A jóléti állam leépítése a posztszocialista Örményországban

A tanulmány a posztszocialista Örményország szociális ellátórendszerét vizsgálja. Megállapítja, hogy a meglevő formális jóléti rendszer fontos, de csak korlátozott mértékű támogatást nyújt a szegényeknek. A Szovjetunió összeomlása után gyors váltás ment végbe az erős szociális állampolgársági jogoktól a reziduális, piacosított és informális jóléti modell irányába. Ebben jelentős szerepet játszott az örmény állam gyenge pénzügyi helyzete és elégtelen adminisztratív kapacitása. Ezenkívül a nagy nemzetközi pénzügyi szervezetek – a Világbank és a Nemzetközi Valutaalap – tanácsára végrehajtott neoliberális reformok is hozzájárultak az állami szociális ellátások csökkenéséhez. A szerző szerint a túlzott mértékű támaszkodás a piacosított és informális szociális ellátásokra erősíti a jövedelemelosztás és a szolgáltatásokhoz való hozzájutás méltánytalanságait, és magas szociális költségekkel jár a szegények számára. Bár a pénzügyi és intézménybeli korlátok jelenleg csak minimális állami szerepvállalást tesznek lehetővé, hosszú távon a jóléti liberalizmus nem lehet a kizárólagos politikai választás Örményországban. A politikusok az alternatív jóléti rendszerek megismertetésével és a róluk folytatott politikai vitákkal lerakhatják egy aktívabb állam alapjait

The skills development seminars: equipping MPA students with key transferable skills

Dr Babken Babajanian is the MPA Programme Tutor. In this post, he explains the Skills Development Seminars, a unique feature of the LSE MPA Programme. These seminars are explicitly designed to equip students with key transferable skills that will bolster workplace efficacy

Problematising the community-contribution requirement in participatory projects: evidence from Kyrgyzstan

This article examines the extent to which the World Bank-funded Village Investment Project in Kyrgyzstan promoted empowered participation of citizens in co-financing arrangements. It is based on in-depth qualitative interviews and focus-group sessions in 16 rural communities. The study found that the poor and marginalised did not always have the ability to engage in the processes of consensus building, influencing local decision making, and exercising free choice with regard to the contribution requirement. Participatory projects must carefully design arrangements and operational procedures for the co-financing component of the project, in order to support citizen empowerment and democratic inclusion

Promoting institutional change in post-Soviet Armenia: is social capital the ‘missing link’?

This paper argues that the social capital framework used by development agencies in community-driven development policies and projects is not adequate for analysing conditions affecting participation. Instead, it proposes a framework for analysing co-operation. The research in Armenia shows that the availability of social capital in a community may not necessarily translate into community participation. The governance environment plays a key role in affecting the nature and forms of community participation and in shaping local institutions in Armenia. This implies that development interventions that focus on building social capital as a means to institutionalise participation may not be effective without addressing broader structural factors affecting participation

Social capital and community participation in post-Soviet Armenia: implications for policy and practice

This article argues that the social capital framework used by development agencies in community-driven development projects in post-Soviet countries may not be adequate for analysing conditions affecting community participation. Research in Armenia shows that the availability of social capital in a community may not necessarily translate into participation. The governance environment plays a key role in affecting the nature and forms of community participation and in shaping local institutions in Armenia. The research argues against the 'cultural' view of institutional change, which presumes that the main barriers to participation are posed by cultural factors, such as interpersonal trust and the 'mentality' of post-Soviet citizens. Development interventions that focus on building social capital as a means to promote community participation may not be effective without addressing broader structural factors affecting participation

Rolling back the welfare state in Post-Socialist Armenia

This article is written in Hungarian

Promoting empowerment? The World Bank's Village Investment Project in Kyrgyzstan

This article examines the extent to which the World Bank's community-driven Village Investment Project empowered people to influence the choice of local investments (micro-projects) and to exact accountability from their leaders. It is based on qualitative interviews and group discussions in 16 rural communities. The research demonstrates that the project provided an effective mechanism for responsive infrastructure delivery to address local priority needs. However, it did not improve accountability either within or outside the micro-project boundaries. The project's bottom-up development model was not by itself sufficient to enable people to exercise power over local government officials and informal leaders in the absence of effective horizontal accountability institutions within the state