Social service innovation and welfare recalibration: a case study of a local training to work trajectory in Belgium

Abstract

Despite a growing interest in the relation between local social innovation in welfare services and ongoing welfare reform in Europe, both the social innovation and welfare studies literature currently lack a conceptually grounded framework to analyse how both are mutually implicated. Building on different, recent contributions in institutional theory the present paper proposes to analyse such changing relations as an interactive social learning process between ‘habits in motion’ (Berk and Galvan 2009) of reflexive, situated actors at the local level and the gradual and multidimensional process of macro-level welfare reform or ‘welfare recalibration’ (Hemerijck 2013). The value of this framework is explored through a case study of an innovative training to work trajectory for foreign language newcomers that receive welfare assistance in a medium-sized Belgian city.