The political economy of private pension provision

Welfare privatisation is generally analysed as welfare state retrenchment or liberalisation: reducing the role of public provision is understood as reducing the role of the state in allocating welfare benefits. This thesis starts from the puzzling observation that pension privatisation seems to go hand in hand with more active state interference in the allocation of private pensions. In order to explain the political dynamics that drive state intervention in the organisation of private welfare, this project moves away from established explanations based on electoral politics and social partner mobilisation. Instead it focuses on the interaction between states as independent actors with a stake in stabilising the welfare system, and financial welfare providers with a commercial interest in public support for private welfare. The first paper examines why Germany and the UK - despite having very different institutional backgrounds - exhibit a surprisingly similar shift away from their voluntarist approach to organising private welfare since the 1990s. This supports the central argument of this thesis. The second paper focuses on explaining one important aspect of recreating social protection within private welfare provision: the ability to organise collective risk-sharing to protect against financial volatility. Whereas prevailing explanations focus on social partner voluntarism, this paper compares Denmark and the Netherlands to argue that analytical attention should shift to how regulatory frameworks are required for overcoming distributional struggles. The third paper explains regulatory interventions that go against financial interests in order to achieve social objectives. Examining efforts in the UK to reduce pension charges, it shows that variation in regulatory decisions does not necessarily reflect differences in pressure by voters or organised interest groups. Instead policy-makers make their own assessment of whether regulatory intervention promotes the expansion of private welfare provision – balancing social stability with commercial viability

Evaluating teachers’ professional development initiatives : towards an extended evaluative framework

Evaluating teachers’ professional development initiatives (PDI) is one of the main challenges for the teacher professionalisation eld. Although di erent studies have focused on the e ectiveness of PDI, the obtained e ects and evaluative methods have been found to be widely divergent. By means of a narrative review, this study provides an extended framework to guide the evaluation of (the e ectiveness of ) PDI. Furthermore, and in accordance with this framework, an overview of measurement instruments that are currently in use is provided. The study concludes with implications for educational research and developers of PDI

Importance of system and leadership in performance appraisal

Purpose Performance - appraisal is used internationally to improve employee performance, also in the educational field. However, doubts exist about the effectiveness of performance appraisal. This study-aims to contribute by expanding the knowledge about important context variables of performance appraisal in secondary education. In particular, the study aims to examine the role of both characteristics of the teacher performance appraisal system and the school leader for procedural justice and perceived feedback utility by teachers. Design/methodology/approach - Both interviews with school leaders and a questionnaire for teachers were used to collect data in 32 schools. Path analyses (n = 298) were used to test the research model. Findings - The results indicate that teacher participation in the teacher performance appraisal system significantly influences the perceived procedural justice by teachers, which in its turn significantly influences the perceived feedback utility. The role of the school leaders is found to be extremely important. Charismatic leadership influences both directly and indirectly (through procedural justice) the perceived feedback utility by teachers. Originality/value - This study contributes to the research field of (teacher) performance appraisal by studying empirically appraisal system characteristics and leadership characteristics that effect appraisal reactions. In this regard, this study responds to the need for more empirical research to uncover the social context of performance appraisal, especially in the field of education where there is a general skepticism towards teacher appraisal and its possible positive outcomes

The influence of school leadership on teachers' perception of teacher evaluation policy

The understanding of teachers' perception of new educational policy is crucial since this perception shapes the policy's implementation. However, quantitative research in this area is scarce. This article draws on empirical data to investigate whether the school leader might influence his teachers' perception of the new teacher evaluation policy. The conceptualisation of teachers' perception consists of three policy characteristics: practicality, need and clarifying function. Our results indicate that school leadership influences teachers' policy perception. More specifically, the structure a school leader provides in a school and the amount of trust teachers have in the school leader have a significant impact on teachers' perception of the practicality of the new teacher evaluation policy