contradictions of capitalism, and the exogenous crises for the welfare state that have afflicted its expansion have, however, been met by faith in its resilience evidenced in its economic functions
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The implosion of the Dutch surveillance welfare state Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-01-07 Menno Fenger, Robin Simonse
From the 1990s onwards, fraud detection has become an increasingly important focus in the design and implementation of a variety of welfare schemes, including unemployment benefits, social assistance benefits, pensions, and personal care budgets. This culminated in the 2014 Fraud Act, which introduced a system of high sanction in all cases of benefit fraud, even if they were causes by administrative
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Digital labour platforms and social dialogue at EU level: How new players redefine actors and their roles and what this means for collective bargaining Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-01-03 Agnieszka Piasna
Digital labour platforms transform work and employment relations in many ways. Crucially, they renounce the role of the employer, leading to a redefinition of traditional categories of actors and their roles in social policy and dialogue. Using the example of the EU proposal for a directive on improving working conditions in platform work, this article examines how this redefinition is materialising
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Excluded workers and exempted employers: A qualitative study on domestic workers' access to social protection in the Netherlands Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-01-03 David de Kort, Sonja Bekker
In the Netherlands, many part-time domestic workers fall within the scope of a particular type of labour law, that gives them fewer social protection rights and that renders private actors (households and workers) responsible for exercising those rights. Over the years, this policy has been criticised for institutionalising the differential treatment of domestic workers, which goes against ideas propagated
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Does digital government hollow out the essence of street-level bureaucracy? A systematic literature review of how digital tools' foster curtailment, enablement and continuation of street-level decision-making Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-01-03 Justine Marienfeldt
The growing use of digital tools in policy implementation has altered the work of street-level bureaucrats who are granted substantial discretionary power in decision-making. Digital tools can constrain discretionary power, like the curtailment thesis proposed, or serve as action resources, like the enablement thesis suggested. This article assesses empirical evidence of the impact of digital tools
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Classifying participatory methods in social care regulation Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2024-01-01 Hilla Dolev, Avishai Benish
This article examines the regulation–participation nexus in social care services. Participatory forms of social care regulation have been expanding over the past 20 years, but the literature on this trend remains scarce. To fill this gap, we developed an analytical framework for classifying participatory regulation methods. This framework is based on two axes, one drawn from the literature on regulation
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“You didn't ask, so you don't know”: Information and administrative burden in social benefit claims Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2023-12-28 Noam Tarshish, Roni Holler
Encounters with welfare state bureaucracy are often burdensome and might even result in administrative exclusion and non-take up. With the growing scholarly interest in administrative burden experiences, a particular focus has been on learning costs, with evidence suggesting that difficulty obtaining reliable and useful information is one of their most fundamental aspects. We still lack a systematic
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The end of welfare states as we know them? A multidimensional perspective Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2023-12-20 Jakub Sowula, Franziska Gehrig, Lyle A. Scruggs, Martin Seeleib-Kaiser, Gabriela Ramalho Tafoya
This article highlights the limitations of unidimensional analyses in the comparative welfare state literature and emphasises the need for a more holistic, multidimensional approach incorporating social spending, welfare state outputs and outcomes. To illustrate the utility of a multidimensional approach, we examine the long-term welfare state trajectories of Sweden and Germany, prototypical social-democratic
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Control pliers in principal-agent relations: An investigation of hardship commissions in the German asylum administration Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2023-12-13 Ina Radtke, Markus Seyfried
There is a remarkable gap in research regarding principal-centred analyses of control means towards—in a formal sense—rather weak independent administrative actors as agents. Therefore, the paper develops a theoretical notion to link means of ex ante and ex post control and applies it to the (re-)actions of ministries vis à vis hardship commissions in the German Länder by asking: How does the super-ordinated
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How do right-wing populist majoritarian governments redistribute? Evidence from Poland, 2005–2019 Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2023-11-29 Leszek Morawski, Michal Brzezinski
There is scarce evidence regarding redistribution policies implemented by right-wing populist parties forming majority governments. We contribute to this literature by measuring the effects of sweeping reforms of the tax and benefit system carried out by the populist party PiS governing Poland since 2015. The reforms included a generous, unconditional, and universal child benefit. Using micro-simulation-based
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Does the unemployment trap still exist? The case of the Italian minimum income scheme Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2023-11-27 Gianluca Busilacchi, Alessandro Fabbri
The question of whether welfare benefits imprison recipients in unemployment traps has been at the centre of academic and political debates in recent decades. Empirical evidence at the micro level supports the existence of work disincentive effects of welfare benefits, although of a small magnitude. However, the question of whether this translates into lower aggregate employment remains unsettled.
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Welfare state regimes and social policy resistance to fiscal consolidations Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2023-11-23 Olivier Jacques
We study how welfare states regimes influence the effect of episodes of fiscal consolidations on the four main components of the welfare state: social investment, pensions, healthcare and labour market insurance. Welfare state regimes are associated with distinct social policy legacies that feedback into political competition by shaping the size and influence of different coalitions of constituents
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Policy representation of everyday harm experienced by people with disability Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2023-11-23 Ciara Smyth, Karen R. Fisher, Sally Robinson, Heikki Ikäheimo, Nicole Hrenchir, Jan Idle, Jung Yoon
People with disability are at heightened risk of violence, abuse, neglect and exploitation (VANE) with policy geared towards responding to and eliminating VANE harm. Yet not all harm experienced by people with disability is captured within the VANE harm. Many people also experience harm in everyday interactions that leave them feeling uncomfortable, devalued, disrespected, threatened or silenced. Our
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Regulatory noncompliance among unlicensed care homes: Evidence from Poland Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2023-11-27 Paweł Łuczak, Maciej Ławrynowicz
The development of markets for private for-profit care homes often raises concerns about the quality of services provided by these care homes. To address the fundamental needs of their residents, governments introduce quality regulations and, through mandatory licensing, allow private care homes to enter the market. However, in some countries, evidence reveals that many private care homes operate without
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What policy functions are reflected in the distribution of financial support for parents by child age and birth order? An analysis of 28 European countries Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2023-11-23 Kristijan Fidanovski
Motivated by the growing prominence of fertility incentivisation and long-term child development in European family policymaking, this paper examines the distribution of financial support for parents over the course of childhood and between birth orders in Europe. We use the term ‘older-oriented age bias’ to refer to support that is more generous for older children and the term ‘younger-oriented age
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All in, against all odds. Path shift in family policy via cross-party agreement: the case of the Single Universal Allowance reform in Italy Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2023-11-20 Ilaria Madama, Eugenia Mercuri
The introduction of the Single Universal Child Allowance in 2021 marked a sharp turning point in Italian family policy. Presented as a major revolution aimed at combating the country's alarmingly low birth rates as well as child poverty, the reform was also meant to rationalise the benefits system while overcoming the historical fragmentation and uneven protection granted to families. Against this
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Adaptive social protection in Indonesia: Stress-testing the effect of a natural disaster on poverty and vulnerability Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2023-11-20 Katrin Gasior, Gemma Wright, Helen Barnes, Michael Noble
Indonesia is among the countries with the highest exposure to natural disasters, and risks are expected to increase due to climate change. Natural disasters and other shocks require well-developed social protection systems that can cushion the economic consequences for those most vulnerable to these events. International stakeholders advocate for ‘Adaptive Social Protection’ which links social policy
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The association between couples' education and gender gap in unpaid care work in India Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2023-11-07 Saumya Tripathi, Fuhua Zhai
This cross-sectional study utilizes data from the 2019 India Time-Use Survey to examine the relationship between education and the gender gap in unpaid care work among married couples in India. Results from the Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) regression demonstrate a paradox where more educated or equally educated wives tend to spend more time on unpaid care work compared to their husbands. Women from
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Buffering national welfare states in hard times: The politics of EU capacity-building in the social policy domain Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2023-11-05 Joan Miró, Anna Kyriazi, Marcello Natili, Stefano Ronchi
The EU has traditionally influenced the social and employment policies of Member States through regulation, leaving redistribution to national welfare states. The latter have, however, been gradually weakened by global socioeconomic change and by the expansion of EU market integration. A series of crises over the last 15 years made a bad situation worse: the longue durée erosion of the capacity of
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Everyday sense making and the discursive delineation of social policy space in Zambia Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2023-10-25 Anna Wolkenhauer
This article connects the notions of policy space and social contract in order to understand the importance of everyday discourse for the perceived legitimacy of social policy choices and emerging responsibilities in Zambia. Based on a Grounded Theory analysis of interview and document material, the article reconstructs common sense ideas about the limited resources of the state, from which modalities
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Social protection, community participation and state-citizen relations: Evidence from a cash transfer program in south-central Somalia Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2023-10-24 Vanessa van den Boogaard, Fabrizio Santoro, Michael Walker
We investigate whether social protection programs can increase participation in community-driven development programs and examine how this affects state-citizen relations. Using a randomized controlled trial in south-central Somalia, we study the impacts of one-time unconditional cash transfers to vulnerable households that were specifically designed to encourage participation in community development
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Conservative ethnic minority LGTBQ+: Facing the challenge of intersectionality in an inhospitable environment Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2023-10-23 Amos Zehavi, Or Keshet
LGBTQ+ suffer from intolerance everywhere, but in certain conservative minority communities, intolerance is especially high. This study explores how non-minority organizations—government and nonprofit—might support minority LGBTQ+ individuals on the backdrop of tense majority-minority relations. While the extension of external support responds to LGBTQ+ plight, it is also likely to provoke community
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Introduction to special issue: States, citizens and social protection in Africa Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2023-10-10 Jeremy Seekings, Alesha Porisky, Sophie Plagerson, Marianne S. Ulriksen
While social protection provision in Africa has primarily focused on the reduction of food insecurity and income poverty, it has the potential to transform the relationship between citizens and states. The articles in this special issue provide insights into the theoretical, normative, and empirical assessment of the transformative consequences of social protection programmes across parts of East,
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On the effects of active labour market policies among individuals reporting to have severe mental health problems Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2023-10-10 Stefan Tübbicke, Maximilian Schiele
On the one hand, unemployment is known to have detrimental effects on individuals' mental health. On the other hand, poor mental health reduces re-employment chances quite drastically, creating a vicious cycle. Active labour market policies (ALMPs) such as training programs or wage subsidies have been shown to ameliorate negative effects on mental health and improve labour market integration on average
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Work and alienation in the platform economy. Amazon and the power of organisation. By Sarrah Kassem, Bristol University Press. 2023. £85.00 (hbk). ISBN: 9781529226546 Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2023-10-09 Cecilia Manzo
CONFLICT OF INTEREST STATEMENT The author declared no potential conflicts of interest concerning the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
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Democratic contestation, organised labour, and pension reform in Ghana and Malawi Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2023-10-04 Yonatan L. Morse
What explains variation in African states' commitment to pensions? This article argues that differences in the structure of contestation and legacies of state-labour relations matter. When competition is confined to fewer and more stable parties, social welfare appeals gain currency to mobilise swing voters and makes it more likely that pensions will become a subject of political competition. However
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Behavioural knowledge for policy design: The connection between time use Behaviours and (or) desires and support for policy alternatives Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2023-09-27 Lihi Lahat, Itai Sened
The study explored how understanding people's behaviours and desires can inform policy design and contribute to policy feedback theory. We focused on uses of time that are affected by diverse policies. Given the growing interest in promoting well-being and the connection between the use of time and well-being, we examined behaviours and desires regarding uses of time. In this exploratory study, we
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Street-level bureaucrats' discretion between individual and institutional factors: The analysis of the minimum income policy implementation in two Italian regions Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2023-09-26 Alberta Andreotti, Diego Coletto, Anna Rio
The article provides and empirically tests an analytical model that considers the relationship between the discretionary power of street-level bureaucrats (SLBs) and the institutional and organisational structures at meso and macro levels. The proposal maintains a bottom-up perspective in the analysis of discretionary practices; at the same time, it highlights the relevance of multilevel governance
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Public understandings of welfare and the economy: Who knows what and does it relate to political attitudes? Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2023-09-18 Jan Eichhorn, Daniel Kenealy, Hayley Bennett
Previous studies have revealed significant gaps in the UK public's knowledge about the welfare state and the economy. However, we know little about which groups of the population know more, and which less. Drawing on survey evidence, we confirm that many people overstimate both the size of unemployment provision and levels of benefit fraud, and also make mistakes when answering factual questions about
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Towards a new era in the governance of integrated activation: A systematic review of the literature on the governance of welfare benefits and employment-related services in Europe (2010–21) Social Policy & Administration (IF 2.283) Pub Date : 2023-09-12 Minna van Gerven, Tuuli Malava, Peppi Saikku, Merita Mesiäislehto
This article presents the results of a systematic literature review of research articles (N = 72) to study the governance logic of integrated activation policies and the problems relating to reintegrating welfare benefits with services. The inductive study of the problems indicated in the literature demonstrates both the vertical and horizontal aspects of the governance of integrated activation at