| During the 1990s, many European nations experienced unprecedented levels of unemployment, matching or even exceeding levels experienced during the economic crises in the 1970s. Have public policy responses to this common challenge systematically varied, and if so, how and why? If not, are labor-market policy regimes in Western Europe converging? This dissertation examines the evolution and trajectory of labor market policy in Western Europe, paying close attention to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and the European Union (EU) as arbitrators of new economic ideas and as fora for social learning. It offers an analytical tool kit to systematically assess labor-market policy regime change cross-sectionally and temporally, while introducing a new actor-centered, historical-institutionalist, analytical framework to explain gradual, yet transformative institutional change. More specially, this dissertation identifies three phases of labor-market policy regime evolution, including: (a) a phase of institutional capacity-building and partial convergence on Swedish-style active manpower policies, coupled with the creation/modernization of national Public Employment Services (PESs) (1960s); (b) a phase of institutional divergence during economically turbulent times and against the backdrop of growing unemployment and inflationary pressures (1970/80s); and (c) a phase of institutional hybridization, effectively mixing and matching public policies and labor market structures (early 1990s-2008). It is argued that this last phase of hybridization has led to the emergence of a new labor market paradigm, resting on three mutually reinforcing pillars: (a) labor market activation, through the systematic application of early interventions, case management, and conditional benefits; (b) a modern, customer and results-oriented PES, governed in a managerial style; and (c) a more inclusive, employment-promoting welfare state, that mobilizes women, older workers, and otherwise "inactive" persons. The dissertation's main contention is that the evolution of policy and institutions is not simply determined by prevailing historical trajectories, economic conditions, or the strength of actor coalitions engaged in struggles over distributional outcomes, but also reflects policy makers' changing beliefs. I provide a rich comparison of institutional evolution in six case studies, including a Nordic pair (Denmark and Sweden), an Anglophone pair (Ireland and the United Kingdom), and a Continental pair (Austria and Germany). |
