Research Catalog

Title

Flexicurity : the emergence of a European concept / Sonja Bekker.

Author

Bekker, Sonja

Publication

• Cambridge [England] ; Antwerp [Belgium] ; Portland [Oregon] : Intersentia, [2012]
• ©2012

Items in the Library & Off-site

Holdings

Details

Description

xiii, 333 pages; 24 cm.

Summary

Flexicurity has been a core concept in the EU's employment debates as of 2006 and was codified into common principles of flexicurity in December 2007. Flexicurity remains an important part of the Europe 2020 Strategy and the flagship agenda for new skills and jobs, and is seen as an alternative for one-sided liberalization tendencies. This study explains the development and conclusion of the EU's flexicurity concept. How did actors finally come to agree on such a complex and sensitive issue? The book first derives theoretical preconditions for the emergence of flexicurity from new governance theory and flexicurity literature, and adds as an alternative explanatory theory the concept of power. The research combines the process tracing and congruence techniques to analyze the policy-making process, including elite interviews with core policy-makers and document analyses. The study found more than 20 factors to explain the emergence of flexicurity, suggesting that a wide variety of variables which interact in a complex web of events and actions form the basis of any flexicurity agreement. This includes the involvement of actors in developing the concept, the exchange of ideas and viewpoints, and taking an integrative and balanced approach to labor market problems and its solutions. Viewing the whole process, both elements of new governance and of the role of power contribute to explaining the emergence of the EU's flexicurity concept. The appropriateness of both new governance and political theories suggests that these theories may complement each other in explaining the flexicurity outcome.

Series Statement

Social Europe series ; volume 30

Uniform Title

Social Europe series ; v. 30.

Subject

• Labor market > European Union countries
• Labor policy > European Union countries
• Labor mobility > European Union countries
• Job security > European Union countries
• Job security
• Labor market
• Labor mobility
• Labor policy
• European Union countries
• Flexicurity

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references (pages 323-332).

Terms of Use (note)

• British Library not licensed to copy

Contents

Towards a theoretical perspective on flexicurity : establishing preconditions -- Research methodology to analyse the preconditions for flexicurity -- The institutional context of developing flexicurity -- Tracing the origins of flexicurity : a brief history -- Flexicurity on the European Agenda -- Developing flexicurity and struggling with labour law -- Emphasising social Europe -- Reaching common principles of flexicurity -- Explaining the emergence of the EU's flexicurity concept.

ISBN

• 9781780680910 (pbk.)
• 1780680910 (pbk.)

OCLC

• ocn820105698
• SCSB-1694914

Owning Institutions

Princeton University Library