The Europeanization of flexicurity: the Lisbon Strategy's impact on employment policies in Italy and Poland

Abstract

The Lisbon Strategy promoted flexicurity as a means to achieve full employment and modernize national labour markets in the European Union. Flexicurity, which combines flexible labour markets and secure employment, became a leitmotif not only for the European Employment Strategy and the Lisbon Strategy but also for national employment policies. However, this contribution shows that there were mixed results in terms of policy adoption in Italy and Poland – two countries with similar structural employment problems. Looking at the policy content of flexicurity in terms of its goals and instruments, the contribution's findings demonstrate that policy change is dependent on the political parties in power supporting the EU while policy inertia is expected when the parties are characterized by hard Euroscepticism.