Full Description
There has been a major transformation in labour market policy in the United Kingdom since the mid 1990s. The obligation of unemployed people to actively seek employment has been strengthened and the receipt of social security benefit has been tied to participation in active job search and job placement programmes. The experience of the United States in experimenting with and implementing welfare to work programmes, dating back to the early 1980s, has been pivotal in shaping labour market and welfare reform programmes in the UK. In this timely work the authors track the influence of US ideology and experience on New Labour's reforms. They present the results of their pioneering examination of over fifty policy experiments in the US, checking whether the correct lessons were learned. An interview-based study of what British policy makers actually used from US experience builds upon this analysis and the book draws US and UK experiences together to understand what kind of programmes work most effectively for which groups. Welfare-to-Work offers readers a unique combination of policy evaluation and the analysis of policy making.
Contents
Contents: Introduction: Welfare, work and welfare-to-work in the UK, Andreas Cebulla and Robert Walker; The road to Britain's new deal, Andreas Cebulla; The use of evidence in designing the new deal , Andreas Cebulla; Workfare evaluations and meta-analysis, David Greenberg and Karl Ashworth; A description of US Welfare-to-work programmes, Karl Ashworth and David Greenberg; Determining what works and for how long, Robert Walker and David Greenberg; Looking over the fence: findings from UK and US programme reviews, Andreas Cebulla; Lessons for welfare policy and research, Andreas Cebulla and David Greenberg; Index.
