Quasi-markets and the delivery of activation: A Frontline Perspective

This article analyzes the delivery of activation or welfare-to-work programmes and services in the context of quasi-market service provision. It adopts a frontline perspective, looking in particular into two issues often discussed in the literature on quasi-markets: risk selection in provider agencies and the administrative costs and burden related to monitoring provider agencies and agents. Data from a Dutch study of frontline workers in purchaser and provider agencies is presented to analyze frontline practices of risk selection and monitoring. The article concludes that interpreting provider behaviour in terms of risk selection may not be as straightforward as it seems, and that the widespread occurrence of risk selection processes throughout service provision chains makes it rather difficult to attribute risk selection unequivocally to rational provider behaviour. The monitoring process is experienced as an administrative burden, especially by workers in provider agencies, but it also has elements which workers consider as making a positive contribution to service provision processes in circumstances where actions of purchasers and providers need to be coordinated. This is partly related to the double function of monitoring in the context of activation policies in quasi-market contexts: monitoring provider behaviour as well as monitoring client behaviour.