How governance conditions affect the individualization of active labour market services: An exploratory vignette study
| Date | 01 June 2017 |
| Author | Deborah Rice |
| Published date | 01 June 2017 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/padm.12307 |
ORIGINAL ARTICLE
How governance conditions affect the
individualization of active labour market
services: An exploratory vignette study
Deborah Rice
Department of Social Sciences, University of
Oldenburg, Germany
Correspondence
Deborah Rice, Department of Social Sciences,
University of Oldenburg, Germany
Email: deborah.rice@uni-oldenburg.de
Service individualization is high on the agenda of active welfare
states. Especially for the long-term unemployed and other people
with complex problems, individualized employment and social ser-
vices are seen as a crucial precondition for social and labour mar-
ket integration. To achieve tailor-made service delivery, welfare
states have introduced new governance mechanisms such as client
profiling, performance indicators, game-theoretical incentives or
institutionalized discretion. However, comparative research on
how these governance mechanisms affect service individualization
is still rare. To fill this gap, this article presents an exploratory
vignette study on Denmark and the Netherlands conducted in
2010–12. The main finding of this study is that institutionalized
discretion, as it is implemented in the Dutch minimum income
system, increases the variety and innovativeness of employment
services, makes service provision more holistic (especially for
vulnerable clients), and increases the targeting capacity of service
allocation between vulnerable and work-ready clients.
1|INTRODUCTION
Individualized employment and social services are the order of the day. Ever since the publication of the OECD Jobs
Study in 1994 and the incorporation of the individualization principle into the European Employment Strategy in
the late 1990s, tailor-made service provision has become a core element of active labour market programmes in
Europe and beyond (cf. Van Berkel and Valkenburg 2007). However, in spite of the success of the individualization
or ‘personalization’agenda, as it is usually termed in the UK (Ferguson 2007; Needham 2011; Fuertes and Lindsay
2015), comparative research on service individualization is still rare (Borghi and Van Berkel 2007, p. 421). In particu-
lar, few studies have tackled the question of how the governance of service individualization, and in particular pro-
cedurally standardizing governance mechanisms versus institutionalized discretion, affects service allocation to
unemployed or otherwise vulnerable individuals (a recent exception is Considine et al. 2015). More research is
needed on this issue because if governance conditions are not set ‘right’, political lip service paid to tailor-made
DOI 10.1111/padm.12307
468 © 2017 John Wiley & Sons Ltdwileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/padmPublic Administration. 2017;95:468–481.
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