Neoliberal governance has been associated with rising inequality and economic exclusion. Recent scholarship proposes that the social investment state (SIS) is a turn away from such inequality and exclusion-enhancing neoliberalism. The ideal SIS responds to neoliberalism-generated social ills by investing in the productive capacities of all its citizens. However, commentators ask whether an SIS addresses the plight of weaker elements in society, specifically that of disadvantaged ethnic minorities. This paper looks specifically at this question by utilising a critical-case study research design of a surprising example of social investment in disadvantaged ethnic minorities: the extensive labour market policies for Israeli Arabs. This paper introduces the concept of a neoliberal targeted SIS in which social investment programmes are developed for economic reasons, promoted by neoliberal actors (right-wing parties and Ministries of Finance), target narrow groups instead of being applied to all, and the preferred mode for the delivery of services is private. Egalitarian outcomes – to the extent that they materialise – might be thought of as a policy by-product.

Minimum income protection (MIP) determines the disposable income a person obtains when she has no market or social insurance income, few assets and no family support. This last-recourse income, usually social assistance benefits plus associated transfers, constitutes a significant indicator of a country's commitment to social justice. Yet, we know little about the politics of MIP, in part because welfare state scholars have focused on more encompassing social insurance programmes, and in part because of a lack of good comparative data. This article takes the measure of MIP adequacy in 18 OECD countries for the 1990–2010 period, for single, able-to-work individuals, tracks its comparative evolution, and proposes an explanation of its determinants, with a times-series cross-sectional model. The main positive determinant of adequacy is a generous welfare state; the main negative force is the importance of the public debt. Overall, the politics of MIP appears consistent with that of the welfare state.

This article provides new evidence on the relationship between benefit conditionality and mental health. Using data on Temporary Assistance for Needy Families policies (TANF) – the main form of poverty relief in the United States – it explores whether the mental health of low-educated single mothers varies according to the stringency of conditionality requirements attached to receipt of benefit. Specifically, the article combines state-level data on sanctioning practices, work requirements and welfare-to-work spending with health data from the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System and evaluates the impact of conditionality on mental health over a fifteen-year period (2000 to 2015). It finds that states that have harsher sanctions, stricter job search requirements and higher expenditure on welfare-to-work policies, have worse mental health among low-educated single mothers. There is also evidence that between-wave increases in the stringency of conditionality requirements are associated with deteriorations in mental health among the recipient population. It is suggested that these findings may reflect an overall effect of ‘intensive conditionality’, rather than of the individual variables per se. The article ends by considering the wider implications for policy and research.

This paper addresses policy change in Britain since 2010 across the three fields of domestic welfare, migration and asylum, and analyses the association between welfare, conditionality and control through the lens of civic stratification. Drawing on the work of Richard Munch and Mary Douglas, it moves beyond existing literature in this area to show that the more complex the classification in play, and the more severe its boundary implications, the more likely the emergence of contestable margins. Informed by Munch's ‘battlefield’ approach, it provides a discussion of contestable margins in each of the three policy fields and outlines the nature and source of challenges that emerge within the ‘institutional battlefield’. A concluding section reflects on what is revealed by viewing welfare, migration and asylum within the same conceptual frame, identifying an emergent welfare paradigm that displays recurrent problems across all three fields.

If gender is neglected in the design and implementation of mainstream social welfare models, unequal social and economic outcomes for men and women tend to be reproduced. This paper contributes to debates about how social protection can contribute to promoting gender equality by considering the gendered redistributive and transformative effects of three types of social security instruments in South Africa: social assistance, unemployment insurance and public employment programmes. All the instruments have some pro-poor and gendered design innovations. The Child Support Grant has had better outcomes than the other instruments, but redistributive and transformative gender effects across the social security spectrum are disappointing. Limited social transformation is largely due to implementation inefficiencies and unresponsive institutions. To serve both economically redistributive and socially transformative ends, gender-sensitive synergies between social security instruments and with other multisectoral interventions could be strengthened, such as access to social services (especially quality child care) and access to basic services (such as water, electricity, transport and internet services).

In social policy discussions about activation or ALMP (Active Labour Market Policies), most attention is paid to supply-side approaches, directed towards jobless individuals. In these discussions, little attention is given to demand-side approaches aimed at activating employers, or combined workplace-oriented approaches that combine supply and demand-side elements. The aim of this article is to introduce demand-side and combined approaches developed within the fields of disability policy and vocational rehabilitation to scholarly discussions about activation and ALMP.

By comparing these three approaches, we show that demand-side and combined approaches challenge key assumptions underlying the dominant supply-side approaches. They do so by representing different views of a) work – as a right instead of a duty; b) the problem of reduced work capacity – not as individual failure, but rather as a prejudice in attitudes among employers or as a gap between capacities and demands; c) the employers and the labour market – as transformable instead of fixed.

Supply-side, demand-side and combined workplace-oriented approaches share the aim of labour market integration; however, their developments seem to have taken place largely in isolation from each other. We argue that when brought together they could form a more comprehensive base for further development of labour market integration.

Distribution of public resources has always been a central issue in public policy. The question of spatial variation in resource allocation as a reflection of differing local conditions is particularly important in decentralised countries with a large number of subunits. On the local level, studies have shown variations in distribution of local welfare but have usually focused on single social policy fields and/or target groups, and often ignored territorial structures. By taking Estonia as a case, this study investigates whether and how the distribution of a range of social services and the structure of disaggregated local social spending corresponds to local socio-demographic conditions. We identify municipal clusters and analyse service provision and social spending on vulnerable groups within them. We use a spatial perspective by taking into consideration the distinction of rural-urban and core-peripheral settings. We show that resource allocation in Estonian municipalities mirrors quite well local socio-demographic structures but the division of municipalities between towns and rural municipalities used in the common discourse of local social policy is too simplified.

This paper draws on insider accounts from UK Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) officials to analyse the relationship between evidence and policy making at a time of rapid policy development relating to Universal Credit (UC). The paper argues, firstly, that evidence selection within the DWP was constrained by the overarching austerity paradigm, which constituted a Zeitgeist and had a significant bearing on the evidence selection and translation process, sharpening the focus of policy officials and analysts on the primacy of quantitative evidence when advising Ministers. Secondly, while methodological preferences (or an ‘evidence hierarchy’) impacted on evidence selection, this was not as significant as practitioners’ perceived capabilities to handle and develop evidence for policy. These capabilities were linked to departmental structures and constrained by political feasibility. Together, these dimensions constituted a significant filtration mechanism determining the kinds of evidence that were selected for policy development and those omitted, particularly in relation to UC. The paper contributes to debates about the contemporary role of evidence in policymaking and the potential of the relationship between future evidence production and use.

This paper examines intergenerational justice discourses that feature prominently in both the contemporary UK media and beyond, arguing that these constitute both a continuation of previous debates about the economic and social burden of the dependent ‘fourth age’ and a newer and more prominent denigration of the ‘third age’, both of which possess deep cultural and psychological roots. Both themes are subsumed in the trope of the old as in some ways stealing the future of the nation, represented by youth. Analysing media depictions of intergenerational injustice across several themes, the paper suggests that, whilst justifying welfare retrenchment and other aspects of neoliberalism, the portrayal of social problems in terms of generational war emerges from age ideology and an age system that, among other things, intersects with and naturalises other forms of stratification. This partly accounts for the fact that the attack on the ‘third age’ is particularly prevalent in left of centre, or progressive, media on both sides of the Atlantic. That the age system has been overlooked and underplayed in sociological terms is an important oversight since the former materially and ideologically facilitates the ever-growing socio-economic inequality that is a feature of our times.

In April 2015, the UK introduced Shared Parental Leave (SPL), allowing mothers to transfer their maternity leave to their partners from two weeks after the birth or adoption of a child. There has been very limited research conducted on this leave policy to date and knowledge on take-up is poor. We present findings from an in-depth survey conducted with expectant mothers in two NHS trusts in England on their knowledge, views and plans around leave after the birth of their child and examine variations across educational and ethnic groups. A total of 575 expectant mothers took part in the survey. Around 7.4 per cent of expectant mothers who were (self-)employed or in education intended to take SPL. Finances and worries over fathers’ careers were cited as the primary barriers to take up of SPL. Individual entitlement for fathers and knowing others who took SPL increased individuals’ reported intention to take SPL. Applying logistic regression models, we found that knowledge of and access to SPL is correlated with education, ethnicity and home ownership. Future research and policy design should attend to such issues to ensure equitable access across families.