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Der israelische Gastwissenschaftler Asa Maron hält zum Ende seines zweimonatigen Aufenhaltes am Zentrum für Sozialpolitik einen Vortrag über Dynamiken von Policy Transfer in Israel.

This lecture will discuss the relations between policy transfer and welfare state reform by using the borrowing and implementation of the “Wisconsin-Works” Workfare program in Israel as a case in point. Drawing on a comprehensive study of Israeli workfare I would like to emphasize two aspects of policy transfer as a socio-political phenomenon that I find relevant for similar processes elsewhere. First, processes of policy transfer are made of international ‘policy borrowing’ sequences and national ‘policy translation’ and ‘policy reenactment’ sequences. While policy borrowing sequences may be analyzed by tracing networks, interactions, and learning events of policy entrepreneurs, policy translation and reenactment sequences call for an institutional analysis that positions new ideas and agents in the context of local power structures and policy legacies. Differentiating these sequences helps to better understand the unfolding of policy transfer and its outcomes. Second, in order to grasp the role of policy transfer in welfare state reform it is important to consider what exactly is transferred? And where exactly such transferred content takes effect? The content of policy transfer consists of different “policy elements”: policy paradigms and models, policy instruments and principles of governance (e.g. managerialism, quasi-markets, partnerships), and also cultural values and interpretation of common social problems. Policy elements may influence the welfare state and promote change through various levels and arenas: from macro-level political and bureaucratic conflicts over the goals of the welfare state, to the meso-level organizational settlements of the welfare state, through to micro-level implementation of new programs via street-level organizations and the routine interaction between their personnel and citizens. After mapping the institutional context in which borrowing the “Wisconsin Works” model took place, the lecture will utilize examples to demonstrate how different policy elements transferred, manifested and influenced the contentious making of Israeli workfare.

Über Asa Maron
Seit dem 1. August 2013 arbeitet Asa Maron am ZeS. Seine Forschungsinteressen liegen vor allem im Bereich der Soziologie von Wohlfahrtsstaaten, insbesondere der Dynamiken und Folgen von Reformen und die Veränderungen von sozialen Rechten und Pflichten.
In seiner Heimat Israel hat Asa Maron vor kurzem seine Dissertation mit dem Titel „Striving for Domination and Liberalization in the Welfare State: State Actors, Private Agents and the Reconfiguration of Social Governance and Citizenship in Israel (1997-2010)“ an der Ben Gurion Universität eingereicht. Seit dem Jahr 2009 forscht er zudem im Projekt „Domains of State Responsibility and the Limits of Privatization“ am Van-Leer Institut Jerusalem. Im Oktober beginnt er eine Stelle als Morris Ginsberg Post-Doctoral Fellow am soziologischen Institut der Hebrew Universität in Jerusalem.
Während seines zweimonatigen Aufenthalts hat Asa Maron an einem ZeS Working Paper zum Thema “Strategic State Actors and Welfare Reform Trajectories: Coercion and Consent in the Neoliberal Redeployment of the State” gearbeitet.