Job Search, Employment Capabilities and Well-being of People on Welfare in the Dutch ‘Participation Income’ Experiments

Muffels, Ruud; Gielens, Erwin

doi:10.1007/978-3-030-30044-9_5

Cited by 10 publications

(14 citation statements)

References 21 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Recent publications (Edzes et al, 2021; Muffels, 2021; Muffels and Gielens, 2019; Sanders et al, 2020) have evaluated the outcomes of the experiments in terms of reintegration in to work, job search behaviour, participation, health, wellbeing, and self-management. Others have analysed the discourse in which the experiments were proposed (Groot et al, 2019).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Struggle for Framing and Interpretation: The Impact of the ‘Basic Income Experiments’ on Social Policy Reform in the Netherlands

Roosma

2022

European Journal of Social Security

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

In the period from 1st October 2017 to 31st December 2019, the Dutch government allowed several municipalities to carry out so-called ‘basic income experiments’, ‘trust’ experiments, or ‘experiments low in regulation’. These experiments focused on giving exemptions on obligations attached to social benefits, allowing people to keep extra earnings on top of their social assistance benefits, and providing more guidance in finding work. In this paper, I critically evaluate the extent to which these experiments have had an effect on social policy in the Netherlands in both the short and long run. For municipalities, the main goal of these experiments was to examine whether an approach focused on trust and intrinsic motivation would lead to increased labour market participation and higher wellbeing. The national government approved the experiments; but in its evaluation, it focused solely on the outflow to work in line with the existing workfare approach. In the short run, the effects of the experiments appeared disappointing for those with the ambition of fundamentally reforming the social security system. However, in the struggle for framing and interpretation, advocates of a different social policy approach obtained success in the long run. Although the Participation Act was not initially amended, the recent coalition agreement of the new Government does propose a change related to the outcomes of the experiment; and in recent party manifestos, there are more far-reaching proposals to change social policy in the direction of a universal basic income.

show abstract

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Struggle for Framing and Interpretation: The Impact of the ‘Basic Income Experiments’ on Social Policy Reform in the Netherlands

Roosma

2022

European Journal of Social Security

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Obligations can be fulfilled through paid work but also volunteering, further education, caregiving and other health, wellbeing and social integration measures (see Groot et al, 2019: 284). However, under these municipalities' 'trust experiments' (Muffels et al, 2019), these participation requirements are neither strictly monitored nor enforced through sanctions. Instead, citizens are trusted to reciprocate by municipalities, and welfare agencies rely on intrinsically motivating participation through offering demand-oriented opportunities that citizens pursue, not out of compulsion, but because they consider them meaningful and worthwhile.…”

Section: What Activities Constitute Post-productivist Participation?mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Instead, citizens are trusted to reciprocate by municipalities, and welfare agencies rely on intrinsically motivating participation through offering demand-oriented opportunities that citizens pursue, not out of compulsion, but because they consider them meaningful and worthwhile. Muffels et al (2019) argue the innovative policy which shifts from focusing on people's (in)ability to work to investment in people's skills and abilities, opportunities and free choices may mark an irreversible shift in welfare state policy making away from highly conditional social assistance programmes towards less conditional participation or basic income.…”

Section: What Activities Constitute Post-productivist Participation?mentioning

confidence: 99%

Income Support in an Eco-Social State: The Case for Participation Income

McGann¹,

Murphy²

2021

Social Policy and Society

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Contemporary models of welfare capitalism have frequently been critiqued about their fit-for-purpose in provisioning for people’s basic needs including care, and longer-term ecological sustainability. The Covid-19 pandemic has also exposed the need for better institutions and a new welfare architecture. We argue a post-productivist eco-social state can deliver sustainable well-being and meet basic needs. Arguing Universal Basic Services are an essential building block and prerequisite for a de-commodified welfare state, we focus on examining the form of income support that might best complement UBS. The article develops, from the perspective of feminist arguments and the capabilities approach, a case for Participation Income. This, we argue, can be aligned with targeted policy goals, particularly reward for and redistribution of human and ecological care or reproduction and other forms of socially valued participation. It may also, in the short term, be more administratively practical and politically feasible than universal basic income.

show abstract

“…The co-created, capability-oriented PI we propose moves away from enforcing participation through sanctions in favour of an enabling approach that relies on appealing to claimants' intrinsic motivations through the quality of participation options available. As discussed below, seeds of this approach are already evident in the reforms to Dutch social assistance under the 2015 Participation Act and subsequent 'trust experiments' (Muffels et al, 2019), as well as in recent experiments with co-creating employability services in Scotland (Lindsay et al, 2018) and Denmark (Larsen and Caswell, 2020).…”

Section: 770mentioning

confidence: 99%

Enabling Participation Income for an Eco-Social State

Laruffa¹,

McGann²,

Murphy³

2021

Social Policy and Society

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

We revise Atkinson’s concept of a ‘participation income’ (PI), repositioning it as a form of green conditional basic income that is anchored in a capabilities-oriented eco-social policy framework. This framework combines the capability approach with an ‘ethics of care’ to re-shape the focus of social policy on individuals’ capability to ‘take care of the world’, thus shifting the emphasis from economic production to social reproduction and environmental reparation. In developing this proposal, we seek to address key questions about the feasibility of implementing PI schemes: including their administrative complexity and the criticism that a PI constitutes either an arbitrary and confusing, or invasive and stigmatising, form of basic income. To address these concerns, we argue for an enabling approach to incentivising participation whereby participation pathways are co-created with citizens on the basis of opportunities they recognise as meaningful rather than enforced through strict monitoring and sanctions.

show abstract

Job Search, Employment Capabilities and Well-being of People on Welfare in the Dutch ‘Participation Income’ Experiments

Cited by 10 publications

References 21 publications

A Struggle for Framing and Interpretation: The Impact of the ‘Basic Income Experiments’ on Social Policy Reform in the Netherlands

A Struggle for Framing and Interpretation: The Impact of the ‘Basic Income Experiments’ on Social Policy Reform in the Netherlands

Income Support in an Eco-Social State: The Case for Participation Income

Enabling Participation Income for an Eco-Social State

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About