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Dear Colleagues, [with apologies for cross-posting] This is to let you know that the final report of this EU project is now available on our website: www.kent.ac.uk/wramsoc together with working papers, articles, reports and the policy maps of welfare state reform in 7 European countries during the last 15 years that were our primary data source. Our key findings were: · Needs associated with new social risks (from shifts in the gender division of paid and unpaid work, the labour market and the balance of state and private welfare) are emerging alongside traditional social needs across European welfare states. Policy responses are shaped primarily by regime differences, but some convergence is taking place in specific areas. · In labour market and work-life balance policy the shifts generally reflect the ‘modernising’ paradigm, proceeding at varying speeds in different countries, and involve greater emphasis on individual activation and benefit conditionality. These changes result from realignments of modernising actors as well as from shifts in policy ideas. · Since actors other than the immediate new risk bearers are heavily involved in the reform debate, the outcomes tend to reflect the interests of groups such as employers. · Good opportunities for EU level involvement in new social risk policy-making through the Open Method of Co-ordination and other means exist. The EU should seek to strengthen the influence of immediate risk bearers in social dialogue. The first project book: 'New Risks, New Welfare' was published by Oxford University Press last November, sample chapter at: http://www.oup.co.uk/pdf/0-19-926727-8.pdf and a second book: 'Ideas and Welfare State Reform in Western Europe' will be published by Macmillan next September. Project partners and researchers: Ana Arriba, Andreas Aust, Giuliano Bonoli, Frank Bönker, Anne Daguerre, Benoit Gay-des-Coombes, Johannes Kananen, Olli Kangas, Trine P. Larsen, Lou Mandin, Luis Moreno, Bruno Palier, Peter Taylor-Gooby (co-ordinator), Virpi Timonen, Helmut Wollmann Peter Peter Taylor-Gooby +44 (0)1227 827514 [log in to unmask] SSPSSR, CoNE, University of Kent, CT2 7NF Risk: http://www.kent.ac.uk/scarr/ EU: http://www.kent.ac.uk/wramsoc/index.htm