Frontline implementation of welfare conditionality in Norway: A maternalistic practice

Welfare conditionality is both ambitious and ambiguous for the frontline workers who put policy into practice. Since January 2017, the Norwegian frontline service should require social assistance benefit recipients under the age of 30 to participate in some sort of work-related activation, so-called mandatory activation. Drawing on qualitative interviews with frontline workers at local offices in the Norwegian Public Welfare Service (NAV), we investigate how the requirement is implemented in a context of a professionalised social welfare service. Mandatory activation is arguably a paternalistic measure. Drawing on Bernardo Zacka's concept of moral dispositions and Laura Specker Sullivan's concepts of maternalism, our findings indicate that at the frontline, mandatory activation policies are implemented by maternalistic decision making, emphasising the interpersonal relation between trained caseworkers and clients. The caseworkers use their discretionary powers in the implementation of conditionality and sanctions by emphasising care and support as embedded in the strict rules.     

Value-based issues and policy change: Medical assistance in dying in four narratives

In 2014, Québec became the first province in Canada to allow medical assistance in dying (MAID) by adopting the Act Respecting End-of-Life Care. This was, and still is, an important policy change. It involves a singular and highly moral issue that generated debates spanning over a longer period than that specific to the law's development and adoption. Using French and English newspapers' renderings of these debates in Québec between 2005 and 2015, this study deconstructs MAID's journey in the province into four periods, each characterized by a specific narrative: flexible precaution, legal hypocrisy, accountability imperative, and ineluctable adaptation. These four narratives allow us to better understand MAID's framing process as they reveal the underlying rationales of three overarching frames covering the 2005–2015 period: the legal frame, the social progress frame, and the service provision frame.     

Leaving like an Englishman: Assisting institutional reform in post‐communist Ukraine

Scholars of Development Studies have largely distanced themselves from research into external advice on governance reform in Ukraine, regarding post‐communist reconstruction as a political rather than developmental project. This article suggests that these seemingly distinct fields of donor intervention have more in common than is usually thought. It examines the influence of external advice on an issue which has particular resonance in the light of recent events in Ukraine, the relationship between Kyiv and the regions. It is argued that the impact of international assistance in this area has been negligible, largely due to institutional factors on the donor side, and that the most persuasive explanations for this are to be found in the literature of Development Studies.     

Social assistance trajectories among young adults in Finland: What are the determinants of welfare dependency?

Social assistance receipt is typical among young adults, but the long‐term trajectories of social assistance receipt have been less studied. We use Finnish population register data to study the kinds of social assistance trajectories found among young adults. We also analyze how individual and family characteristics are associated with the likelihood of following different social assistance trajectories. Individuals are followed from the age of 19 to 25. According to the results, social assistance receipt is relatively common among young adults but spell duration is usually short. Around 35% receive social assistance at least once between the ages of 19 and 25, and 2.5% receive social assistance each year. Using latent class growth analysis, we estimated six trajectories based on the annual number of social assistance months: (1) no receipt; (2) transitory; (3) slow exit; (4) occasional; (5) increase; and (6) dependency. Almost 4% of young adults follow the “dependency” trajectory. The results from multinomial logistic regression indicate that having only a short education is a particularly strong predictor of social assistance dependency. Parental social assistance receipt and moving out of the parental home at a young age are also significant predictors of social assistance receipt.     

基于幂风险谱和蒙特卡洛模拟的贷款优化配置模型

极端风险对于银行资产配置至关重要,尤其是次贷危机之后尾部风险以惨重的代价引起了金融机构的重视,传统条件风险价值CVaR、风险价值VaR不能有效度量尾部极端风险,因此本文基于幂风险谱和蒙特卡洛模拟构建了贷款组合优化配置模型,同时控制尾部极端风险和信用风险。本文一是通过损失-X_i越大、其风险权重φ_i也就越大的思路,构建幂风险谱PSR （Power Spectral Risk）最小的目标函数对极端风险进行控制,即弥补了CVaR同等看待尾部风险、忽略风险较大的损失应予以更大权重的不足,也同时弥补了VaR仅提供某一置信水平下资产损失的最大值、无法反映一旦超过这一数值的可能损失的弊端。二是通过蒙特卡洛模拟信用等级迁移引起贷款收益的变化情景,并以信用等级迁移后贷款组合损失越大、则风险厌恶权重越大的思路构建幂风险谱PSR最小为目标函数,以贷款组合的收益大于目标收益为约束,构建贷款优化配置模型,改变了现有研究贷款配置时没有同时控制信用风险和尾部风险的不足。对比分析结果表明：本文模型能够实现更高的收益风险比,即在单位幂风险谱PSR下能够实现较高的收益。     

中国农民工社会保障研究

随着我国工业化、城镇化的快速推进,以及农村经济体制改革和产业结构调整的逐步深化,越来越多的农民选择了到城市谋求发展的空间。他们为社会的发展做出了巨大贡献,但同时我们也应该看到,这一群体长期以来都游离在我国现有的社会保障体系之外,成为我国一大不容忽视的弱势群体。究其原因主要有长期以来的城乡二元体制桎梏、农民工社会保障的立法缺失以及人们的一些思想观念阻碍等多因素共同造成的。因此,改革户籍制度、建立健全有关农民工社会保障的法律、法规并逐步完善农民工的社会保障制度等是农民工社会保障的理性选择。     

完善我国农村医疗救助制度的思考

贫困人口医疗救助制度是我国农村医疗保障制度的组成部分,有必要对我国农村贫困人口实施医疗救助制度,要正确处理好农村贫困人口医疗救助制度与新型农村合作医疗制度的关系。福利经济学、凯恩斯经济理论和剑桥学派的社会救助思想是我国农村医疗救助制度的理论基础。我国农村贫困人口医疗救助制度处于初级发展阶段,需要确立政府在医疗救助中的主体地位,扩大农村大病医疗救助的范围,建立社会救助机构和基金,完善医疗救助政策法规体系。     

Towards sustainable hybrid relationships in cash-for-care systems

Welfare state services are currently challenged by a key contemporary issue relating to citizens’ independence. But very little attention has been paid to how this affects the relationships between providers and receivers of welfare services. As the objective of cash-for-care systems is to enhance users’ independence by giving them the role of an employer in relation to their care workers, this article focuses on the implications of this system for user–care-worker relationships. Based on the findings of a qualitative cross-national study in Norway and the United Kingdom, the article suggests that the British system tends to foster one of two kinds of relationships – a master–servant type of relationship or a strong solidarity/emotionally-based relationship – while the Norwegian system rather tends to encourage a more professional type of relationship. In everyday practice, however, relationships can be mixed types or they can even resist the direction more usually taken within the particular cash-for-care system.     

对家庭经济困难大学生资助育人工作方式的思考

当前,以国家奖学金和助学金、勤工助学、国家助学贷款、减免相关费用和补助为主体的资助体系的实施,大幅度提高了对家庭经济困难大学生的资助面和资助强度。高校贫困生的资助工作是一项长期的社会性的系统工程,它需要政府、高校、企业、社会、学生等多个角色的积极参与和共同努力。为此,高校需要探索一个全面资助家庭经济困难大学生的工作机制、方法体系。     

我国个人住房抵押贷款违约风险影响因素的实证研究

 次贷危机的爆发提醒人们重新认识个人住房抵押贷款违约带来的风险。现阶段,我国商业银行已经发放了大量个人住房抵押贷款,那么,哪些因素可能对我国个人住房抵押贷款违约产生显著影响,这是需要我们深入研究的问题。本文在实地调研的基础上,利用637组数据,对影响我国个人住房抵押贷款违约风险的因素进行了实证分析。研究结果发现,借款人受教育程度越高,工作行业稳定程度和垄断程度越高,违约率越低;借款人购买住房面积越大,每月偿还贷款金额与家庭收入之比越高,违约率越高;本地人比外地人违约率高;购买现房借款人比购买期房借款人的违约率高。对违约影响较大的因素依次是住房面积、月还款额占家庭收入比、是否期房、受教育程度。