Public Sector Employment Regimes ― Transformations of the State As an Employer

Public employment regimes are changing. New forms of service provision based on performance assessment have replaced the traditional model of the civil servant who offers obedience and loyalty in exchange for privileged employment conditions. This book explores the extent to which the material and ideological driving forces of change have actually resulted in a transformation of public employment regimes in Western countries. By analyzing reform processes in energy market regulation, waste collection, and the police in Germany, France, and Sweden, and contrasting these against the implementation of New Public Management in the United Kingdom, the authors show how institutional structures, legal traditions, functional requirements of specific public services, and labour market conditions have influenced the pathways of reform. They demonstrate how public employment regimes have unravelled in different domains of public service, contesting the idea that the state remains a 'good' and 'model' employer.

Karin Gottschall is Professor of Sociology at the SOCIUM Research Center on Inequality and Social Policy at Bremen University, Germany. Her research focuses on the sociology of labour markets, social inequality, social policy and education, and gender studies. Since the 1980s, she has published widely on social inequality, the flexibilization of work, gender and labour market segregation and public employment. She has served on various social sciences advisory boards and is reviewer to national and international science foundations.

Bernhard Kittel is Professor of Economic Sociology at the University of Vienna, Austria. He is interested in experimental group decisions, comparative labour markets and welfare states, and social science methodology.

Kendra Briken is Chancellor's Fellow in the Department of Human Resource Management at the University of Strathclyde, United Kingdom. Her research interests include private/public security, lean management, and industrial relation. She recently co-edited Urban (In)Security: Policing the Neoliberal Crisis (2014, with Volker Eick).

Jan-Ocko Heuer was Research Fellow at the Collaborative Research Centre 597, 'Transformations of the State' and is currently working at the Centre for Social Policy Research (ZeS) at the University of Bremen, Germany. His research focuses on the political economy and sociology of public policy, social policy and financial regulation. His latest publications deal with consumer insolvency regimes in comparative perspective.

Sylvia Hils is Research Assistant and Women's Representative of the University of Bremen, Germany. Between 2008 and 2014 she worked as a research assistant at the Collaborative Research Center 597, 'Transformations of the State' . Her scientific interests are in the field of gender research and the sociology of work and labor markets.

Sebastian Streb worked as a research associate between 2008 and 2012 at the Collaborative Research Center 597, 'Transformations of the State', University of Bremen, Germany.

Markus Tepe is Professor of Political Science at the University of Oldenburg, Germany. His research focuses on comparative public policies and public administration.