Determinants of public employment services: exploring the relationship between benefit conditionality and partisan politics

Abstract The purpose of this study is to analyse determinants of resources devoted to public employment services (PES). It has proven difficult to disentangle ‘carrots’ (placement and services) from ‘sticks’ (sanctions and monitoring) when tracking the development of PES spending. This has contributed to ambivalence concerning the role of partisan politics, especially since welfare states have been argued to increasingly emphasize the ‘sticks’ aspect of the PES, irrespective of ideological orientation. This suggests that the role of partisan politics should be analysed together with ‘demanding’ activation, which is made possible with novel data on unemployment benefit conditionality. The analysis includes 16 welfare states and results indicate that left and secular centre-right parties are associated with increased resources devoted to PES, but that effects of partisan politics are contingent on the form and extent of benefit conditionality. Increased conditionality is associated with higher PES spending, thus nuancing the cost-containment argument for activation.