Comment on Anton Hemerijck. Social investment, a problematic concept with an ambiguous past

Jean-Claude Barbier ()
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Jean-Claude Barbier: CES - Centre d'économie de la Sorbonne - UP1 - Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique

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Abstract: Anton Hemerijck has written a warm plea in favour of social investment policies. Highly politicized, the concept is ambiguous and has existed under different guises for a long time, since its first avatar "enabling state" in the late 1980s. It is very risky to distinguish between social protection expenditure according to whether they are investments or not. The failed policies of "flexicurity" and "activation" that are supposed to illustrate social investment at its best, are good examples of this ambiguity.

Keywords: social protection; welfare reform; activation; flexicurity (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2012
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Published in Sociologica, 2012, 1, pp.1-11. ⟨10.2383/36889⟩

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hal:journl:halshs-00711519

DOI: 10.2383/36889

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