Activating the Activators: double activation in the Australian, UK and Dutch privatised welfare markets

Since late 1970s, OECD countries have seen major policy shifts in their employment assistance programs, with Australia at the cutting edge of reform. At the centre of such policy change are arguments that a successful... [ view full abstract ]

Since late 1970s, OECD countries have seen major policy shifts in their employment assistance programs, with Australia at the cutting edge of reform. At the centre of such policy change are arguments that a successful welfare-to-work model rests on not only the activation of jobseekers but also on the activation of frontline employment services staff by the government purchaser – so called double activation. Underpinning such thinking is a deep concern about the perverse effects of welfare dependency and the potential that citizens will become permanently dependent upon unemployment benefits. These reforms are further informed by new perspectives on the proper role of frontline staff. Instead of being passive instruments for the distribution of services to citizens, frontline staff are now seen as individuals who are also in need of activation, in order to generate outcomes.

This paper explores the shifts in policies that have occurred in Australia, the UK and the Netherlands – three enthusiastic advocates of the active labour model. Specifically, we investigated how those policy shifts have resulted in changed behaviour at the frontline and consequently, effectiveness in getting people into sustainable employment. In this research, the voices of the unemployed themselves are observed only indirectly in their interactions with frontline staff. Data for the purpose of this paper was collected using surveys in 1998, 2008 and 2012, focusing on the interface between the frontline of service delivery and the clients.

The research results afford a fascinating insight into social policy restructuring and service delivery adaptation. In the Netherlands the emphasis has been on devolution. In the UK, the public provider has remained at the centre of the system, although private providers have had an increasing influence on the model. In Australia, we have witnessed a seismic shift away from a fully funded and delivered public system; to a mixed public/private employment services economy; to the world’s first fully-privatise employment services system. Australia and the UK were also found to move in reverse direction in their approach to activation policies: Australia has been transitioning from a ‘black box’ approach which allowed frontline staff considerable discretion, towards an increasingly prescriptive performance measurement framework. The reverse is true for the UK. Interestingly, despite the differences, we did not see improvements in terms of frontline autonomy and flexibility overtime in either country while the impacts of those policy shifts on the program’s effectiveness in placing jobseekers into work have been mixed.

We conclude that a double activation approach to welfare delivery generates particular policy challenges, that so far, appear difficult for the purchaser to adequately address. In particular, frontline activation appears to require a level of surveillance that undermines service delivery autonomy. We conclude with early observations drawn from a recently commenced new research project in which we seek to address the challenges of designing a service delivery system that is both responsible, innovative, and benefits the hardest to help.