Marketisation meets Civil society – the case of non-public ALMP provision in Sweden

• In Event: Country studies on the impact of New Public Management on nonprofit service providers

Abstract

A key characteristic of NPM is the introduction of market mechanisms within public service provision. Such mechanisms stand in stark contrast to the emphasis on the varying values advocated by different civil society organisations (CSOs), such as solidarity, compassion, and altruism. Given the combination of market mechanisms in public services and a political will to involve CSOs in social policies in many welfare states, CSOs that want to provide welfare services face difficult dilemmas that emerge as they must balance between living up to their values and to compete with other service providers on public quasi-markets. Drawing on the works of Michael Lipsky (2010) and others, these dilemmas also raise the question how front-line staff balance the needs of clients with organisational demands.

The paper investigates implementation of market mechanisms within the provision of active labour market policies in Sweden. Once known for its strong emphasis on public and national programmes to stimulate full employment, Sweden has increasingly come to rely on non-public organisations to provide individualised services. In 2021, the Public Employment Services introduced market mechanisms where clients chose from a list of for-profit and non-profit organisations. Based on performance measures, service providers receive funding in relation to outcome, i.e. whether their clients find employment.

Two CSOs, providing labour market services, are investigated in the paper. One is the Workers’ Educational Association, a Social-Democratic organisation historically known for its emphasis on “bildung” and bottom-up learning of workers. The other organisation is the City Mission, a Christian charity organisation that emphasis “trust in humans´ inherent power to change”. Both CSOs rely on values seemingly at odds with the marketized provision of ALMPs in Sweden as the latter relies on a work-first approach and conditionality (i.e. clients has to take part of services to receive unemployment benefits). The paper aims to investigate how CSOs on organisational level navigate the tension between providing value-based services while also compete with other service-providers. It also investigates how front-level staff balance: (i) the needs of clients, (ii) providing profitable services, and (iii) provide services aligned with the basic values of their organisation. The paper relies on an analysis of policy documents as well as interviews with managers and front-level staff in both organisations. In terms of theory, the paper takes its starting point in organisational hybridisation (Min, 2022) and street-level bureaucracy (Lipsky, 2010) to facilitate a multi-level analysis, including organisational and managerial levels as well as front-level. Taken together, the paper provides important insights in how CSOs, and their staff, navigates through the dilemmas that arise as they intend to embody their values in services provided in competition with other service providers in an NPM-oriented welfare state.

References

Lipsky, M. (2010). Street-level bureaucracy: dilemmas of the individual in public services. Russell Sage Foundation.

Min, B. H. (2022). Hybridization in government–civil society organization relationships: An institutional logic perspective. Nonprofit Management and Leadership, 32(3), 409–428. https://doi.org/10.1002/nml.21484

Author

• John Brauer, Örebro University