Globalization, unemployment and ‘social exclusion’ in Europe: Three perspectives on the current policy debate

Abstract

This paper begins by reviewing recent development in employment policy at the EU and member‐state levels. It concludes that the dominant current trend is to re‐define employment policy as the targeting of potentially problematic groups of the unemployed, rather than as the attempt to create employment opportunities for all. The paper then suggests that contributions to current debates on labour market policy in Europe (and economic policy more generally) can be grouped into three broad ‘schools’. Variants of the global neo‐liberal paradigm predominate, although a ‘New Regionalist’ variant is growing in influence. A third approach, founded on a recognition of ‘structural instability’, has been marginalized by the leading policy actors. The three schools suggest different conceptions of the global‐local economic relationship, and of sorting processes in the labour market. European policy thinking in the 1990s has been dominated by the first and second schools but the third still offers essential insights. A broadening of both the intellectual and political influences on the development of policy is required.

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