The Roles of Social Welfare CSOs in Poverty Reduction: A Mixed Methods Case Study

Rulla Sutter ()

No 57, University of Bern Social Sciences Working Papers from University of Bern, Department of Social Sciences

Abstract: Civil society organizations (CSOs) play multifaceted roles in social security, yet CSO scholarship typically examines them along single analytical axes – focusing either their functional roles or how they relate to the state. By unifying those fragmented approaches, this article proposes a conceptual framework that synthesizes six major typological traditions within a micro-institutionalist lens. Empirically, a mixed-methods case study of Caritas Switzerland demonstrates how service provision, welfare mediation, and advocacy operate as mutually constitutive roles in poverty reduction. The resulting conceptual map overcomes fragmentation in existing scholarship and enables holistic, power-sensitive assessment of CSOs' transformative capacity for social innovation. The article thereby contributes a theoretically grounded and empirically demonstrated map for analysing civil society social innovation within welfare.

Keywords: Civil Society Organisation; Poverty; Social security; Welfare non-take-up; Covid-19; NGO (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D31 D33 H55 L31 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 39 pages
Date: 2026-03-04
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