Activating the Unemployed: A Comparative Appraisal of Work-Oriented Policies

by Gilbert,Neil

• ISBN13: 9780765807670
• ISBN10: 076580767X
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Nonspecific Binding
• Copyright: 2001-05-31
• Publisher: Routledge

Summary

The last decade has witnessed a conspicuous alteration in policies protecting unemployed people in modern welfare states. Social policies are increasingly designed to encourage economic independence. Policy makers have introduced a wide range of reforms linking disability, unemployment, and welfare programs cash benefits to work-oriented measures. Welfare policies are being framed by a new emphasis on recipients' obligations, emphasizing that the receipt of benefits creates a responsibility to take action towards becoming self-reliant. The objective is to minimize the duration of dependence or improve the well-being of family or community.Activating the Unemployed addresses this growing interest in work-oriented measures. This represents a shift in the dominant discourse on social welfare from focus on the citizen's rights to social benefits to emphasis on their responsibilities to work and lead an active life. In this volume, a distinguished array of international contributors provide cross-cultural perspectives to analyze recent diverse policy initiatives to activate the unemployed in nine countries -- Britain, France, Italy, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United States. Each provides a systematic account of the background, design, implementation, and results of employment-oriented measures. Collectively they permit comparison of organized responses to common problems in the areas of public assistance (welfare), unemployment, and disability, among others. Further chapters seek to broaden perspectives on policy options, the issues raised, and lessons learned in the course of activating the unemployed.This thorough and insightful accountaddresses significant contemporary issues and concerns about welfare, social security, and unemployment. It will aid policy makers, professionals, and scholars in assessing current trends in welfare in various countries throughout

Table of Contents

Introduction	vii
Evaluating Welfare to Work in the United Kingdom	1	(28)
Ken Judge
Creeping Workfare Policies: The Case of Italy	29	(40)
Valeria Fargion
Work-Oriented Reforms: New Directions in New Zealand	69	(44)
Ross Mackay
From Welfare to Work Fare: Dutch Policies in the Nineties	113	(22)
Piet K. Keizer
Welfare-to-Work to Work-to-Welfare: The French Case	135	(50)
Jean-Claude Barbier
Bruno Theret
Moving People from Welfare to Work in the United States	185	(28)
Neung Hoo Park
Rebecca A. Van Voorhis
The Emergence of Active Policy in Switzerland	213	(30)
Francois Xavier Merrien
Sweden - Still a Civilized Version of Workfare?	243	(24)
Sven E. O. Hort
The Norwegian Work Approach in the 1990s: Rhetoric and Reform	267	(26)
Espen Dahl
Jon Anders Dropping
Activating the Unemployed: The Challenge Ahead	293	(14)
Neil Gilbert
Rebecca A. Van Voorhis
Contributors	307	(2)
Index	309