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The purpose of this study is to gain a comprehensive understanding of the factors contributing to the current housing crisis in Greece and to offer a critical assessment of existing interventions on social policy. It focuses on the way in which the multiple crises over the past 15 years and their management have exacerbated social inequalities. Housing represents an illustrative case study. In terms of housing resources, a systematic process of reverse redistribution is attempted, from the lower and middle social classes towards higher ones, by the Greek governments. The framework for managing the existing challenges of housing precariousness, such as rising rents, non-performing loans, foreclosure auctions, energy poverty phenomena, and the privatization of the energy market, as well as the resulting landscapes of humanitarian crisis (homelessness and refugee management), all lead to a deterioration of housing conditions. This phenomenon is inherently connected with the values underlying neoliberal social policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Institutional scholarship highlights policy as a frozen landscape, explaining its reluctance to depart from the predetermined trajectories. However, this argument needs to be reassessed to better capture the reality of the Indonesian social policy reform, most notably in healthcare. The reform involved sudden and radical changes from a segmented and decentralized model to a more integrated and inclusive one—outside the critical juncture of the 1998 economic crisis—creating a patchwork of old and new ideas and features within policy institutions. Empirical interview data show that path-creation changes in healthcare reform are characterized by a deviation from the path followed as an institutionally embedded principle. This deviation was made possible due to the considerable influence of academics-turned-senior bureaucrats (policy entrepreneurs), who capitalized on the widespread distrust of the ruling government to drive the desired reform. In addition, the success of Obamacare as a populist healthcare program amid the capitalist US system also undermined the legitimacy of policy actors' previous attempts to reject reform. This article helps clarify the development and application of the path-creation theory, comparing it to established theories to reduce ambiguity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the Covid crisis, while countries set up an unprecedented social protection response, international organisations quickly turned towards envisioning how to 'build back better' using social protection. Building on a qualitative document analysis, the article finds that international organisations frequently imagine the future through anticipations of protracted and multidimensional crises – often in quantified form. Arguing that futures are an ideational influence on policymaking, the article reconstructs two ways in which these crisis anticipations inform international organisations' social protection policy proposals: first, as legitimising narratives for expanding social protection; second, in the form of policy proposals that embed crisis anticipation in their design, as in the case of 'adaptive social protection'. The article shows that adaptive social protection departs from traditional social protection policy: it promotes strengthening individual, household and systemic resilience, and implementing preparedness as a governing rationale, thus moving from a focus on compensation and provision towards prevention. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social media communication makes visible the linkages between governments' actions to diplomatic events and domestic audiences' reactions. This study analyses tweets that discuss the recent diplomatic crisis between Japan and Korea. Through the detection of clusters of Twitter users and the content analysis of the tweets in the two countries, this study shows the public's interpretation of a crisis widely differs by their stances towards their country's government. The analysis finds that the clusters are aligned with their pro- and anti-stances towards the current government and that pro-government clusters tend to interpret the diplomatic crisis through a historical perspective, while anti-government clusters interpret it as a matter of present-day politics. Furthermore, we find strong negativity in the tweets discussing the opponent online groups, especially by the anti-government cluster against the pro-government online camp. These findings suggest that a diplomatic crisis may create or deepen domestic polarisation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Finnish correctional labour facilities, which were closed institutions that operated on the basis of forced labour from the 1920s to the 1980s, were designed mainly to detain individuals perceived to be vagrant, maladjusted or alcoholic and those who were defaulters on child maintenance or the paying back of poor relief. These people had committed no crimes but were detained as a result of administrative decision-making. This article considers what grounds there were for sending people to correctional labour facilities from the perspective of the local level of the municipalities in which the individuals lived and were most likely known (including as neighbours) to the local social board members who made decisions. The main argument is that local social boards in northern municipalities primarily used correctional labour facilities to solve problems of placement originating within institutions themselves or, if outside, typically in family life. By analysing the types of cases that, in the view of social board members, were sufficiently problematic to require intervention, the article shows that everyday experiences might differ significantly from the legal grounds for detention. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scholars have long investigated the positive link between income and well-being, including its gender difference. However, little is known about (1) how low income is linked to ill-being among women and men; and (2) how their association varies depending on societal-level gender (in)equality. Filling this knowledge gap is crucial not only for scholarship but for social policy to tackle income-based disparities of ill-being. In this study, using the European Social Survey and the joint European Values Study-World Values Survey data, we conduct country-specific regressions and cross-national multilevel analyses to examine the relationship between low income, subjective ill-being (SIB), and macro-level gender parity. We first confirm that low-income individuals, regardless of gender, are more likely than their affluent counterparts to suffer from SIB in many countries. This indicates the applicability of implications derived from conventional approaches focused on the positive association between higher income and better well-being to the studies on low income and SIB. Nevertheless, the SIB risk significantly differs depending on the degree of gender inequality in that (1) both women and men face a higher likelihood of SIB in gender-inegalitarian societies; and importantly, (2) the psychological penalty for the poor is intensified under such gendered circumstances, especially among men. These results suggest that gender inequality not merely induces women's ill-being but punishes low-income men possibly by exacerbating pressure as a breadwinner and imposing stigmas when they cannot meet gendered social expectations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Democratic governments produce more policies than they can effectively implement. Yet, this gap between the number of policies requiring implementation and the administrative capacities available to do so is not the same in all democracies but varies across countries and sectors. We argue that this variation depends on the coupling of the sectoral bureaucracies in charge of policy formulation and those in charge of policy implementation. We consider these patterns of vertical policy-process integration an important feature of bureaucratic quality. The more the policymaking level is involved in policy implementation (top-down integration) and the easier the policy-implementing level finds it to feed its concerns into policymaking (bottom-up integration), the smaller the so-called "burden-capacity gap." We demonstrate this effect through an empirical analysis in 21 OECD countries over a period of more than 40 years in the areas of social and environmental policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper introduces a novel dataset on working-time regulation for 197 territories between 1789 and 2010 to document how working hours have become globally standardised through public policy. Descriptive analysis shows that working-time reforms are global in scope, rare events, sizable once undertaken and tend to reduce hours. Democracies were historically more likely than autocracies to regulate hours, but this is not the case now, and there has never been a large gap in the content of their regulations. Whereas independent states always regulated hours to a greater extent, over half of all dependent states just prior to decolonisation regulated hours with more generous regulations than independent states. Based on these patterns, the paper first makes a methodological plea for more long-term historical studies and, second, sketches two possible explanatory frameworks for working-time reforms. One highlights shocks to the powerbase of antiregulation coalitions; the other highlights international normative change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the emergence of new counter-terrorism programmes in the Britain and Norway through which intelligence and security agencies administer welfare. Support and resources are covertly allocated to persons identified as potential threats, through multi-agency structures led by intelligence and security agencies. Unlike Countering Violent Extremism programmes, this multi-agency management is not led by the local municipality; nor are its participants asked to consent to participation. These new programmes are covert. To conceptualize the significance of intelligence agencies entering the space of welfare administration, Mitchell Dean's work 'Liberal Government and Authoritarianism' is used to underline the traditional separation of agencies within liberal governmentality. Governing through freedom entails the ostensible separation of policing, education and care agencies – reflecting the categorization of the population into groups requiring varying levels of coercion to self-govern. To avoid governing too much, each category of population is allocated a specific agency. Traditionally, intelligence and security agencies have been positioned at the highest tier of repression. By entering the space of welfare administration (and thus social policy), intelligence and security agencies have disturbed the sectoral separation integral to liberal governmentality, leaving care and repression in an ever more ambiguous relationship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many claim a high prevalence of single motherhood plays a significant role in America's high child poverty. Using the Luxembourg Income Study, we compare the "prevalences and penalties" for child poverty across 30 rich democracies and within the United States over time (1979–2019). Several descriptive patterns contradict the importance of single motherhood. The U.S. prevalence of single motherhood is cross-nationally moderate and typical and is historically stable. Also, child poverty and the prevalence of single motherhood have trended in opposite directions in recent decades in the United States. More important than the prevalence of single motherhood, the United States stands out for having the highest penalty across 30 rich democracies. Counterfactual simulations demonstrate that reducing single motherhood would not substantially reduce child poverty. Even if there was zero single motherhood, (1) the United States would not change from having the fourth-highest child poverty rate, (2) the 41-year trend in child poverty would be very similar, and (3) the extreme racial inequalities in child poverty would not decline. Rather than the prevalence of single motherhood, the high penalty for single motherhood and extremely high Black and Latino child poverty rates, which exist regardless of single motherhood, are far more important to America's high child poverty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Labor consolidation is not a sufficient criterion to abandon the need for the qualification and requalification of professionals, especially in the field of education, whichmust respond to the uncertainties of society in the light of trends and advances incorporated in pedagogical research. Methods: The present qualitative study analyzes the training demands of social education professionals from their own perspective, using their own stories in a semi-structured interview format conducted with), key informants from governmental and non-governmental organizations in southeastern Spain, specifically from the autonomous community of the region of Murcia. Results: According to the results, the most frequent and significant formative limitations are those referred to in the field of social policies, legislative training, administrative processing, specialized work in specific sectors or collectives, and mediation. Similarly, the results reveal fashion themes (mental health, gender) and reiteration of non-exclusive conditioners of social education. These are extrapolable to other areas, such as the increasing bureaucracy and complexity in the proceedings as common places in the reflection of professionals with their own initiative and commitment to their own updating that is associated with a reflective criticism of their own professionalization. Discussion: The diverse range of responses and subjects, as indicated by the numerous descriptors needed for the categorization and their respective percentages, leads us to conclude that ongoing professional training does not encourage excessive specialization. Instead, it necessitates offering a broad range of training adjusted to the versatility of situations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this study is to investigate the impact of delegated monitoring by a group leader and peer monitoring by group members on loan defaults in a group-based lending program in Vietnam. The data used in the study were collected from a questionnaire survey of 675 participants involved in a group-based lending program conducted from August to October 2022 in the Mekong River Delta, Vietnam. This group-based lending program employs a unique monitoring system that involves hiring the group leader to supervise the group and encouraging group members to monitor each other. The empirical findings derived from the Probit model indicated that delegated monitoring significantly reduces loan defaults, but there was no evidence supporting the effectiveness of peer monitoring within the group. Additionally, under the delegated monitoring scheme, commissions and group size plays an important role in decreasing loan defaults. The implication of the findings is that the Vietnam Bank for Social Policies (VBSP) could maintain large group sizes to provide incentives for group leaders through commissions to enhance repayment rates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines social protection pathways in the former French colonies in sub‐Saharan Africa. We identify five steps to understanding the patterns and dynamics of social protection in these countries that provide evidence of its exogenous construction. First, we characterize the main developments in social protection systems and policies from their inception, covering the colonial era to the present, underlining the role of colonial legacy and the global social policy framework. Second, we document the similarity of national social protection trajectories and lack of national ownership of the policy problem markedly that characterizes social protection pathways. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dhaka's rapid urbanization, income inequality and unplanned growth have brought this megacity to international attention. Although limited elements of ethnoreligious segregation are prevalent in the city, a general concern in the existing literature is that the city is failing to provide distributive justice to its citizens. This paper explores the current socio-spatial division of Dhaka city to understand its patterns and underlying causes. The paper uses the isolation index ($$x{P_x}$$ x P x ), Moran's I (I) index and location quotient (LQ) to understand the pattern of segregation in Dhaka. At the same time, the local indicators for spatial association (LISA) contribute to recognizing clustering patterns in this city. In the context of limited national census data on urban services, this study triangulates its findings through geospatial analysis of existing census data, interviews, and field observations. Results suggest that the eastern part of the city is segregated because of poor urban service conditions. Small clusters of affluent neighborhoods are emerging in Dhaka, whereas enclaves of isolated neighborhoods with inadequate housing and service situations are evident at the city core. Limited housing supply, geographic constraints, elitist planning, the concentration of investment in the city core, budgetary limitations, and management failure have resulted in the isolation and clustering of neighborhoods with poor living conditions. In its conclusion, the paper cautions that segregation requires more policy focus and calls for policy interventions to address the underlying causes of segregation in Dhaka. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Poverty is associated with psychological variables such as increased anxiety, increased depression, steeper time discounting and greater risk aversion. However, less is known about whether short‐term changes in financial circumstances are coupled to immediate psychological responses. We present data from the Changing Cost of Living study, in which panels of adults in France (n = 232) and the UK (n = 240) completed financial and psychological surveys every month for a year (September 2022–August 2023). We found the expected overall socioeconomic gradients in anxiety, depression and time discounting. In addition, monthly fluctuations in financial situation were associated with fluctuations in depression, anxiety and risk preference. Increases in essential costs, considered separately from fluctuations in income, had an immediate impact on depression. Social support, the instrumental and emotional assistance derivable from one's social network, buffered the effects of short‐term financial fluctuations on depression and time discounting, but did not mitigate the overall gradients. We conclude that declines in income or increases in the cost of living have immediate and measurable psychological impacts, which must be borne in mind in the formulation and evaluation of social policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Between 2022 and 2024, there was no devolved government functioning in Northern Ireland. This protracted absence of government occurred in the aftermath of the Covid‐19 pandemic and during what is arguably the worst economic crisis of recent years. Women are more vulnerable to hardship during economic crisis and thus it is unsurprising that the Cost‐of‐Living Crisis is hitting women hardest. This paper examines increasing food insecurity for women in Northern Ireland and the implications for the realisation of their human right to an adequate standard of living. The UK Government has ratified the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, which provides a legal duty to ensure that everyone has adequate access to food. However, increasing numbers of food banks and ill health related to insufficient food intake indicates that there is a fundamental problem. This article draws on 20 focus groups with 250 women on a low‐income to explore their experiences of the Cost‐of‐Living Crisis in Northern Ireland. The research found that women routinely skipped meals; described feelings of shame and guilt associated with struggling to feed their children; and discussed difficulties associated with purchasing food. Much of the pain associated with the hunger experienced by these women and children is hidden within the private sphere of the home. This article intends to shine a light on women's experiences and will reflect on the necessary policy change required to ensure compliance with international human rights obligations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In globalization, the primary way to increase the country's competitiveness in the world market is to improve education and increase human capital. The transition to the knowledge economy is a long-term process and requires fundamental changes in the education system. The traditional mission of the education system - informational education - has become a thing of the past. Today, the main priority is developing a quality education system and supporting science, technology, and innovation. The development of a knowledge-based, innovative economy is a necessary condition for increasing Georgia's competitiveness. Several reforms were implemented to improve the education system, ensure macroeconomic stability, attract foreign investments, develop foreign trade, and economically integrate Georgia with the European Union. However, social policy and human capital development remain challenges for our country. Numerous scientific studies have been devoted to determining the connection between the level of knowledge and economic growth. New strategies and policy documents are being created, the analysis of which and the development of recommendations for monetary policy improvement are the main goals of the paper. The article presents the main challenges of the Georgian education system and evaluates the role of human capital and innovation in the development of the economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The rapid development of technology provides easy access to information. The success of the community in utilizing the internet optimally is the key to realizing a Smart City. Smart City in Cirebon City has one of the programs called "Cirebon Internet Literate". This program is carried out by the Cirebon City Information and Statistics Communication Office (DKIS). This program provides free Internet services in public areas and provides socialization to the public about digital literacy. The formulation of the problem in this study is how to implement the Cirebon Melet Program policy. The research method used is a qualitative research method with a descriptive method. which includes data reduction, data presentation, and conclusion drawn. Data collection was carried out by means of interviews and observations at the Cirebon City Information Communication and Statistics Office (DKIS). The purpose of the research is to find out how the Cirebon Melet Program Implementation Policy is running effectively. The results of this study show that the implementation of the Cirebon Melet Program Policy Implementation has been running but is still not optimal, because there are factors that affect due to limited Internet access so that wifi coverage is not evenly distributed throughout the Cirebon City area, inadequate infrastructure because the infrastructure to support the Cirebon Internet Literacy program is still limited. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this polemic against state policies and sections of the mainstream media in France, Germany, Italy and the UK since 7 October 2023 in relation to Israel/Palestine, the author exposes the ways in which a concerted anti-Palestinian racism interacts with civilisational racism and the criminalisation of international solidarity. The piece, based on speeches and briefings by the author in 2023–24, foregrounds the attack on the Palestinian diaspora in Europe. It focuses on the way a moral panic around shows of solidarity with Palestine have been fomented; the suppression of the works of artists, academics and public figures, including prominent Jewish anti-Zionists, who question official narratives; the equation of solidarity with terrorism and antisemitism and hence a reframing of what constitutes 'hate crimes'; and the restrictions on the right to protest. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent literature on authoritarian stability and legitimation has highlighted the role of propaganda and information control, national identity politics, participation technologies and other communication strategies autocrats use to shape public opinion. The authoritarian tool kit is, incomplete if we do not account for governance-related measures. Focusing on authoritarian social policy and contributing to the literature on the authoritarian welfare state, this study measures the political effects of unconditional and conditional cash transfers, specifically focusing on child subsidies, that the Russian government has increasingly integrated into its policy tools. Social policy and child support earn the government political dividends in terms of shoring up public support and have acquired added significance over the last few years. It is part of the current social pact that enables authoritarian resilience during Russia's war against Ukraine and that is made possible by the actions at the federal, regional, and municipal levels of government. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

EU foreign policy is highly dependent on EU member states, but we still lack a coherent conceptual framework that does justice to the interdependences and co-constitutive relations between EU countries. Building on relational theory and social psychology, we develop a social relational model about group emotions in the Council that conceptualises under what conditions emotions play a role in EU foreign policy decision-making. We formulate scope conditions detailing when the performance of emotions might allow member states to accumulate relational power (e.g. process power), which can in turn allow for the emergence of group emotions and even drive policy changes. Most notably, we shed light on group dynamics within the Council, determining if and how group emotions inform the EU´s policy response to norm contestation. Our framework helps understand why processes of emotional appraisal, contagion, and emergence might sometimes help propel the EU into action, whereas other times they seem to have little or no effect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study explores the tension between journalists' personal social media accounts and newsroom social media policies to understand how newsroom managers exacerbate journalism's labor crisis by de-professionalizing the field through restrictive policies. To analyze this tension, we conduct a critical discourse analysis of (1) managerial discourses collected from newsroom social media policies and scholarly literature and (2) journalistic discourses collected from in-depth interviews with 37 U.S. journalists. We find that newsroom social media policies require journalists to make four sacrifices in service of their organization's reputation: individuality, opinion, voice, and privacy. This leaves journalists feeling frustrated by their lack of agency when it comes to engaging with the public and pursuing social media success. We conclude that this conflict contributes to journalism's human resources crisis by limiting journalistic professionalism and autonomy, both of which are crucial for job satisfaction and journalism's democratic mission. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As in the rest of the world, in Türkiye, the ageing population has become an issue that needs to be focused on. Elderly care service includes a social, economic and psychological process. Social policy, elderly care services are carried out by nursing and daycare homes. However, since placing elderly individuals in nursing homes is not a widely accepted approach under the traditional family structure in Türkiye, care services are primarily provided in the elderly person's own home or their children's. In addition, the participation of women in working life mainly results in the elderly individuals at home being cared for by a newcomer woman, and this care service is often carried out by people who have not received the necessary training in elderly care and often by foreign national employees; accordingly, the care that should be supplied to the elderly is not provided proficiently. Particularly in the present, the lack of sufficient quantitative health professionals to meet the increasing elderly population causes deficiencies in providing the necessary care. Considering that this deficiency can be met at the technician level, geriatric care technician training programmes are being initiated, and the gap in this field is being filled with trained personnel shortly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As the population ages and supportive services are increasingly delivered in home- and community-based settings, greater demands are placed on family caregivers. This essay introducing the special issue of the Journal of Aging and Social Policy discusses signs of progress on policies to ease the burden on family caregivers. It introduces a series of articles that reflect the growing body of research on caregiver-related policy actions. These actions range from expanding access to paid family leave and payment for providing care, to ensuring access to better data about family caregivers and improving the post- hospital discharge experiences of rural and underserved caregivers. It also explores a major conundrum around caregiving policy – why progress on family caregiving policy has been so slow, despite its clear importance to the health and welfare of those who receive supports, as well as to those providing supports. In addition, the essay discusses developments, such as Biden administration actions and the RAISE Family Caregiver Advisory Council, indicating that the political dynamic around caregiving has changed, concluding that this is a uniquely hopeful time for family caregiver-related policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the present study, we propose a novel conceptualization of homeownership in the United States as a special commodity, whose consumption involves a two-stage process: homeownership entry wherein the ability to consume is pivotal, and homeownership retention wherein the outcome rests on economic security. Based on the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID), we test this conceptualization with consumption ability being proxied by income and economic security by liquid wealth. Three hypotheses are verified: (1) income predicts first-time renters' chance of becoming homeowners but has weakened influence on homeownership retention; (2) liquid wealth constitutes the central determinant for first-time homeowners' ability to avoid going back to renting; and (3) nonliquid wealth fails to exhibit a significant impact on either homeownership stage. By revealing the two separate stages of different homeownership dynamics, this study is the first to systematically explore the built-in contradiction of capitalist housing markets. Policy implications are also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How do national political parties vary in their views on Social Europe? I focus on an aspect that has received less attention despite its growing prevalence—EU regulations with ambitions to diminish social inequality to encourage social convergence among Member States. Since the Juncker Commission, the European Commission has become increasingly active in pursuing this aspect of Social Europe. Thus, understanding parties' positions on this aspect of Social Europe has become more important. However, current literature lacks measures of national party stances towards Social Europe, and explanations for these stances. Here, I use data from the Chapel Hill Expert Survey (2006, 2009, 2014 and 2019) to develop an indirect measure of party positions on Social Europe. Leveraging studies in party politics and EU politics, I propose that party families and national economic conditions may affect parties' positions on Social Europe. The analyses suggest substantial variation in parties' positions on Social Europe both within and across party families. The analyses also demonstrate that socialist and green parties support Social Europe most, whereas radical right parties support it least. Lastly, I do not find systematic evidence that national economic conditions influence parties' support for this aspect of Social Europe. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The European Pillar of Social Rights sits at the fulcrum of EU social policymaking. This article aims to explore its legal and political character, how it was shaped in the adoption process and its place within Social Europe. The key argument is that the Social Pillar builds on but also critically modifies previous initiatives present within the broader EU governance framework, notably in the European Semester. Key political actors like Commission President Jean‐Claude Juncker and parliamentary rapporteur Maria João Rodrigues contributed to the adoption process not only through their long‐held political views but also by bringing to bear their own critical reflections on previous EU initiatives. Methodologically, the article relies on 15 interviews with policy experts and uses an interdisciplinary approach based on legal analysis, process tracing and actor‐centred constructivist theory. The contribution of the article is threefold: (1) it helps to better understand the EU's social flagship initiative and the modifications of its governance approach compared with previous initiatives, (2) it sheds new light on the tensions and opportunities of social policymaking within the EU and (3) it shows the added value of actor‐centred constructivist approaches on a theoretical level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social Europe, or the social dimension of the European Union (EU), has been receiving increasing attention in academic debates. This special issue introduction discusses Social Europe through the analytical framework of multi‐level governance while asking, perhaps controversially, whether Social Europe has the potential to become a fully‐fledged welfare state. This introduction also summarises the articles included in this special issue which focus on different governance levels, including EU institutions, member states, national parties, economic sectors, workers and the general public. On this basis, the introduction identifies sources of challenges and opportunities for Social Europe from various levels of governance. We conclude that the needs and demands become more diverse when we move from European institutions to the citizens. Notably, obstacles from one governance level often carry over to another governance level. Consequently, it becomes much more difficult to design welfare policies on the EU level that work for everyone. While a more evolved EU‐level welfare state may be possible in the future, substantial obstacles make it difficult to achieve in the short run. Hence, future research should examine the multi‐level structure of Social Europe in more detail to better grasp what Social Europe can and cannot deliver and why. Such research is not only relevant in the European Union but also in other multi‐level governance systems across the world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While the public opinion literature on Social Europe is growing, so far, it relies on quantitative survey evidence that hides some of the arguments and motivations lying behind the standardized results. This article reveals through qualitative research that 'welfare Euroscepticism' (i.e., opposition towards Social Europe) needs more attention in the literature and explains why. Specifically, this article uses qualitative focus group discussions on Social Europe collected in Germany, the Netherlands, Poland and Spain (134 participants in total). The participants filled out a quantitative survey before the discussions started and these survey results are in line with the usual public opinion literature on Social Europe, that is, relatively supportive of the social dimension of the EU. However, multi‐faceted welfare Eurosceptic attitudes appeared throughout the discussion. While participants may support the general idea of a Social Europe, they are highly critical about how it actually works in practice. The analysis reveals that the public is sceptic towards both harmonizing social policies on the EU level and redistributive social policy instruments on the EU level. Three overarching and partly overlapping rationales appear to drive welfare Euroscepticism: (1) economic self‐interest, (2) cultural ideology and (3) the democratic deficit. The results emphasize the public preferences for more conditional redistributive policies and the need to make Social Europe more visible to the public. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Digital labour platforms transform work and employment relations in many ways. Crucially, they renounce the role of the employer, leading to a redefinition of traditional categories of actors and their roles in social policy and dialogue. Using the example of the EU proposal for a directive on improving working conditions in platform work, this article examines how this redefinition is materialising in practice among social partners in order to understand its implications for the future of social dialogue and legislation. While previous research focused on the status of workers, this study takes a complementary view by considering the employer side as a key counterpart in a functioning employment relationship. The actor‐approach is used to analyse the views and positions of EU social partners and how their prerogatives are affected by the blurring of the role of the employer and the redefinition of traditional categories of actors in social policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: There is a significant body of research investigating how institutions moderate the relationship between public opinion and policy in the American States, but far less attention has been given to understanding the variance of policy change. Some states have remained relatively stable in their ideological trajectory, while other states tend to see large unstable swings in policy. Objectives: I argue that the variance of policy, not just the mean, is an important component of understanding policy responsiveness. A state's institutional design can influence both the extent to which policymakers follow public opinion and the ease of moving the status quo. Methods: I use a heteroskedastic regression to model policy responsiveness and variance in the state using a measure of the strength of a state's checks and balance system and a measure of accountability pressure. Results: States with a robust checks and balances system see less policy variance, whereas there is mixed evidence that institutions designed to strengthen public opinion's role in policy are associated with more stable policy. I also find that institutions play a much stronger role in reducing social policy variance compared to economic policy. Conclusion: Variance should be incorporated into our understanding of policy responsiveness, and represents another dimension in which institutions may influence the relationship between public opinion and policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Policies that promote the common good may be politically infeasible if legislators representing 'losing' constituencies are punished for failing to promote their district's welfare. We investigate how varying the local and aggregate returns to a policy affects voter support for their incumbent. In our first study, we find that an incumbent who favours a welfare-enhancing policy enjoys a discontinuous jump in support when their district moves from losing to at least breaking even, while the additional incremental political returns for the district doing better than breaking even are modest. This feature of voter response, which we replicate, has significant implications for legislative politics generally and, in particular, how to construct politically feasible social welfare-enhancing policies. In a second study, we investigate the robustness of this finding in a competitive environment in which a challenger can call attention to a legislator's absolute and relative performance in delivering resources to their district. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Brian Howe was elected to the federal Parliament in 1977 as the Labor Member for Batman (now Cooper). Following the election of the Hawke Government in 1983 until his retirement from politics in 1996, Howe held several key social policy portfolios in both the Hawke and Keating Labor Governments, and was Deputy Prime Minister from 1991 to 1995. As a politician, Howe held a strong commitment to policy development and implementation. During his career as a Government Minister, he oversaw some of the most significant changes in social policy in Australian history. This article sets out his reflections on policymaking over this period. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We analyze support for the welfare state across time and space in Great Britain. Using multilevel regression and poststratification with historical data and an original survey, we show that a virtually identical majority of people supported those policies in the mid-1990s and in 2020, but patterns of support were very different. Young and highly educated people are now the strongest supporters, as are the youngest and most highly educated geographic areas, mirroring divides over "second-dimension" issues like Brexit. However, young and highly educated voters are clustered in a small number of places, with the Labour Party struggling to win moderately educated and moderately young areas. As a result, the left's problem in majoritarian systems is not the rise of second-dimension politics per se but rather how its supporters are distributed spatially along that dimension. A majority of voters in favor of welfare and redistribution no longer translates as easily into winning a majority of places in support. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Commuting, the spatial mismatch between work and residential locations, necessitates integrated urban and transport policies to mitigate its societal impacts. While cross-border commuting (CBC) is increasing and governance of border regions is on the rise beyond national borders, no systemic review of this specific commuting pattern exists. We aim to consolidate the CBC literature accumulated over the years into a coherent and synthetic framework. Our systematic review assembles an inaugural comprehensive corpus of cross-border commuting literature. It reveals three transversal key topics (transport-oriented topic, qualitative approaches versus a lack of quantitative data, and a large majority of European papers) and four sub-topics (patterns, determinants, impacts and policies). Moreover, we consolidate findings through meticulous mapping of evidence, where most links are traced between the determinants and the level of flows across borders. Finally, the discussion offers directions for future research, with an exhortation to explicitly link policies to sustainability and social concerns, and the necessity for standardised datasets for methodological comparability across cases and in alignment with general commuting research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While the poverty risks of non‐standard employment have been explored extensively, this study focuses on the role of activation‐oriented social policy in alleviating material deprivation for persons with non‐standard employment histories. Using EU‐SILC data, individuals over a four‐year period were analysed. I focused on substantial earners and distinguished between six non‐standard employment histories expected to benefit from activation measures. Multi‐level models revealed that compared to standard employment histories, all non‐standard employment histories had higher material deprivation risks but to substantially different extents. At the macro level, participation in activation measures, expenditures in formal childcare and minimum income protection reduced material deprivation. Participation in training can be interpreted as an equaliser, as the deprivation gap between standard and most non‐standard employment history types diminished. As expenditure‐ and participation‐based measures differed significantly, evaluating the success of activation strategies in reducing inequalities and alleviating poverty highly depends on the measurement of activation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Formal social citizenship is limited in how it enables us to think about informal social citizenship and informal welfare. This informal perspective is important in all contexts where access to social rights is negotiated through local and transnational spaces, and where the state is a relatively minor player. By drawing on work on moral economy (Scott, 1976) and informal welfare (Gough and Wood, 2006) the article aims to propose a new theoretical model to understand the nature and social practice of both informal citizenship and welfare. This model departs from a western-centric understanding of nation-state-based citizenship and national welfare states, adopting instead the perspective that informal social citizenship and welfare have existed independently of the nation state as long as there have been human communities. Formal citizenship together with formal welfare rights represent just one particular crystallization of such informal practice. Our proposed model highlights the interdependent (rather than evolutionary) relationship between formal welfare at national level and informal welfare practices at local and transnational levels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present article presents empirical evidence regarding factors that explain the involvement of social workers from minority groups in policy practice based on data from an extensive survey of social workers from the Arab minority group in Israel (n = 218). The findings revealed that the sociopolitical context of an ethnic minority significantly affects their involvement in policy practice. In order to increase the involvement of minority social workers in policy arenas in multicultural societies, professional bodies and social work training frameworks should provide social workers with knowledge resources and professional skills, including tailored organizational support. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In Chile, social policies are founded on the notion of women as primary caregivers burdened with the main responsibility for others. These policies conceptualise women as deficient, requiring their parenting to be monitored. Drawing from our ethnographic studies of specific instances of encounters with the state, this article examines how low-income mothers navigate, experience and are subjected to silence and silencing. Silences are at the basis of their relationship with a state that provides minimal, almost imperceptible care, compelling these women to manage their silence to obtain even the slightest assistance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of the article is to research and analysis of the amount of indexation of pension payments related to inflationary processes. The object of the study is the state of pension provision in Ukraine. The subject of the study is the process of indexation of pension payments as a result of the implementation of social policy in Ukraine. An analysis of the history of the development and reform of pension provision in Ukraine was carried out. This allowed for a deeper understanding of the content of events related to the establishment of pension provision in Ukraine. The research methodology involves the synergy of mathematical methods of analytical geometry and economic-mathematical modelling. It is shown that the presence of inflationary processes in the national economy leads to the need to increase the pension provision of citizens. At the same time, the size of the increase in pension payments should be differentiated in order to ensure social "justice". The scientific task set in the article is to demonstrate a modern approach to choosing a strategy for implementing the state pension policy in Ukraine. As a result of the research, two models of appropriate indexation of pension payments in Ukraine are presented. The calculation made it possible to choose the most significant model. In the future, it is advisable to direct the research to the search for other more effective ways of indexing pensions. It is assumed that for this it is necessary to formalize the mathematical formulation of the problem of finding the optimal value of the index of pension payments as extreme, taking into account the necessary restrictions. A scientific novelty in solving this issue is the receipt of practically significant recommendations regarding the indexation of pensions. The practical significance of the obtained results lies in the elimination of social defects in the indexation of pension payments. Further research should be directed to the search for rational solutions that will stimulate the creation of an effective pension system in Ukraine. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Immigrants' access to housing is often the outcome of self-settlement practices within a context of limited social policies that often characterizes Southern European metropolises. Hence, immigrants are facing multiple constraints and remain vulnerable towards diverse socioeconomic fluctuations. This article focuses on the housing practices followed by Albanian immigrants, the largest immigrant group in Athens's municipality, to examine how spatial inequalities are intertwined with ethnicity in the Greek capital. The objective is twofold: to discuss ethnic segregation on the micro-scale of Athenian central neighborhoods and examine how immigrants' housing practices are being challenged within a rapidly changing socio-spatial context. The methodology follows a mixed approach, aiming at identifying differentiations and inequalities both on the macro- and micro-spatial scale. First, differentiations among Greeks, Albanians, and other third-country nationals in Athens (2011) are traced and compared, based on quantitative data. Second, for the purpose of highlighting micro-geographies in the city, this article presents an analysis of collected narratives of Albanian immigrants, through semi-structured interviews held in 2023. The main results indicate that the population under study finds itself in an "in-between" socio-spatial condition: an "in-between", compared to the housing experiences of Greek households and other third-country nationals, that produces (and reproduces) segregation trends visible on the micro-scale. Moreover, this article attempts to highlight how the lack of housing policies put in peril the successful self-settlement practices of Albanian immigrants, in the current context of financialization of the Athenian housing market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the last few years there has been growing attention to and discussion of the so-called militarization of policing. Unfortunately, much of this discussion poses the militarization of policing as a recent phenomenon. This paper examines policing in Canada within the context of an ongoing military practice. It shows that policing was founded on a military basis and continues to be carried out on a military basis as exemplified in the more recent developments that have raised alarm about militarization. It raises the need for a retheorization of policing within the context of capitalist social struggles and highlights some instructive recent theoretical developments toward that end. Properly understanding the police in Canada can help to contextualize and challenge current responses that are limited to reforms for police (de-militarization, de-escalation, improved training, non-lethal weaponry, etc.) or which even allow for the expansion of policing (community policing, drones, etc.). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) has an increasingly important role in organizations, which are taking a proactive stance in the inclusion of concerns and initiatives at this level. This theme has an impact on employees, namely in the meaningfulness through work. Thus, this research aims to assess whether the CSR affect the meaningfulness through work, and whether the degree of incorporation and the design and implementation approach interfere in this relationship. The results, obtained from 235 responses, suggest that it is not CSR policies and practices that impact meaningfulness through work. For this feeling to be achieved, it is necessary for employees to perceive CSR as embedded and the design and implementation of policies and practices to be bottom‐up. In other words, for CSR to lead to real benefits for employees, organizations must make a genuine and substantial commitment to it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Basic income (BI) has lately re-emerged as a topic of debate, without having lost its explosiveness and contentiousness. Of particular interest in this debate is the labour supply effect of a BI, which holds significant implications for its societal desirability, economic sustainability and political feasibility. To shed light on this issue and facilitate more informed policy discussions, this article delves into six decades of research, encompassing negative income tax and BI experiments, lottery studies and unconditional cash transfers (UCTs). In an effort to advance existing knowledge, we not only review the labour supply outcomes of existing studies but also systematically examine their design features, implementation characteristics and analyses. Our examination reveals the presence of significant methodological shortcomings in much of the empirical research. Great caution is thus advised when making broader inferences about the impacts of a BI. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent robotics and artificial intelligence advancements have exacerbated fears of technology-driven unemployment and inequality. However, the relationship between automation risks and regulatory policy support remains inconclusive. Moreover, the role of institutional safety net in shaping this connection, and factors influencing preference shifts regarding automation, remain understudied. This study conducts an online survey experiment in the UK and Sweden to address these gaps. First, we find subjective concern, and occupational risks combined with perceived weaker labor market safeguards, lead to calls for automation restriction and job loss compensation. These trends are particularly pronounced in the UK, where institutional protection for workers is less robust. Second, people support accelerating technology-driven change when they see its benefits shared widely, but this shift is mainly observed among individuals relatively safer from automation risks. Our findings suggest strengthening the institutional safety net and envisioning equitable benefit-sharing are crucial for moderating public anxiety toward technology-driven economic change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article investigates how the type of elite to which a person belongs and their intergenerational contextual experiences are associated with attitudes towards inequality among elite individuals. We propose that membership of the economic elite and access to private schools, higher education business schools and affluent residential areas may contribute to the development of views that favour inequality. Using unique survey data collected in 2018 from a sample of 416 individuals belonging to Chile's economic, political and cultural elites, we construct an additive score to measure attitudes towards inequality. Results of our regression analyses indicate that individuals belonging to the economic and political elite are more tolerant of inequality than members of the cultural elite. Moreover, intergenerational experiences at both private schools and higher education business schools significantly contribute to the formation of attitudes that favour inequality. These contextual experiences also relate to significant attitudinal variations within all elite groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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