Experiments Participation Act:Know what works for whom

In recent years (1 October 2017 - 31 December 2019), six municipalities have conducted experiments in the assistance under the Temporary Decree Experiments Participation Act. The aim was to improve the implementation of the Participation Act through less control and coercion and more room for own direction, extra guidance and customization. The municipalities have asked the research institutes to scientifically investigate the results of these experiments. In order to be able to compare, the researchers used the same questionnaire in all six municipalities, the same outcome measures were used and the analysis model is also the same. However, because the experiments are designed at the municipal level, the differences between the municipalities and the experiments implemented are too big to really be able to combine the data. For a complete comparison and interpretation of the six experiments, we refer to the local final reports. The experiments, however, each individually, but above all in conjunction, provide relevant information for (future) policy that can fuel the discussion about the future of social security in the Netherlands. That is why we decided to write this joint semi-trailer to provide an initial insight into the broader outcomes on a selection of outcome measures. After a brief summary of the conclusions, we will discuss the various experiments and some important outcome measures in more detail

Entering a Knowledge Pearl in Times of Creative Cities Policy and Strategy. The Case of Groningen, Netherlands

This chapter argues that: (1) urban inequalities and injustices associated with creative urbanism, for example in terms of employment, income, or housing, are not always visible in the way typically associated with global cities and therefore require nuanced analysis; (2) the “creative cities” paradigm (as well as the contestatory right to the city framework or the just city debate) offers a powerful explanatory device for global neoliberal urbanism, including examples of “creativity orthodoxy” and the capitalist city in Amsterdam, and (3) Groningen in the northern region of The Netherlands provides a compelling case of hidden inequalities and the politics of urban development in what Gabe et al. (2012) and van Winden et al. (Urban Studies 44 (3): 525-549, 2007) would term a “knowledge pearl” city.</p