Setting the scene

This book reports and reflects on the results of Inclusion through Participation (INPART), a research project that took place during 1998 and 1999, and funded in the context of the European Commission's Targeted Socio-Economic Research programme. INPART's aim was to shed light on the inclusionary and exclusionary potentials of various types of work. In other words, to find out to what degree participation in various types of paid or unpaid work contributes to inclusion or exclusion. This objective was formulated against the background of the growing concern in social policy debates and social policy practices with the issue of ‘activation’. Put simply, activation implies a shift in the inclusion discourse from ‘inclusion through decent income provisions’ towards ‘inclusion through participation in work’. This transition from ‘passive’ social policies (income provision), to an emphasis on ‘active’ social policies (the promotion or enforcement of participation; see Chapter Three of this volume) is taking place in all member states of the EU, and is exacerbated by various policy initiatives of the EU, mainly the European Employment Strategy and the open coordination method on Social Inclusion.

INPART involved research teams from six EU countries: Belgium, Denmark, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, and the UK. Although we do not want to claim that this group of EU countries can be considered a representative sample, it does represent the various welfare-state regimes of the EU. Belgium is a corporatist welfare state; Denmark is an exponent of the social democratic welfare state. The UK is a liberal welfare state, while the Netherlands is a ‘mixed’ or ‘hybrid’ welfare state regime, combining corporatist and social democratic characteristics (Esping-Andersen, 1999). Portugal and Spain are Southern European, sub-protective or ‘familistic’ welfare states (Gallie and Paugam, 2000; Andreotti et al, 2001). Of course, welfare regime typologies have been developed on the basis of an analysis of ‘passive’ rather than ‘active’ social policy characteristics. It is not yet clear whether or not specific ‘passive’ regimes correspond with specific ‘active’ regimes, or how and to what degree the introduction of activation influences income protection schemes.

Nevertheless, the countries involved in INPART reveal significant differences with respect to the ‘activation’ characteristics of their social policies as well. For example, Denmark has a long tradition of some types of active labourmarket policies. Traditionally, active labour-market policies were considered to reflect the commitment to full employment of social democratic welfare states (see Therborn, 1986).