Internationale Konferenz Fördergeber: Universität Siegen, Forschungskolleg „Zukunft menschlich gestalten“ (FoKoS), Laufzeit: Dezember 2012 – Juli 2013,
Economic as well as social forces question the traditional governance of European welfare states and trigger their transformation. Due to economic globalisation, European integration, low growth rates and unemployment, and not to forget the repercussions of the financial crisis of 2008, welfare states face rising functional pressures. In order to cope with tighter public budgets governments have been open for market solutions: economisation and marketisation of welfare governance have developed to a major reform trend. Throughout Europe and across the different fields of social policy the creation of welfare markets could be observed, albeit to a varying extent and with differing timing. The turn to market-based welfare governance comes to light in the field of old age security as well as in health care, long-term care, or unemployment policy.
Next to financial problems which gain much attention in the public as well as in the academic debate, social developments provide formidable challenges, too. As a matter of fact, the socio-demographic characteristics of users and clients of welfare services have changed considerably – and thus suggest the need for encompassing reforms of traditional welfare governance. Two major drivers of social change are brought to the fore in this conference: that is, diversity and mobility. Just as the mobility of capital has increased, so has the mobility of labour. Immigration flows have intensified over the past decades and a coalescent Europe has encouraged vocational mobility. Both developments are part of the cause of increased cultural or religious heterogeneity in European societies. Socio-demographic change of welfare recipients, however, is also a result of augmenting labour participation of women, shrinking birth rates, and an aging society.
To some extent, the social and economic forces outlined above press in the same direction, namely towards an intensified financial pressure. Demands are increasing, while at the same time the relationship between those who fund the welfare state via social contributions and/or taxes and those dependent on welfare benefits is changing. Social heterogeneity and mobility, however, also create particular problems of their own, such as the question of the ‘portability’ of pensions. How to design funding and service provision when classical principals such as the place of work or residence are no longer appropriate? And what does the notion of diversity imply for policy principles in unemployment policy? Further examples for the new challenges resulting from mobility and diversity that the welfare state has to cope with are global care chains or health tourism: how to deal, for instance, with diversity in health or long-term care, when patients and those who care have differing cultural backgrounds and religious beliefs?
Against this background a workshop with international scholars has been organised to discuss the following questions: How are welfare markets governed in a human way, thereby taking increasing diversity and mobility into account? The underlying assumption is that a positive handling of social heterogeneity and mobility provides remarkable challenges, especially for those welfare states which rely heavily on private for-profit service provision. To ensure that welfare markets achieve not only efficient solutions but also solutions which are desirable from the point of view of social policy, an effective regulatory regime is required. A regulatory regime for private welfare provision preventing the typical negative externalities of markets such as restricted access, creaming and cherry-picking, or additional out-of-pocket payments for users, and so forth, includes not only mechanisms to hold private actors accountable, but also a modernised public administration putting welfare market regulation into effect as well as encompassing consumer rights to enable the user of services to claim their rights.
Publication: Klenk, Tanja (Guest editor) (2015): Special issue “The governance of welfare markets – how to cope with mobility and diversity?”, Journal for European Policy Analysis (1) 1, download unter http://www.ipsonet.org/publications/open-access/european-policy-analysis/volume-1-number-1-spring-2015.
Letzte Änderung: 31. Juli 2024