Neoliberalism, Nordic Welfare States and Social Work

Current and Future Challenges

Masoud Kamali, Jessica Jönsson, Masoud Kamali, Jessica H. Jönsson, Jessica Jönsson, Masoud Kamali, Jessica H. Jönsson

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2018
• Print ISBN: 9781138084308
• eBook ISBN: 9781351620215
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Social Work
• Index: Social Sciences

How have three decades of neoliberalism affected the Nordic welfare states as well as the organisation, education and practices of social work in those countries?

During recent decades the welfare states of Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden have gone through dramatic changes infl uenced by the political triumph of neoliberalism. This has led to both the electoral success of extreme right and mainstream neoliberal parties, and to the neoliberal ideological transformations of social democratic parties. The neoliberal doctrine of making governance cheaper has thus been made the focus of governance and has led to increased marginalisation and social problems.

This is the first book to comparatively explore the role of neoliberal reforms on social work and social policy across the Nordic welfare states. The richly theoretical and empirical chapters explore and illustrate the consequences of the dominance of neoliberal policies and provide an analysis of the effects of globalisation, glocalisation, welfare nationalism, symbolic violence and forced migration. The book provides valuable insights into the shortcomings of retreating welfare states in a time of increasing glocal social problems.

Neoliberalism, Nordic Welfare States and Social Work should be considered essential reading for critical social work education. Students, scholars, educators and researchers of Nordic countries and beyond have much to learn from this book.

Part I

Neoliberalism and the transformation of social policy

Masoud Kamali and Jessica H. Jönsson

The chapters comprising this part of the book consist of contributions that critically analyse different aspects of neoliberal changes in social policy and their implications for social welfare and social work in each of the four Nordic countries represented in this volume. Through an examination of different social policy issues in Nordic welfare regimes, this part acknowledges and reflects upon the dominant political, economic, social and cultural forces shaping social policy and the practices of social work in recent years. Contributors explore the consequences of policy change for traditionally strong welfare states, characterised by the use of social policy based on well developed social engineering. They outline and provide examples of the shortcomings and negative consequences of neoliberal policies, such as the failure to secure rights, meet needs and challenge inequalities and injustices. The authors offer different perspectives on and analyses of the subject matter (this being informed, not least, by their national context), but all raise common concerns about how neoliberal policies transfer formerly public services into more hybrid organisational structures – structures which greatly influence the lived experiences of people in need of social work interventions, and which, more specifically, reinforce inequalities and injustices, and lead to growing social problems and anti-immigrant politics, welfare nationalism and protectionism. In this connection, the contributors illustrate the neoliberal changes that have occurred in the Nordic countries, such as the privatisation of social care and social work, the reinforcement of managerialism in social work, the increase of demands on people in need in the name of ‘activation policy’, and the growth of anti-immigrant policies and measures.

1Neoliberal drivers in hybrid civil society organisationsCritical readings of civicness and social entrepreneurism

Linda Lundgaard Andersen

Civil society organisations (CSOs) and social entrepreneurship take up a significant position in a welfare system in transformation. Voluntarism and civil society have played an important role in the development of the welfare state and its services in Denmark, as in the other Nordic countries, for at least a century. Recently, however, the positioning and context for civic society organisations has changed quite profoundly, due to neoliberal welfare policies and steering regimes. In this chapter, I point to neoliberalism as both a political discourse about the nature of rule, and a set of practices that facilitates control from a distance. In this way, neoliberalism deeply influences the everyday lives of both professionals and individuals. I identify two themes, which reflect significant neoliberal organising principles – namely the human rights subject versus the entrepreneurial labour market subject, and the commodification and performativity of civil services and human growth – and, drawing upon one illustrative single case, I provide insight into hybrid organisations rooted in civic society and social entrepreneurism.

Civil society in transformation

Within the past decades, we have seen a significant change in the conditions and framings that surround civic society and non-governmental organisations (NGOs). Previously, CSOs mainly aimed to provide autonomous and self-governing civil activities and tasks to local communities, and often offered parallel or complementary activities to public and local welfare services. Nowadays, many CSOs are engaged in providing civil-based welfare services that are part of the public welfare profiles, serving ‘as intermediate institutions between the citizens and the state’ (Enjolras and Strømsnes 2017, p. 6). Wijkström states that:

civil society organisations represent both bridges between groups of individuals and the ideologies, visions and other ideas often portrayed in their organisational missions and bridges between these ideas and individuals and a wider surrounding society. Through the actual provision of voice (advocacy, representation) or the production of services (for members or others), the organisations of civil society are developing, promoting and preserving a wide variety of values and ideals.

(Wijkström 2011, p. 17)

Civic organisations and civil society are vehicles for active citizenship, activism in social movements and participatory democracy (Boje 2015, p. 40).

However, in recent decades we have seen how civil society and groups of volunteers have been positioned as part of public practices and form strategic points in governmental and municipal policy documents. Gradually, CSOs have been integrated as part of a differentiated public welfare service profile. Civil society and volunteers have enhanced their role as public partners due to their altruistic, close and trustworthy relationship with citizens, often based on participatory democracy. Civil society research reports a number of strengths: when citizens, voluntary organisations, welfare professionals and municipalities all engage in collaborative activities, they experience synergy, added value and shared power. When several partners engage in shared task deliveries, this multiplies and further enhances opportunities for innovation and welfare solutions. Public sector and civil society partnerships are often accompanied by expectations of flexible solutions to solve complex challenges and address the needs and wellbeing of citizens. In addition, the NGO culture, traditions and collaboration may lead to more hybrid network organisations that have the potential to anchor welfare services in the resources of the local community (Buckingham 2011, Andersen and Espersen 2017a, Enjolras and Strømsnes 2017).

This development, however, has its downsides. A number of critical voices point out how voluntary social work has become increasingly defined and governed by market conditions (Eikenberry and Kluver 2004, Boje et al. 2006, Henriksen 2015, Sandberg 2016), has been driven by the public-civil ‘contractual culture’ and has begun to adopt a market lingo that labels its members as ‘service providers’ (Wijkström 2010). This public contractual culture might lead to processes of isomorphism: in order to meet expectations, CSOs and civic initiatives and collaborations undergo mission drift and over time mirror mainstream public organisational delivery culture, structure and communication in order to seek legitimacy and funding (Mason 2012, Andersen 2015b). This creates a significant paradox. CSOs are often involved as public sector partners because they operate without rules and restrictions and display certain strengths related to networks, collaboration and equity. However, to be attractive partners for the municipal and political system and to receive funding and support, organisations must develop collaborations that comply with rules and restrictions generated from New Public Management. This may in many cases be counter-productive and represent quite an unfamiliar rationale (La Cour and Højlund 2008). In addition, voluntary engagement is driven by individual and beneficial motives along with the classic altruistic motive, and the former is a motivation that is growing (Andersen and Espersen 2017a). However, research points to how civil and voluntary social work includes elements of civil resistance due to volunteers’ self-governing and individual motivation for involvement, which is difficult to maintain if there is excessive control and reporting. So if control increases, volunteers will simply leave for other activities (Henriksen et al. 2008, Boje 2017).

Civic society organisations: advocacy, hybridity and social entrepreneurism

As illustrated above, many CSOs find themselves in processes of transformation, in which hybridity and social entrepreneurism are significant features. Wijkström and Zimmer even conclude ‘that CSOs are both drivers and arenas of change’ (Wijkström and Zimmer 2011, p. 10). They point to ‘a transformation in the division of labour’ between the different institutional sectors and spheres, leading to ‘a change in the portfolio of activities’ for CSOs – but also for public and private sector organisations (Wijkström and Zimmer 2011, p. 12). From this follows that contemporary volunteerism and CSOs exhibit a more blurred task profile and we see a differentiated spectrum of partnerships in public policies and the deliveries of local government strategies and tasks (Wijkström and Zimmer 2011, Andersen and Espersen 2017b). The term ‘hybridity’ refers to corporate and organisational forms that intersect and combine different formats like those of private, public and civil society. Filip Wijkström has stated that while the typical hybrid character of civil society in the 20th century could be described as ‘half movement’ and ‘half government’, the relationship today has transformed its character into ‘half charity’ and ‘half business’, which is more activities of entrepreneurship and business activity (Wijkström 2011).

Hybrid organisations include profit and non-profit components and may have competitive advantages, challenges and difficulties that may affect their mission, business and organisational ideology and value orientation (Mair and Noboa 2003). They involve several stakeholders, more differentiated goals and a mix of resources combining governmental funding, market income and charity. Some perceive this as an advantage and an organisational asset (Brandsen et al. 2005, Billis 2010, Mair et al. 2015), while others see it as a potential weakness because of its volatile nature, which threatens to affect or change organisational structure and mission over time (Evers 2005, Billis 2010, Buckingham 2011, Pestoff 2014).

Neoliberal practices

Neoliberalism, according to Larner, has traditionally been theorised as policy framework, ideology and/or governance. However, Larner stresses the important point that we should be careful not to underestimate the significance of contemporary transformations in neoliberal governance. Neoliberalism is both a political discourse about the nature of ruling and a set of practices that facilitate control from a distance (Larner 2000) – and, I might add, have a deep influence on the everyday lives of professionals and others. Dean, who claims ‘This case of neoliberalism is far from closed’, shares this approach. He indicates, amongs other things, the enormous potential offered by the analysis of ‘neoliberalism’, not as a coherent ideology or identifiable state form, but as a heterogeneous militant movement seeking to influence and appropriate the powers of national and international organisations, including states (Dean 2014). In brief, neoliberalism – in the format of New Public Management – in Danish welfare services has provided a quasi-market, consumerism, performance management, marketisation and individualisation through generations of ‘modernisation programmes’ displaying objectives and performance criteria (Andersen 2015a). The initial welfare modernisation programmes comprised service and governance innovation (Hartley 2005), institutional in-house collaboration, democracy, and co-creation of local budgets; leading to more in-house innovation and, years later, to a more inter-organisational, inter-sectoral and open innovation form of practice (Hartley et al. 2013, Andersen 2015a). These programmes also focused on workplace learning and a more qualified professionalism, as well as on strengthening a multi-actor learning approach to foster more and better collaboration among employees, managers and users (Andersen 2015a, p. 252). This development was initiated and matured in parts of the public sector but has gradually made its way into social work and civil society. I now turn to two themes that illustrate significant neoliberal organising principles; I identify and discuss these using a case from a hybrid civil society organisation.

Three well established Danish CSOs formed a partnership to enable them to make a bid for job integration and upskilling of marginalised citizens. These organisations had all proved to be quite successful, and over time had developed and refined a collaborative approach to marginalised citizens in their local communities. However, increased cuts and the implementation of a quasi-market in job integration interventions forced them to accept the terms of procurement from the municipal authorities if they were to continue their activities – rooted in a civil society philosophy. Their approach combined a treatment and activity profile of equity and a slow-paced and long-term progressive participation in civil and local micro-activities in which a mixed group of local citizens was involved. These activities included: participation in a social environment, turning up on a regular basis, gradually being able to move towards more active participation in handyman’s work, assistance in a second-hand shop or coffee shop. The consortium won the bid and in the following years they worked to meet the desired outcomes and targets. This, however, proved to be quite difficult. The CSOs found themselves in a large number of meetings with consortium partners, the municipality and case officers from job centres and enterprises, with outcome and target deliveries for their services that were time and number specified and monitoring procedures that were detailed and time-consuming. These new rationales for ‘producing’, performance criteria and the change of foundation slowly thinned out their origins and roots as CSOs and made the outcomes weaker and more difficult to achieve. Eventually they dissolved the consortium.

The human rights subject versus the entrepreneurial labour market subject

One of the historic strengths of civil society is its ability to offer arenas with the capacity of providing ‘beings and being together’ and shelters to vulnerable citizens, arranging local everyday encounters including and engaging a multitude of citizens, and initiating activities that grow from local interests and priorities. In many ways, social work and CSOs have been rooted in a human rights approach, which helps to guard ‘the values of caring, pluralism, collaboration, civil discourse [and] build the social capital necessary for the smooth functioning of democratic processes, collective deliberation, and participatory decision-making’ (Sandberg 2016, p. 55). Nevertheless, this has gradually been challenged by an increased focus on the entrepreneurial labour market subject. In my illustrative case, the lack of funding and implementation of performance management forced the CSO consortium to change path. But this change of course proved difficult, since the CSO’s original values and professional approaches were fighting a losing battle when encountering ‘the Entrepreneur and entrepreneurialism’ (Sandberg 2016). The new socio-political priorities in Denmark have led to a shortage of unconditional funding and ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Series Information
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Figures
• Tables
• Contributors
• Preface
• Introduction: Neoliberalism and social work in the Nordic welfare states
• Part I Neoliberalism and the transformation of social policy
• Part II Neoliberal reorganisation of the welfare states and social work practice
• Part III Neoliberalism and the professional identities of social workers
• Part IV Social work education and a changing welfare state
• Part V Resistance and progressive social work in a global neoliberal era
• Index