The political determinants of benefit work conditionality

Abstract

ABSTRACT The increasing conditionality of access to social protection on claimants’ proven willingness to seek and accept work has been one of the major dimensions of welfare state transformation of recent decades. Our understanding of the political determinants behind this trend, however, remains insufficient. This article assesses the state-of-the-art of political research on benefit work conditionality; points out a series of gaps and inconsistencies in existing research; and formulates an agenda for renewed and intensified research on the politics of work conditionality reforms, highlighting also how this research would contribute to important debates in welfare state research and political economy more generally.