Unemployment In Europe

Unemployment is the most serious economic and social problem in Europe today. Although the extent varies from region to region, it is generally most extreme in large cities. This volume asks why European unemployment is so high and examines the policies adopted at local, national and European level to tackle the problems. It also includes five case

Covers mainly the period from 1970 to 1993.

This book offers a state-of-the-art discussion of the political issues surrounding unemployment in Europe. Its unique combination offers both a policy and institutional perspective, whilst studying the viewpoint of individual civil society members engaging in collective action on the issue of joblessness. It is the result of Marco Giugni’s three year cross-national comparative research project, financed by the European Commission, united with hand picked contributions from invited experts. Throughout his study he focuses on how the EU approaches national unemployment, the main national differences in talk about unemployment and unemployment policy, and how the representatives of the unemployed produce and coordinate demands in relation to unemployment policy. This book contains a number of genuinely cross-national chapters along with sections on specific national cases, namely the UK, Ireland, Germany, Switzerland, Belgium and Sweden.

The book is the first major study to examine the implications of differences in welfare regimes for the experience of unemployment in Europe. It is concerned with three central questions about the way such regimes affect the experience of unemployment. The first is how far they protect the quality of life of unemployed people with respect to living standards and the experience of financial hardship. The second is their role in mediating the impact of unemployment on the individual's longer-term position in the labour market, addressing the issue of how far they help to prevent progressive marginalization from the employment structure as a result of motivational change, skill loss or the growth of discriminatory barriers. The third is how far such regimes mediate the impact of unemployment on social integration in the community, for instance with respect to the maintenance (or rupture) of social networks and the degree of psychological distress experienced by the unemployed. The book is the product of a major cross-cultural research programme, funded by the European Union (TSER), bringing together teams from eight countries. The emphasis has been on rigorous comparison rather than the all-too-frequent separate country analyses, which usually provide data which differs in format from one country to another. In addition to a systematic comparison of national data sources, it has been able to make use of a new important data source (the European Community Household Panel) produced by Eurostat which provides directly comparable information for all EU countries. The study shows that institutional and cultural differences have vital implications for the experience of unemployment. While welfare policies affect in an important way the pervasiveness of poverty, it is above all the patterns of family structure and the culture of sociability in a society that affect vulnerability to social isolation. The book concludes by developing a new perspective for understanding the risk of social exclusion.

Researchers in policy and social sciences from across Europe explore a number of perspectives for developing preventive labor market policies in the continent against the background of existing experience with national strategies and the increasing influence on labor market programs by the European Union. They focus on the extent to which the conditional framework is changing and how programs and instrument must respond, what response mechanisms characterize national strategies, and what learning processes can be triggered by exchanging national experience and what role the European Union organs play in such exchanges. The 12 papers are from a workshop for which no date nor location are identified. Annotation copyrighted by Book News Inc., Portland, OR

Examines the main factors influencing unemployment at both an aggregate level and at an individual level and assesses the role of policies to bring unemployment down.

In Youth Policies and Unemployment in Europe Paola Giannoni analyses the situation of the European youth regarding the changes in the job market dynamics and the strategies implemented by the EU for the social inclusion of young people.

It is often argued that European welfare states, with regulated labour markets, relatively generous social protection and relatively high wage equality, have become counter-productive in a globalised and knowledge-intensive economy. Using in-depth, comparative and interdisciplinary analysis of employment, welfare and citizenship in a number of European countries, this book challenges this view. It provides: an overview of employment and unemployment in Europe at the beginning of the 21st century; a comprehensive critique of the idea of globalisation as a challenge to European welfare states; detailed country chapters with new and previously inaccessible information about employment and unemployment policies written by national experts. Europe's new state of welfare is essential reading for students and teachers of social policy, welfare studies, politics and economics.