Welfare Mixes and Hybridity: Analytical and Managerial Implications

Abstract

The notion of a “welfare mix” has two different points of reference. One is the variety of institutional arrangements of modern welfare states in, basically, capitalist democracies. This is primarily connected to a cross-country comparative perspective, very much influenced by classic pieces of research on the varieties of welfare states in general and related typologies (above all Esping-Andersen, The three worlds of welfare capitalism, 1990; see also Arts and Gelissen J Eur Soc Policy 12:137–158, 2002; Castles et al., The Oxford handbook of the welfare state, 2011). We believe to know, for instance, that Scandinavian welfare states are much more state-centered and, accordingly, third sector organizations much less important than in, say, conservative or corporatist welfare states such as Germany or Austria or in liberal welfare states such as the United States (cf. Salamon and Anheier, Defining the nonprofit sector: a cross-national analysis, 1997). A second point of reference of the “mix” of welfare state arrangements is the combination of sector-specific institutions in the provision of welfare-related services in a given country. It is here where the notion of hybridity is particularly relevant since it is typically the arrangement of overlapping sectoral segments that characterize the “mix” in question (cf. Evers Int J Public Adm 28:736–748, 2005 for an overview). Examples are tax exempted foundations in the field of education or science, private voluntary associations providing public goods such as social services of various kinds or private goods such as housing provided by public enterprises or cooperatives.