Accounting in der Arbeitsverwaltung: Vermittlungsfachkräfte zwischen Steuerungsimperativen und autonomem Vermittlungshandeln

Sowa, Frank; Staples, Ronald

doi:10.1515/zsr-2014-0204

Cited by 17 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 27 publications

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“…It is embedded in the organizational context of a public administration that has transformed its governance and management structures according to market logic over the last two decades. In particular, performance measures and quantifying practices of accounting have been shown to be crucial factors shaping frontline work (Sowa & Staples, ).…”

Section: Frontline Work In Germany's Labor Administration: Legislativmentioning

confidence: 99%

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

2018

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Following Michael Lipsky's well‐known argument that policy is made in the daily encounters between street‐level bureaucracy and citizens, a growing body of research emphasizes that actors and organizations delivering social and labor‐market policy play a crucial role in welfare‐state politics. Using qualitative data collected at three local employment agencies in Germany, this article explores worker‐client relations as a crucial mechanism through which activation policies are translated into practice. The analysis investigates how caseworkers define their role and their relationships with clients. The findings show that it is essential for caseworkers to achieve client compliance. In such a context, building relationships of trust is a strategic instrument in overcoming possible barriers to co‐operation in the caseworker‐client interaction. Caseworkers develop strategies to create the impression of trustworthiness and to motivate both unemployed clients and employers to become trust‐givers in the caseworker‐client relation. While research has often stressed the dichotomy between disciplining and enabling elements of activation policies, our explorative study shows that persuasion and trust‐building are a further important dimension of the frontline delivery of activation policies. These strategies reflect the importance of emotional aspects of frontline work.

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Section: Frontline Work In Germany's Labor Administration: Legislativmentioning

confidence: 99%

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

2018

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“…Since 2007, in-house seminars and training programmes on marketing have been held for placement personnel. Employer-oriented placement staff are supposed to think and act along marketing lines and make a contribution to efficient and effective job placement (Sowa and Staples, 2014). A team leader says: Well, actually, it’s to sell the client [jobless person] to them, isn’t it.…”

Section: Results – Restructuring Of the Pes And The Reform Perceptionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Employer orientation in the German public employment service

Sowa

Reims

Theuer

2015

Critical Social Policy

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Through the introduction of welfare states and social policy, owners of labour power acquired alternatives to the permanent sale of their labour. Entitlements to social security created the conditions for a strategic temporary withholding of labour. Based on qualitative data, this article presents empirical evidence of trends towards recommodification in Germany, i.e. a reduction in the possibilities for decommodification, as a result of a new employer orientation in the public employment service (PES). The findings highlight an increased employer orientation as well as a differentiation and specialisation in placement work leading to a shift in the placement rationale encountered in the local branches of the German PES. A pure market orientation is seen to increasingly replace the social policy mandate of the PES. Strengthening employer-oriented placement services implies, on the one hand, a professionalisation of services and, on the other, a further recommodification of labour.

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“…Couldn't we imagine a kind of institutional support not only handing out little money and giving sanctions or improper treatment for misbehaviour, but also supporting knowledge, motivation, enabling and empowering poor citizens to change their fate into agency? There are huge differences from place to place, and the centralized new system has -at least in Germany -a strong tendency towards bureaucracy and tayloristic forms of work organization with low skill at the front office, which make case-sensitive solutions quite difficult (Sowa and Staples 2014). And, if we accept that there are more targets than just taking up work, may they be equally justified or interim steps, how can we measure the achievement of soft targets like employability, participatory effects, better health and social stabilisation effects of different schemes?…”

Section: Open Questionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Nueve años de hartz iv: evaluación de una reforma del bienestar

Promberger

2015

Cuad. Relac. Lab.

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Nine years ago, Germany has implemented Hartz IV, the last one in a series of welfare state reforms, merging the former separate systems of long term unemployment benefit and basic income support into a new system. The article summarizes the main empirical findings from a growing field and draws a few conclusions. Mainly, after years of heavy debates and practical experiences in Germany and elsewhere, it has to be said the goal of substantially reducing poverty and saving public money has not really been achieved. Although the system is working well in terms of financial support and population coverage, there are problems in providing cultural and social participation, and even the money is not enough under certain family constellations. Moreover, the idea to solve every poverty problem by rigid work first policies does obviously conflict with the observable heterogeneity of poverty situations. Main results are the disappearance of the privileges of persons in long term unemployment, a shift from permanent unemployment to unsteady low wage employment and need for further subsidies for a major part of the poor, as well as a consolidation of the normative image of a 'normal working citizen', making it harder to get support for people who don't fit into that scheme.

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Accounting in der Arbeitsverwaltung: Vermittlungsfachkräfte zwischen Steuerungsimperativen und autonomem Vermittlungshandeln

Cited by 17 publications

References 27 publications

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

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

Employer orientation in the German public employment service

Nueve años de hartz iv: evaluación de una reforma del bienestar

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