European Pillar Of Social Rights Research Articles

Social dialogue in defining the European Union economic and social strategy

Following very significant initiatives, such as the European Pillar of Social Rights and its Action Plan, the Commission presented in 2023 its Communication on Strengthening social dialogue in the European Union: harnessing its full potential for managing fair transitions, together with a Proposal for a Recommendation to the Council on strengthening social dialogue. The present analysis will discuss the progress and limitations of these initiatives, such as the lack of binding nature of the legal instruments used or their effect on policymaking. In this regard, particular attention will be paid to the insertion of social dialogue into European economic and social governance mechanisms. To this end, the study deals with the influence of the economic governance framework on the role and development of social dialogue in the most recent transformations that have taken place since the 2008 crisis to the present. Likewise, the role given to social dialogue will be analysed in the new fiscal rules and economic governance framework recently approved.

Reaching the European 2030 poverty target: The imperative to balance the EU social agenda

Reaching the three targets of the European Pillar of Social Rights (EPSR) Action Plan is the litmus test for effective EPSR implementation. While the EPSR puts forward a prima facie balance between employment, equal opportunities and social protection, two important questions arise: a) whether and to what extent the resources available at EU level are sufficiently balanced across the different dimensions of the EPSR; and b) which implications this may have for achieving the 2030 poverty target. Analysing the three domains of the EPSR, its Action Plan and the wider EU legal framework of the principles contained in the EPSR, the paper argues that abundant EU resources are available for the areas of equality and employment, but fewer for social inclusion. The empirical evidence on poverty trends over the past decades, however, points to important successes in terms of employment and (gender) equality, but not with respect to social inclusion: a significant increase in employment and defeminisation of poverty have been accompanied by greater precarity for low-skilled men and women. Particularly striking is the rise in the risk of poverty among jobless households, linked with the weakening of the poverty reduction capacity of social protection for this group. Meeting the European social inclusion targets will thus require policies that duly focus on strengthening the framework for social inclusion and social protection.

Driving the EU working conditions directive: social partner reactivity and the limits to commission entrepreneurship

The EU’s social dimension has been strengthened since the mid-2010s. Recent research has shown how Commission entrepreneurship in meta-governance such as the European Pillar of Social Rights and the European Semester turned existing regulation in a more ‘social’ direction or led to new regulation strengthening Social Europe. This article asks whether the Commission also stands out as the most important actor in initiatives focused exclusively on working conditions and if the European social partners also in these are secondary reactive actors. Focusing on a recent case where the social partners had a treaty-based right to bargain—the Working Conditions Directive—the article confirms the Commission’s dominance and the reactivity of the social partners. The choice not to bargain reduces the social partners to lobbyists attempting to influence other key actors. However, the case also shows the limits to Commission entrepreneurship in that EU member states and the European Parliament were able to influence the outcome in important ways.

Effective enforcement of the EU framework on the posting of workers: Empirical evidence

This article addresses the issue of effective enforcement of EU labour law by looking at the case study of the enforcement of the EU framework on the posting of workers. While recent years have seen a revival of Social Europe in the form of the European Pillar of Social Rights, scholars have also expressed concern over the effectiveness in practice of transnational labour law, and EU labour law in particular. Rasnača (2022) argues that ineffective enforcement creates a ‘justice gap’ between formal rights on paper and access to these rights in practice. One example of an area of EU labour law plagued by enforcement issues is the posting of workers. It is a peculiar type of intra-EU labour mobility, where posted workers, despite often being EU citizens, cannot benefit from the protection afforded by the EU's fundamental principle of the free movement of workers. As the original Directive 96/71/EC on the posting of workers proved manifestly inadequate to safeguard the rights of posted workers, the EU enacted Directive 2014/67 to improve the framework's enforcement. This article offers an evaluation of the Enforcement Directive based on data collected from 29 qualitative interviews. The effectiveness of the Enforcement Directive will be assessed based on the theoretical framework of precarious work. It will be argued that while the Enforcement Directive has contributed to narrowing the justice gap, posted workers continue to be exposed to precarity.

The principle of adequate social protection in the European Pillar of Social Rights: Assessing the instruments used to realise its potential

Improving the social security protection of atypical workers has been high on the EU agenda in recent years. With the adoption of the European Pillar of Social Rights in 2017, the EU wished to break away from a decade of austerity measures. The EU further developed the right to adequate social protection in the Pillar through the Recommendation on access to social protection for workers and the self-employed. This instrument urges EU Member States to ensure adequate access to social protection for workers, regardless of their employment relationship, and the self-employed. As part of the EU's recovery strategy during and after the Covid-19 crisis, several financial instruments were developed to support EU Member States. Through the Temporary Support to Mitigate Unemployment Risks in an Emergency, EU Member States received support for job retention schemes. The EU also adopted the Recovery Resilience Facility, which provided grants and loans. Another support instrument was the European Social Fund Plus. This article discusses those recent EU initiatives, focusing on unemployment and the protection of atypical workers and the self-employed. With the introduction of the European Employment Strategy (1997), a closer link was made at EU level between unemployment, increasing labour market participation and activation measures. Less attention was paid to ensuring adequate unemployment protection. In recent years, however, it appears that the EU has been playing an increasing role in providing funding for temporary support and in introducing changes to EU Member States’ policies.

The European Pillar of Social Rights: How strategic agency shaped the European Union's flagship social initiative

AbstractThe European Pillar of Social Rights sits at the fulcrum of EU social policymaking. This article aims to explore its legal and political character, how it was shaped in the adoption process and its place within Social Europe. The key argument is that the Social Pillar builds on but also critically modifies previous initiatives present within the broader EU governance framework, notably in the European Semester. Key political actors like Commission President Jean‐Claude Juncker and parliamentary rapporteur Maria João Rodrigues contributed to the adoption process not only through their long‐held political views but also by bringing to bear their own critical reflections on previous EU initiatives. Methodologically, the article relies on 15 interviews with policy experts and uses an interdisciplinary approach based on legal analysis, process tracing and actor‐centred constructivist theory. The contribution of the article is threefold: (1) it helps to better understand the EU's social flagship initiative and the modifications of its governance approach compared with previous initiatives, (2) it sheds new light on the tensions and opportunities of social policymaking within the EU and (3) it shows the added value of actor‐centred constructivist approaches on a theoretical level.

Towards a Re-insurance union? SURE as an EU response to preserve jobs in the COVID-19 pandemic

Is the EU evolving towards a Re-Insurance Union? The creation of SURE, an EU financial tool to support national short-time work (STW) schemes in the midst of the pandemic, has revitalized debates on fiscal stabilizers as a means to counter economic downturns and protect jobs within the European Union. Drawing from document analyses and 17 interviews with EU and national stakeholders, this study explores the politics underpinning SURE’s adoption following a decade of heated and unsuccessful debates on the European Unemployment Reinsurance Scheme (EURS). Through the lens of ‘purposeful opportunism’, the article illustrates how the European Commission leveraged prior EURS insights and the emerging consensus on STW schemes to craft SURE in a way which addressed national concerns about EU-wide welfare harmonization, while positioning the EU as a holding environment for national welfare states. Looking ahead, making SURE a permanent ‘second line of defence’ against macroeconomic shocks could contribute to further substantiating new, EU-wide, social rights codified in the European Pillar of Social Rights.

PRINCIPLE OF EQUAL PAY FOR EQUAL WORK AND PAY TRANSPARENCY

The European Pillar of Social Rights, jointly proclaimed by the European Parliament, the Council, and the Commission, incorporates among its principles equality of treatment and opportunities between women and men, and the right to equal pay for work of equal value. The Union gave the guideline, principles and some mechanisms to regulate the real situation of discrimination, still existing in industrial labour relations. the normative act is Directive (EU) 2023/970.

Excluded workers and exempted employers: A qualitative study on domestic workers' access to social protection in the Netherlands

AbstractIn the Netherlands, many part‐time domestic workers fall within the scope of a particular type of labour law, that gives them fewer social protection rights and that renders private actors (households and workers) responsible for exercising those rights. Over the years, this policy has been criticised for institutionalising the differential treatment of domestic workers, which goes against ideas propagated in international initiatives, like the European Pillar of Social Rights. This contribution explores Dutch domestic workers' access to social protection in greater detail. Drawing on semi‐structured interviews with 30 domestic workers, we show that the actual access to social protection greatly varies over different workers and over different employment relationships of individual workers, but generally falls below par. Our findings indicate that this is partly due to the fact that the Dutch policy option underestimates domestic workers' wariness of placing demands on the households they work for, which raises questions over the desirability of non‐mediated employment relationships in the sector. We conclude with a brief discussion and suggestions for future policy directions.

Public preferences for social investment versus compensation policies in Social Europe

The recent enactment of the European Pillar of Social Rights (EPSR) has significantly strengthened the social dimension of the European Union (EU), including the social investment (SI) elements of that social dimension. What is not known, however, to what extent the priorization of SI is supported by the broader public. To address this research gap, we investigate public opinion on 15 different policy areas from the EPSR using Eurobarometer data from 2020 across all EU countries, asking whether the public rather prefers these policies to be delivered at EU or national level. A principal finding is that the public indeed supports more SI than CP policies with respect to EU-level social policy, and more CP than SI policies with respect to national-level social policy. We also investigate whether socioeconomic status (SES) and welfare state effort can explain this phenomenon. We find that higher socio-economic status and more generous welfare states are associated with more support for SI policies on both EU and national levels and vice versa. The findings emphasize the importance of what policies are provided versus who provides them but also pose a puzzle for trade-offs in multilevel governance settings. Hence, the article has important implications for future research on public opinion and Social Europe.

An examination of ‘instrumental resources’ in earmarked parental leave: The case of the work–life balance directive

This article examines factors that could contribute to explaining variation in take-up of leave among fathers in the light of the EU’s Work–Life Balance Directive (WLBD). The WLBD seeks to equalize care responsibilities between fathers and mothers, especially through reserved leave, with high compensation. The article begins with a cross-country overview of take-up of leave among eligible fathers, considering earmarking and the degree of compensation. Our results show variation, which cannot fully be explained by policy design (presence of high compensation with reserved leave for fathers). The article then theorizes that instrumental resources – information and accessible administrative application procedures – could be a missing link to understand the actual shift from de jure to de facto social rights. The article then carries out embedded case studies on these two aspects of instrumental resources, using original qualitative data collected during the implementation of the WLBD. The most striking finding is that countries with similar formal implementation of earmarked paid parental leave, display significant differences in commitment to instrumental resources. Put differently, the WLBD is being implemented differently, not regarding formal social rights, but on instrumental resources. This finding is important because it means that EU-initiated legislation on parental leave, could lead to differences in outcomes, that is, take-up of leave among fathers. The implication of our findings is that decision-makers and policy actors at EU level and in member states, should focus more on instrumental resources in the implementation process. This is particularly important for enhancing the de facto legitimacy of the EU in social policy, given that EU social regulation is increasing via the European Pillar of Social Rights.

Social citizenship as a marble cake: The changing pattern of right production and the role of the EU

The launch of the European Pillar of Social Rights has reinvigorated the debate on the role that the European Union can exercise in the sphere of subjective rights. Such debate has traditionally focused on the limits of the current social acquis, considered unable to create fully-fledged European social citizenship, that ultimately remains limited to the right to reside and freely move within the EU and enjoy social rights as nationals. Conversely, this article argues that the gradual expansion of the EU’s social acquis has slowly but clearly started to disconnect social rights from their exclusive national foundations, leading to the emergence of a new marble cake pattern of right production, which to a large extent reproduces the trajectory of federal polities. To capture this development, this article proposes an original analytical framework to dissect the notion of social rights as bundles of power resources (normative, instrumental and enforcement), which enable individuals to claim and actually receive material benefits in order to cope with a codified array of risks and needs. By shifting the attention from the formal dimension (laws and their enforcement) to its concrete practice (access and outputs), our conception connects the concept of social citizenship more directly to what ultimately matters for life chances (individualised material benefits) as well as for the social and political bonds of a community (the rights-based claim and experience of social protection). In so doing, we move beyond the boundaries of the nation-state as the only producer of social entitlements and are able to appreciate the increasing relevance of the European Union as a provider of power resources and guarantor of policy outputs.

Working conditions in platform work: testing digital platform workers’ rights on platform cooperatives

The emergence of platform work has provided new opportunities for job creation, yet it also poses numerous challenges, thereby placing the topic at the centre of the policy debate. At the same time, discussion of the platform economy usually fails to acknowledge the coexistence of different platform models and their diverse socioeconomic impact with regard to the SDGs and the European Pillar of Social Rights (EPSR). This paper aims to contribute to the debate on regulating platform work by testing the ‘Charter of digital workers’ rights’ arising from the Platform Labour in Urban Spaces (PLUS) European project, in three platform cooperatives: Fairbnb.coop, SMart, and Katuma. The empirical analysis and testing are based on qualitative surveys, co-creation sessions and interviews. The analysis could prove useful for further EU policy, national transposition of EU legislation and potential legislation worldwide. The results show the importance of providing a clear-cut definition of platform work, as well as considering different platform models. More specifically, the paper reflects on the definition and fair scheduling of working time (total amount of working hours, scheduling, and disconnection), fair and decent remuneration, the right to information on contractual conditions and the right to transparency in algorithmic systems, and training rights.

Monitoring Convergence in the European Union with the convergEU Package for R

Upward convergence, that is an improvement of Members States’ economic and social indicators’ performance, is a core policy target of the European Union. This concept isembodied in the European Pillar of social rights (EPSR) proclaimed by EU leaders in 2017. In 2018 Eurofound has developed a methodology to measure convergence, which has beenimplemented in the convergEU R package described in this work (rel. 0.5.0). The package extends the original STATA toolbox developed by Eurofound beyond the calculations ofthe four main measures of convergence as it provides functions to download, filter, impute, smooth indicators. Country and indicator fiches are automatically prepared and compiledin HTML format. Graphical output includes qualitative patterns of change along time to emphasize the key behaviour of an indicator with respect to the average of an aggregationof Member States. Besides EU Member States, the analysis of other collections of regions is supported for general indicators if context information is provided. A user-friendly,no coding required, shiny-based web application provides policy makers with a tool to produce convergence reports on selected indicators and countries.

Об’єднання єдиного соціального внеску і податку на доходи фізичних осіб у контексті євроінтеграційних прагнень України

Introduction. The high tax burden on labor is a problem not only for Ukraine, but also for many European countries, negatively affecting the labor market, in particular, it is considered one of the reasons for relatively high unemployment and informal employment. In Ukraine, it is proposed to solve this problem by consolidation the unified social contribution(hereinafter-USC) and personal income tax( hereinafter-PIT)(in fact, by abolishing the unified social contribution). Problem Statement. Despite the fact that the implementation of this proposal is associated with serious fiscal and social risks, it has not been the subject of scientific debate, although it was first published in Ukrainian periodicals in 2018-2020. Purpose. To assess the abolition of the unified social contribution in the context of compliance of such a transformation with European guarantees of adequate social protection and the European social model in general. Methods. The methods used are comparative and statistical analysis, abstract logic, analogies and theoretical generalization. Results. It has been established that, unlike the proposal to consolidate USC and PIT in Ukraine, the implementation of which will lead to a decrease in the living standards of people who have already retired and will receive a minimum income from the state budget, which will be able to protect them only from absolute poverty, and reliance on future pensioners-participants of private pension funds of all risks related to their provision after termination of employment, principle 15 of the European Pillar of Social Rights emphasizes the right of older persons to adequate pensions and a dignified old age. The importance of achieving this goal is evidenced by the fact that every three years, the European Commission publishes a report that reviews the current and future adequacy of old-age incomes in EU member states in three dimensions – poverty prevention, ability to replace income received before retirement and retirement duration – and analyzes key reforms aimed at ensuring the financial sustainability of pension systems. Such reforms are carried out in two main areas: revision of social contribution rates and expansion of financing from general government revenues, in particular, property, consumption, and environmental taxes. Conclusions. It has been found out that the abolition of USC as a stable source of financing the social insurance system in Ukraine will result in either its erosion or complete dismantling of the welfare state. This may complicate our movement towards the EU due to the inconsistency of Ukrainian approaches to solving social problems with European ones.

Social Enterprises – a Key Factor in Strengthening Cohesion and a Fair Transition

Abstract The European Union is facing an increasing concern related to numerous social and environmental issues (climate change, precarious conditions of society supported by a regressive living condition, as well as the uneven effects expected in the context of the green and digital transition) that reinforce calls for solutions that could address all these shortcomings as comprehensively as possible. Social enterprises are seen as the tool that could face the challenges of our times on a three-dimensional level, addressing economic, social, and environmental problems at the same time. These are even more important for the European model as they prioritize social value and development as a driving force for the implementation of the European Pillar of Social Rights. Social entrepreneurs are a part of civil society that have chosen to be actively involved in solving the issues that surround us by promoting innovative business models that support a sustainable and harmonious development. Policy makers must create a unified framework at European level regarding social enterprises and strengthen their role in the European economy by including in the main EU policies that would support their financing and development. Therefore, the objective of this article is to examine how social enterprises could act to ensure the premises of an inclusive ecological transition, as well as to stimulate discussion and research on the topic of social enterprises.

Social Europe in Times of COVID-19

COVID-19 gave rise to an unprecedented global crisis. As the end of the pandemic approaches and new crises have taken hold of Europe in the shape of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, we propose in this study to analyse the actions taken by the European Union in the field of labour law during the pandemic. While any crisis can reveal the strengths and weaknesses of a society, what does the pandemic tell us in particular about the state of Social Europe and its future? The responses from Europe have been different from the previous crisis, especially the 2008 crisis. First, as an immediate response, the European Union released Member States from the European budgetary rules enshrined in the European Semester. Second, it adopted a specific instrument, the Support to mitigate Unemployment Risks in an Emergency (SURE) programme, to facilitate short time working (STW) schemes. Third, the implementation of the European pillar of social rights continued, with new social directives expected to be adopted in the coming months. Unlike the 2008 crisis, the COVID-19 period could mark a deepening of social Europe. Social Europe, European Employment Policy, COVID-19, Short-time Working, European Pillar of Social Rights

The European Pillar of Social Rights: A Dangerous Distraction?

The European Pillar of Social Rights set out to reaffirm a European promise of universal welfare and prosperity as a remedy for a perceived crisis of legitimacy of the EU. This paper argues that the Pillar does not actually state legally binding rights and that ist name is therefore misleading. However, case-law of the European Court of Justice indicates that the Pillar could be used as a tool for the interpretation, in particular, of the – legally binding – Charta of Fundamental Rights, potentially widening the scope of application of the latter. This in turn, the article argues, might undermine the very objective the Pillar set out to reach – improving the EU‘s appeal to and acceptance by its citizens – by way of gradually increasing democratic deficits of the European Union while insufficiently targeting social ones. crisis of legitimacy, source of interpretation, democratic deficit, social deficit

TENDENCIES OF HIGHER EDUCATION DEVELOPMENT: EUROPEAN PERSPECTIVE

This paper represents an attempt to conduct research of modern tendencies, strategies and directions of education development within the perspective of the European Union. The main aim of the research is to learn more about the policy of the European Union concerning the general development of education, forming of favorable educational environment and protecting the rights of its citizens for education and professional development. The study relies on the theoretical methods of scientific research. The main source of the analysis, generalization and description is represented by various documents, recommendations, programmes, and guidelines issued by the European Commission, the European Pillar of Social Rights, the European Educational Area, the European Research Area, the European Skills Agenda, Europe 2020. 
 In the course of the study, the works of foreign researchers have been analyzed, which helped to view the topic of interest from different perspectives. The results of the study highlight the fact that the sphere of education has undergone its major changes due to the circumstances caused by the pandemic. In Ukraine, the great number of obstacles in education has appeared due to war, which made qualitative education impossible for many Ukrainians. Because of this, it is certainly important to study foreign experience in order to develop new working schemes and models for the sake of keeping education abreast of time and being in line with students’ and teachers’ needs. In the result of the conducted research, it is found that the European Commission has managed to develop a programme to support the future of its education. The main tendencies, strategies and priorities of the European Union concerning the further development of education are represented and described. 
 Key competences and basic skills for people’s personal and professional development throughout life developed by the European Commission and EU Member States are analyzed.

Social rights in EU and its member states

AbstractThis article informs about core aspect of the European Pillar of Social Rights as well as presenting the articles in this special issue of social rights in Europe. Overall, the articles points towards the role of the EU, while also showing continously strong variation across EU welfare states.