Mara Yerkes

An Institutional Embeddedness of Welfare Opinions? The Link between Public Opinion and Social Policy in the Netherlands (1970-2004)

A major shortcoming in the existing literature on welfare state legitimacy is that it cannot explain when social policy designs follow public preferences and when public opinion follows existing policy designs and why. Scholars examining the influence of public opinion on welfare policies, as well as scholars investigating institutional influences on individual welfare attitudes, find empirical evidence to support both relationships. While a relationship in both directions is plausible, scholars have yet to thoroughly investigate the mutual relationship between these two. Consequently, we still do not know under which circumstances welfare institutions invoke public approval of welfare policies and under which circumstances public opinion drives welfare policy. Taking a quantitative approach to public opinion and welfare state policies in the Netherlands, this paper addresses this issue in an attempt to increase our understanding of welfare state legitimacy. The results show that individual opinions influence relatively new policies, policies which are not yet fully established and where policy designs are still evolving and developing. Social policy, on the other hand, is found to influence individual opinions on established and highly institutionalised policies, but does not influence individual opinions in relatively new areas of social policy.

Mothers and work–life balance: exploring the contradictions and complexities involved in work–family negotiation

This article presents data from a project exploring womens experiences of work and care. It focuses primarily on work–life balance as a problematic concept. Social and economic transformations across advanced post-industrial economies have resulted in concerns about how individuals manage their lives across the two spheres of work and family and achieve a work–life balance. Governments across the European Union have introduced various measures to address how families effectively combine care with paid work. Research within this area has tended to focus on work–life balance as an objective concept, which implies a static and fixed state fulfilled by particular criteria and measured quantitatively. Qualitative research on womens experiences reveals work–life balance as a fluctuating and intangible process. This article highlights the subjective and variable nature of work–life balance and questions taken-for-granted assumptions, exploring problems of definition and the differential coping strategies which women employ when negotiating the boundaries between work and family.

Social risk protection in collective agreements: Evidence from the Netherlands

To what extent can collective bargaining compensate for a decline in or absence of welfare state protection against social risks? In this article, we use a comprehensive collective agreement database to analyse social risk coverage in the Netherlands from 1995 to 2009. We compare two forms of social risk, disability and work—life arrangements, analysing the share of collective agreements that offer these arrangements across time. Our results show that collective bargaining differs across the public and private sector but is similar at different levels of bargaining. In general, our findings demonstrate that collective agreements often compensate for declining welfare state coverage or a lack of state provision. As a result, the findings presented here suggest occupational welfare, in the form of collective bargaining, is an important component of welfare provision that is oftentimes overlooked in the current welfare state literature.

One welfare state emerging? Convergence versus divergence in 16 western countries

In this article we try to investigate the empirical validity of the convergence thesis, which assumes that welfare states are increasingly similar because more generous universal welfare states are adopting policies of retrenchment and neo-liberalization. Using data on the popularity of neo-liberal ideology, welfare state expenditures and the generosity of this spending for 16 western countries, we find that there is no general trend towards neo-liberalization and retrenchment. However, we do find that there is a trend towards convergence. More generous, universal welfare states are becoming more liberalized, and liberal welfare states are expanding, which causes convergence in the middle. At the end of the article we attempt to explain why welfare states are converging. We find that although they do not converge on neo-liberalization as is often thought, two common explanations used to support the neo-liberal convergence arguments, globalization and Europeanization, can explain the “middle-of-the-road” convergence found here.

The Transformation of Solidarity : Changing Risks and the Future of the Welfare State

This study investigates the consequences of processes of social individualisation and economic globalisation for welfare state solidarity. Solidarity is defined as the willingness to share risks. The institutions of the welfare state, such as social security or health care insurance, are founded on the willingness of citizens to share risks and organize solidarity between the young and the old, between the healthy and the sick, between the working and the unemployed. Processes of individualisation and globalisation affect these risks and in this study the authors investigate how and to what extent these changes influence the way risks are perceived by the public, what this means for the willingness to share risks and how this is translated in risk management strategies in firms, unions and administrative agencies. [Publisher website]

The employment status of doctoral recipients : An exploratory study in the Netherlands

Studies of employment often focus on general labour market developments or the employment status of vulnerable groups concentrated at the lower end of the labour market. In contrast, the employment of highly educated individuals, in particular PhD recipients, has received less em-pirical attention. This article contributes to this area using data from a web survey carried out among respondents at four universities in the Netherlands. Dutch doctoral recipients have an above-average employment rate of 86 per cent. In addition, when looking at variables related to academic and non-academic employment, demographic variables, such as age and children living in the household, as well as publications submitted and accepted, are more closely related to con-tract type (permanent versus temporary) than factors such as PhD supervision and labour market preparation. Gender is a particularly important variable related to employment status, with male doctoral candidates more likely to be employed outside academia. We conclude with recommendations for PhD candidates, their super-visors and universities.

Who are the job seekers? explaining unemployment among doctoral recipients

Despite increased attention for doctoral education in recent years, one particular phenomenon has received little attention—the unemployment of doctoral candidates following graduation. While the unemployment of doctoral recipients is relatively low in comparison to the general popula-tion, the absence of empirical studies means possible important patterns are being overlooked. Using survey data from four universities in the Netherlands, we investigate unemployment among recent doctoral graduates. By comparing the job seekers to employed doctoral recipients and fo-cusing on both structural and individual level variables, including demographic characteristics, previous research experience, job seeking activities, and differences in the PhD trajectory, we are able to discern a number of shared characteristics among the job seekers. Our findings suggest that unemployment among doctoral candidates is not random or evenly distributed. In contrast to the general population, where socio structural characteristics such as educational level and gender are integral in explaining unemployment, within this level of educational attainment primarily individual level factors are more salient in explaining unemployment among this group of job seekers.

The disconnection between policy practices and women's lived experiences: Combining work and life in the UK and the Netherlands

Combining work and family life is central to womens participation in the labour market. Work–life balance has been a key objective of UK and Dutch policy since the 1990s, but policies created at the national level do not always connect with the day to day experiences of women juggling caring and domestic responsibilities with paid work. Using qualitative data from a European Social Fund Objective 3 project the paper explores womens lived realities of combining work and family life in the UK in comparison to the Netherlands as a possible ‘best practices’ model. We argue that women in both countries experience work–life balance as an ongoing process, continually negotiating the boundaries of work and family, and that there needs to be a more sophisticated appreciation of the differing needs of working parents. Whilst policy initiatives can be effective in helping women to reconcile dual roles, many women in both the UK and the Netherlands still resolve these issues at the individual or personal level and feel that policy has not impacted on their lives in any tangible way.

Choice or constraint? Women’s weekly working hours in comparative perspective

This article analyses the influence of individual working preferences on women’s labour market behaviour in the Netherlands, Germany and the United Kingdom, addressing the question: to what extent do individual preferences have a causal effect on women’s average weekly working hours? Using longitudinal panel data from all three countries, a fixed-effects model is applied to measure the effect of individual preferences in year t-1 on women’s average weekly working hours in year t. The data is pooled from 1992 to 2002. After controlling for a number of individual, household and job characteristics we see that individual preferences are most influential in the Netherlands. However, the data do not support the idea that choice is more important than constraint because individual, household and job characteristics remain significant. In addition, the results demonstrate that it is important to understand individual preferences within the institutional context. Therefore, within the theoretical and policy debates about women’s labour market participation we must consider possible barriers that hinder women when making labour market “choices”.

Transforming the Dutch welfare state: Social risks and corporatist reform

This comprehensive study provides a thorough account of important policy developments in the Netherlands that are significant beyond the borders of the Dutch welfare state. It demonstrates the dramatic changes that have taken place in the protection of old and new social risks, exploring the mechanisms behind these changes in the context of corporatist welfare state institutions. This book is essential for welfare state scholars, graduate students and policy makers.