Social partners and the welfare state: Recalibration, privatization or collectivization of social risks?

Abstract

The comparative political economy literature has been inconclusive in its assessment of the extent of welfare state retrenchment. One strand of research emphasised that welfare states have not undergone outright retrenchment, but recalibration. Another strand argued that there is a shift towards the privatization of risks and increased reliance on the market. While these assessments likely represent differences in magnitude, our paper seeks to contribute to these debates with an alternative argument: collectivization of social risks. We employ a method of contextualized comparisons, examining three cases of collectivization across diverse contexts: the financing of disability insurance in the Netherlands, training provision for employed and unemployed in Greece, and regulation of atypical contracts in Italy. The paper concludes by discussing the political dynamic that ensued and the wider relevance of the argument to debates in comparative political economy and comparative industrial relations. 2

Inclusive Unions in a Dualized Labour Market? The Challenge of Organizing Labour Market Policy and Social Protection for Labour Market Outsiders

“…This institution was introduced by the 1997 reform and set up by the 1998 TAW CLA, with a crucial contribution provided by the social partners in filling the implementation vacuum left by the 1997 reform, which did not specify the shape that training for temporary workers should have taken in detail (Johnston et al . : 357). Formatemp has been offering four types of training to TAWs since 2001: (1) basic training, which focuses on general skills such as foreign languages or information technology literacy; (2) professional training, to which most of the resources are devoted, aiming to equip workers with specific and technical skills that can be of immediate use at the workplace; (3) on‐the‐job training, aiming to (re‐)align workers' skills to those needed for his or her job; and (4) continuous training, which consists of a training voucher that allows TAWs to attend a specific training programme of their choice (Formatemp ).…”

“…Yet, several accounts of Italian unions suggest that inclusive strategies towards atypical workers have been put in place (Benassi and Vlandas ; Burroni and Pedaci ; Leonardi ) and that unions have also emerged as important actors for the organization of social policies targeting labour market outsiders (Johnston et al . ).…”

Opportunity or threat? How trade union power and preferences shape occupational pensions

“…In recent years, a number of authors have argued that, for trade unions, the introduction or expansion of occupational welfare constitutes a way to respond to gaps in the welfare state related to newly emerging social risks or, as is of particular interest here, insufficient or declining public welfare (Johnston, Kornelakis, & Rodriguez d'Acri, 2011;Yerkes & Tijdens, 2010). Especially during the crisis, when public welfare came under increasing budgetary pressure, several types of occupational welfare have helped to alleviate the deterioration of social protection (Glassner with Keune, 2012;Johnston, Kornelakis, & Rodriguez d'Acri, 2012).…”

European Integration and Pension Policy Change: Variable Patterns of Europeanization in Italy, the Netherlands and Belgium

“…There is a large literature on the role of the social partners, especially unions, in welfare state development (Anderson 2002;Hassel 2003;Johnston et al 2011). In corporatist political economies, unions' and employers' privileged position in social policy making, especially collective bargaining, means that they constitute important veto actors when welfare state reform is on the political agenda.…”