Targeting, residual welfare and related concepts: modes of operation in public policy

Abstract

A mode of operation defines a pattern of policy-making or approach to policy. This paper attempts to deconstruct the relationship between certain modes of operation, political ideology and specific techniques, using the main example of targeting. Targeting is commonly related to a number of other concepts, including selectivity, meanstesting, conditionality, residual welfare, and rationing. The inter-connectedness of the issues is often taken for granted: residualism implies selectivity, selectivity is undertaken by means-testing, selectivity and means-testing are a form of targeting, targeting and conditionality substantially overlap, and all of them have played an important role in the development of arguments for the limitations on expenditure and the restriction of welfare provision. But the methods can be used in different systems, for different purposes. Means-testing is not the same thing as selectivity; selectivity is not the same thing as conditionality or targeting; rationing can take place in any kind of service; and none of these options is necessarily residualist. Modes of operation are often compounded with political aims, the structural context of policy, discussions of implementation and the application of specific policies. When the concepts are unravelled, it becomes possible to think of the methods and approaches involved in different ways.

Governance modes, policy regimes and operational plans: A multi-level nested model of policy instrument choice and policy design

“…This final level of policy specification is thus highly constrained, lending some order and continuity to what might otherwise be a largely random selection of micro-level policy goals. Regularized patterns of interactions between major policy players (Grin and Graaf 1996;Spicker 2005), their perceptions of what is feasible to accomplish given existing and future resources and the presence of the dominant sets of ideas held by epistemic communities and other relevant policy actors vis-a-vis notions of problem causation and target group behavior (Donovan 2001) heavily influence the development of specific program goals and targets which will vary considerably from context to context as a result. Nevertheless, once such goals have been set they become entrenched and difficult to alter, forming a final core context for policy tool choices.…”

What Is Wrong with Conditional Cash Transfer Programs?

“…However, this conclusion is based on a failure to differentiate the desired policy outcomes from the instruments or tools used to address those policy aims. As Paul Spicker noted, the arguments about conditionality and targeting have been “colonized by particular partisan approaches, giving the political right a claim to a monopoly of certain methods and closing the minds of the left to strategic alternatives'' (Spicker , 363). Nevertheless, targeting and conditionality can be used for diverse purposes.…”

The impact of child benefits on single mother poverty: Exploring the role of targeting in 15 European countries

“…The exact meaning of universalism and targeting, and related concepts such as means‐testing and selectivity, is not always clear, however, and in the literature these terms are often applied in a rather loose way (van Oorschot, ; Spicker, ). Benefits are universal if they are granted to every individual regardless of need, while benefits are selective whenever entitlement is restricted for whatever reason.…”