Benchmarking Social Protection and Social Inclusion Policies through the European OMC: Panacea, Failure, or Good Enough governance?

Transcription

1 Benchmarking in Federal Systems: Australian and International Experiences Joint Roundtable of the Forum of Federations and the Productivity Commission Melbourne, October 2010 Benchmarking Social Protection and Social Inclusion Policies through the European OMC: Panacea, Failure, or Good Enough governance? Presentation by Bart Vanhercke, European Social Observatory (OSE) and K.U.Leuven (CESO)

2 Outline of the talk 1. Introduction: scope & limitations 2. The Open Method of Coordination (OMC) : what is that (defining the elephant)? 3. Benchmarking within the OMC: how does it work? 4. Is OMC benchmarking delivering the goods (failure, panacea, good enough )? 5. [From Lisbon to Europe 2020 : what is to be done (forward looking)]

3 Introduction: scope and limitations Politics of benchmarking rather than technical aspects: see Marlier et al. (2007); Room (2005); Atkinson et al. (2002) EU-level (general), with some examples from a small federal state, Belgium: illustrate how OMC benchmarking (mis)fits with federal architecture Social Protection and Social Inclusion («Social») OMC 3 strands: Social Inclusion, Pensions and Health Care & Long-term Care

4 Important: «The»OMC doesnot exist MS let 1000 flowers bloom (+) Inflation of OMC s since Lisbon European Council 2000 BEPG, EES, education (established) Organ transplantation, influenza, immigration, smoking, EU development policy, family policy, disability policy, Latin America (recently proposed, more or less seriously) VERY different benchmarking tools in the OMC toolboxes Different effects / usage as a consequence

5 2. The Open Method of Coordination: what is that? No formal definition (!)

6 Technically speaking OMC is A cyclical process where mutually agreed Objectives (political priorities) are defined, after which peer review (discussion among equals) takes place on the basis of National Action Plans (reports). Soft Recommendations (Commission/Council) and comparable and commonly agreed indicators (and targets) enable to assess progress towards the Objectives

7 From a certain distance the elephant looks like this

8 Member States Social OMC: process cycle (3y) EU (EC, Council) Launching (2000) Common Objectives Joint Report Peer Reviews Supported by PROGRESS (learning) NSR Indicators Targets Social Partners & Civil Society

9 In essence: Cyclical process of reporting and evaluation of policies, which should facilitate policy learning between the (27) Member States, and thereby improve policies Mostly for sensitive issues for which EU has no legislative competencies ( subsidiarity )

10 3. Benchmarking within the OMC: how does it work? Member States and the EU (Commission, Council) engage in «bottom-up collegial benchmarking», through: Common Objectives Indicators Targets Peer Reviews Joint Reports ( Country Fiches ) EC: facilitator; MS call the tune ; stakeholders sneak in ; EP is mute

11 3. Benchmarking within the Social OMC: how does it work (Common Objectives) Example (SI): MS policies should have a decisive impact on the eradication of poverty and social exclusion by ensuring that social inclusion policies are well-coordinated and involve all levels of government and relevant actors, including people experiencing poverty, that they are efficient and effective and mainstreamed into all relevant public policies[ ] In other words: focus on outcomes (eradication of poverty) and on process (coordination, involving a variety of actors, mainstreaming) Objectives often quite general and ambiguous (struggle about ideas and views on social Europe )

12 3. Benchmarking within the OMC: how does it work (Indicators) Member States agree (unanimously!) on «harmonised» indicators (commonly defined) Portfolio of (primary and secondary) indicators for SI, PEN and HC policies + overarching + context indicators

13 Eg. Laeken indicators on poverty and social exclusion Key model of Social Indicators (2004 Discussion Paper Dpt of the Premier and Cabinet) Cover several aspects of social exclusion, e.g. financial poverty, employment, health and education (multidimensional) Outcome indicators (indiv & households) Eg. Early school-leavers % of the total population aged who have at most lower secondary education and not in further education or training

14 Other indicators Social OMC At-risk-of-poverty-rate (60%)! Healthy life expectancy Aggregate replacement ratio (pensions) In-work poverty risk Regional disparities (empl.) Others are being developed

15 How are the indicators used? The key is: prudence (subsidiarity, once again) 2001: first and last attempt by EC to propose a genuine ranking of Member States (SI) nearly killed the OMC before it started top down or independent monitoring does not work in EU context, at least not publicly (see also Kok Report in 2005)! Still, league tables are published: shows MS performance on indicators eg At-risk-of poverty rate in the EU (%), children and total population

16 3. Benchmarking within the OMC: how does it work (Targets) - Increasing (and successful) pressure from European Council and Commission on MS to set national targets in their national reports ( benchmarking benchmarking ) Eg. Naming in Joint Report - GER-GR-ESP- LIT: SI strategy lacks clear quantified targets

17 3. Benchmarking within the OMC: how does it work (Targets) Some EU targets Barcelona European Council (2002) childcare target: provide childcare by 2010 to at least 90% of children between 3 years old and the mandatory school age, and at least 33% of children under 3 years of age Europe 2020 (June 2010) headline targets poverty : lift at least 20 million people out of the risk of poverty and exclusion education: reduce school drop-out rates to less than 10% [ ]

18 3. Benchmarking within the OMC: how does it work (Peer Reviews) Two ways of organising the «laboratory federalism» «Formal Peer Review», based on National reports (NAP/NSR ): Issues vast, time short, content agreed upon between MS Value added? Pressure?

19 3. Benchmarking within the OMC: how does it work (Peer Reviews) Progress Peer Reviews» (some 6O so far): smaller groups of MS + independent experts and civil society discuss good practices in Social Inclusion: e.g.. rough sleepers, England 2004 Pensions: e.g. public information on pension systems, Poland 2008 HC and Care (after hesitation!): e.g. quality longterm care in residential facilities, Germany 2010 Contextualized benchmarking (some) genuine pressure (among peers, not public!)

20 3. Benchmarking within the OMC: how does it work (Joint Reports) EC refrains from tough comments on individual MS performance. And yet they bite (irritate/embarrass) Some examples: Member States confuse monitoring of the implementation of actions with the evaluation of their impact and effectiveness ( benchmarking benchmarking ) MS Stop using indicators when outlining new commitments (B, GER, FR, IT, LUX)

21 3. Benchmarking within the OMC: how does it work (Joint Reports) IT: Coordination between national and subnational interventions should be strengthened establishing the levels of assistance that are deemed essential nationwide (swallow) NL: The gender dimension of poverty and social exclusion is lacking (swallow twice)

22 Evaluation by Commission not as soft as some had hoped Social Protection Committee: Commission was labeled an agent on the run (POL, UK)

23 4. Is OMC benchmarking delivering the goods (does any of this matter)? It does matter, at least in terms agendasetting and improving governance But in terms of outcomes (reducing child poverty, waiting times in hospitals or early retirement): we basically don t know!

24 Then what do we know? Common Objectives created push for the Institutionalisation of NGO involvement in Social Inclusion policies Belgium from teacher to pupil : participation model ( people experiencing poverty ) looked especially well on paper, less so in practice From window dressing to adaptational pressure (irrispective of fit )

25 Boomerang effect Example where uploading of national priorities (to EU) bounces back to domestic policy setting OMC works like a pendulum (EU-MS) Reciprocal influence, not one-way impact!

26 4. Is OMC benchmarking delivering the goods (does any of this matter)? Strengthening and even boosting statistical capacity Belgium: desert for social indicators, contested statistics and even trends FR/IT/most New MS No more hiding behind incomparable statistics B early retirment feature re-labelled as problem (need to justify performance by comparison with others)

27 4. Is OMC benchmarking delivering the goods (does any of this matter)? OMC initiated adoption of targets in SI policies - New feature in several countries - More than that: NSR inlcude national targets for regional competencies (education, housing etc.)

28 Belgian NAP Social Inclusion Target 1 To increase the proportion of social housing for rent as a percentage of the total number of private households % 6.3% 7% 8%

29 Do Peer Reviews matter? Some (but few) examples of direct policy transfer (eg rough sleepers) through such external benchmarking no siren call of best practice Participants seem to be learning a lot but do they change their behaviour? EC about to launch assessment on this issue

30 BUT: national spill-overs of peer reviews - Exchange of information between regions (across language borders): discovering each other's policies ( national OMC ) through a mirror effect (internal benchmraking) - Sub-national OMCs (Gender Equality: Flanders; Italian regions); Local OMCs (e.g.. city of Leuven) EU cooperation within the context of the OMC brings about procedural changes, including vertical cooperation

31 4. Is OMC benchmarking delivering the goods (does any of this matter)? - Benchmarking within context of OMC brings about substantive policy changes (!) - Child poverty : new concept in Social Inclusion policies of many Member States: straight from OMC cognitive shift (power of ideas) - Remarkable: longstanding resistance against this issue (failed to halt the issue!) Strong EU pressure ( hard governance of soft law, Greer and Vanhercke, 2010)

32 This child poverty focus did not just happen: it was engineered by making use of the different benchmarking tools ( ) National Strategy Reports 2006 Commission identifies Child poverty as important challenge for many EU countries March 2006 Council conclusions formulate a new Common Objective Member States are asked to take necessary measures to rapidly and significantly reduce child poverty [ ] 2007 thematic year on child poverty SPC Report on Child Poverty and Well-Being (adopted in 2008) Specific reporting by MS on strategies to fight child poverty Peer Review of the Social Protection Committee Result: 2008 National Strategy Reports, child poverty is a key priority in 24 Countries; many have set quantified targets in relation to child poverty (not the case before) 2009: new data of EU-SILC module on material deprivation includes 20 child specific items

33 Reporting and data collection on child poverty is thereby institutionalised (and what gets measured gets done ) B: discovered it had a problem (new dimensions) Belgian Presidency of the EU (June-Dec 2010): top priority Before it had never been on the agenda same is true for enlargement and neighborhood countries Emerging issue: early childhood development (ECD) and the Roma issue (!)

34 Wrapping up: messy business OMC bottom-up collegial benchmarking has not been a panacea (some thought it would be a revolution in policymaking) flaws of peer reviews, soft country specific recommendations, the wrong people do the learning, lack of data effect on outcomes? But in some respects it delivered : substantive as well as procedural changes, allowing for better policymaking It is a good enough policy instrument, esp. in view of the fact that for the foreseeable future there is no alternative: benchmarking is there to stay (not a transitional instrument)

35 4. What is there to do? Debate about the place of the OMC in «Europe 2020» (4 points)

36 4.1 Secure what has been achieved - far from sure whether some of the basic benchmarking tools of the OMC (National Strategic Reports, Joint Reports etc.) will be part of future architecture - who will be monitoring the headline target? (EMCO/ECOFIN/EP) Institutional competition legitimacy/ownership (eg Education targets) - who will coordinate national reporting? (finance/prime minister) - temporal cycle is uncertain

37 4.2 The building blocks of a strengthened Social OMC should be spelled out (I) A lo of uncertainty during the past few weeks whether the Social OMC would continue to exist as a separate process at all (replaced by a new Platform on Poverty ) Need for a broad Social OMC not exclusively geared at poverty and social exclusion SPC and Social Affairs ministers should be in charge safeguard a political space in which they can have their say on any European initiative/development with potential social consequences

38 4.2 The building blocks of a strengthened Social OMC should be spelled out (II) This includes a variety of topics pensions (ECOFIN-IMF) healthcare and long-term care (IM) services on general interest education climate change and sometimes even agriculture On these issues, the SPC should be able to develop Social Impact Assessment (Lisbon Treaty!)

39 4.3 We should strengthen OMC benchmarking - By increasing its openness and participation - Still too much a closed shop - Participatory governance indicators (including at the regional and local level) would greatly improve the monitoring and assessment of national practices (e.g. involvement of civil society) in this regard.

40 4.3 We should strengthen OMC benchmarking - By making learning more thematic - Demand driven (ahead of refarm) - Learn from champions and losers (difficult!)

41 4.3 We should strengthen OMC benchmarking - By reinforcing the set of indicators (and making them more transparent) - Underpinning the common objectives with indicators that measure the social adequacy of a variety of benefits - pensions, unemployment, invalidity etc.

42 4.3 We should strengthen OMC benchmarking - By linking it to other EU policy instruments (funding, legislation) - Making EU Structural Funding (esp. ESF) conditional to achieving the objectives of the Social OMC - Put your money where your mouth is shadow of hierarchy, give OMC teeth - Financial Perspectives Instrument hybridity

43 4.4 Towards Hard soft law? - Member States may contradictory as it may seem - have to give up some of their national prerogatives if they want their social systems to be able to deal with the challenges ahead. - introducing stronger country-specific Recommendations (but BEPG and EES suffer from similar problems) - binding regulatory standards (minimum income) - Pathway to that will be long and uncertain.

44 Through these four avenues, OMC benchmarking could contribute to a more productive approach to some of the difficult issues MS and the EU are tackling - a powerful commitment to good governance

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