Activation, Public Employment Services and their Clients: The Role of Social Class in a Continental Welfare State

Abstract

This article fills a gap in the existing literature by investigating how public employment service (PES) staff actually deal with their clients under a continental regime of activation. The results reported here are based on interviews both with PES staff and their unemployed clients in Germany. We argue that due to its Bismarckian origins as an insurance-based system of 'unemployment protection', Germany's system of unemployment compensation is attractive not only for the marginalized, but also for core workers. As a result, PES staff deal with clients from very heterogeneous class backgrounds. We demonstrate that social class is a significant factor in client outcomes, and that earlier research has perhaps overemphasized the role of frontline staff as 'street-level bureaucrats'. While staff do have considerable power, the result of the encounters between the administration and clients also depends on the capabilities of the clients, which, in turn, are strongly related to social class.

Practices of activation in frontline interactions: Coercion, persuasion, and the role of trust in activation policies in Germany

“…On the other hand, producing trust may also be a rational strategy with regard to the frontline worker's position in his relation with clients. Even though there is a structural power asymmetry between street‐level bureaucracies and their clients, individual encounters between caseworkers and their clients are likewise shaped by the capabilities of the clients (Ludwig‐Mayerhofer, Behrend, & Sondermann, ). Moreover, research on sanctioning practices within the German basic income support scheme has shown that many caseworkers tend to avoid sanctions and prefer to rely on practices of non‐sanctioning in interactions with welfare recipients (Karl, Müller, & Wolff, ).…”

How-to Bureaucracy: A Concept of Citizens’ Administrative Literacy

“…Citizens will not only differ in terms of their attitudes and trust towards public institutions (Cook & Gronke, 2005), but also in the way they interact due to their knowledge and skills (Gordon, 1975;Ludwig-Mayerhofer et al, 2014). By conceptualizing a model of 'administrative literacy' (AL), this study adds an explanation for differing behavior in public encounters.…”

“…However, the role of citizens remains mostly passive in these studies, whereas scholars agree that the abilities and capacities of citizens may be crucial for influencing the behavior of SLB (Ludwig-Mayerhofer et al, 2014; Senghaas et al, 2019, p. 10), for example, during negotiation processes (Raaphorst & Loyens, 2018, p. 22). While SLB will tend to treat most clients alike due to routinization, “ .…”

Personally affected, politically disaffected? How experiences with public employment services impact young people's political efficacy

“…We therefore control for the effects of gender, age, educational level, marital status, and current economic activity. Social background, in particular, has been shown to influence the type of encounter PES users have (Ludwig‐Mayerhofer, Behrend, & Sondermann, ). Moreover, we take into consideration whether the respondent has a migration background (either first or second generation), as this group is at particular risk of unemployment and social disadvantage in Germany .…”