Disability and Employment Policy in Canada: National Policy Variation for Working Age Individuals

This article analyses and compares disability policies for working-age individuals in Canada with a focus on the mode of policy provision and type of measure to determine the degree to which direct funding is used in this country. To consider policy diversity in this federal system, policies are compared using a mixed-methods approach. Using quantitative methods, federal, provincial and territorial policies are first compared using hierarchical cluster analysis. This provides evidence of three distinct clusters in Canada according to policy provision and measure type. In a second, qualitative analysis, the disability strategies of four provinces’ (British Columbia, Ontario, Newfoundland and Labrador and Quebec) are compared, to determine over arching policy orientations. Findings indicate that policy provision in Canada largely favours money over services. Furthermore, most provinces emphasize either health or integration measures over substantive measures. Despite these commonalities, significant variation persists across Canada. This extends to poverty and disability reduction strategies with two of the four provinces having a broader orientation while the other two provinces focus specifically on employment as a means of social inclusion. The article concludes with a discussion on the state of employment policies for individuals with a disability in Canada.

Obama and the use of force: a discursive institutionalist analysis of Libya and Syria

What factors explain variation in decisions to use force in American foreign policy? Consider the Obama administration’s decision to intervene in Libya. Upon assuming office, Obama outlined a foreign policy marked by a self-professed doctrine, ‘don’t do stupid shit’. In short, Obama sought to avoid the unnecessary use of military force, but when the threat of mass atrocity emerged, despite strong protests from senior advisers, he became drawn into the 2011 Libya intervention. By contrast, following chemical weapon attacks in Syria in 2013, Obama reneged on upholding his so-called ‘red-line’, pursuing diplomatic measures even though support for a military response was strong. But what explains this variation? Rationalist perspectives across the board have tended to overrate interpretive efficiency. Yet, such assumptions obscure the capacity for interests to be interpreted in different ways. To redress this issue, I build on discursive institutionalist insights, developing a model to show how principled and cognitive ideas act as weapons in institutional debates, serving to repress or displace information. To show how agents come to rely on principled or cognitive ideas, I develop a three-part model offering two mechanisms – cognitive repression and normative displacement – by which agents displace and repress certain types of information, depending on the ‘form’ in which that information is presented. This enables a more comprehensive understanding of how different interpretations lead to policy variation at critical moments of decision.

I Do it My Way: Understanding Policy Variation in Pandemic Response Across Europe

To contain the spread of the COVID-19, governments have designed and implemented a large range of exceptional measures. Yet, the restrictive nature of the policy options chosen and the severity of their enforcement mechanisms considerably vary across countries. Focusing on the case of the European Union—a group of closely connected nations which develop some forms of supranational policy coordination to manage the pandemic—, we first map the diversity of policy responses taken using two original indicators: the stringency and scope of freedom limitations and the depth of control used in their enforcement. Second, we elaborate three theoretical scenarios to explain cross-national variation in pandemic policy-making. Our exploratory results—based on bivariate statistical associations—reveal that structural determinants (the level of political and interpersonal trust, a country’s overall resources, democratic experience and, to a lesser extent, political check and balances) shape crisis policy-making more than crisis-related factors such as the magnitude of the crisis at stake. These results call for further research into the determinants of crisis policy-making that we propose to address with a new research project focusing on the modalities, determinants and impacts of exceptional decision making in times of COVID-19.

Does Federalism Prevent Democratic Accountability? Assigning Responsibility for Rates of COVID-19 Testing

Does federalism prevent citizens from holding governments accountable for their actions? The pandemic represents the ideal scenario for testing the effects of federalism on democratic accountability because citizens are highly motivated to hold governments accountable for preventing or failing to prevent the rapid transmission of the virus. Previous research suggests that a number of institutional and political factors complicate the accountability function in federal systems. We add to this literature by assessing the effect of one political factor, exclusivity (measured in terms of policy variation at one level), on accountability. The coronavirus pandemic provides a unique opportunity to assess this factor given the high levels of issue saliency, media attention, and low levels of intergovernmental and interparty conflict it has generated. Drawing on original data from the May 2020 Democratic Checkup Survey and public data from the Canadian National Microbiology Laboratory, our preliminary findings suggest that interprovincial policy variation with respect to coronavirus testing is not correlated with public assessments of the adequacy of provincial testing, and so it seems that Canadians are not able to assign responsibility to the correct level of government despite ideal conditions for doing so.

The Policy and Guidance

The contours of international protection in EU member states are mainly determined by three elements: the 1951 Refugee Convention and the EU Common European Asylum System (CEAS), alongside international human rights law, including the 1950 ECHR (Chap. 10.1007/978-3-030-69441-8_3). While Germany and Italy are bound by the CEAS recast instruments, the UK has remained only bound by the 2003 Reception Directive, 2004 Qualification Directive and 2005 Procedures Directive. Yet, this and other type of legislative options do not, in themselves, necessarily produce considerable variations across the EU (Querton 2019), as many other factors contribute to different degrees of policy variation between EU member states. Amongst these factors, it is worth considering in particular geographical location, political context and internal governance structure, further contextualised by the statistics available.

I do it my way. Understanding policy variation in pandemic response across Europe

To contain the spread of the Covid-19, governments have designed and implemented a large range of exceptional measures. Yet, the restrictive nature of the policy options chosen and the severity of their enforcement mechanisms considerably vary across countries. Focusing on the case of the European Union – a group of closely connected nations which develop some forms of supranational policy coordination to manage the pandemic -, we first map the diversity of policy responses taken using two original indicators : the stringency and scope of freedom limitations and the depth of control used in their enforcement. Second, we elaborate a comprehensive set of eight hypotheses to explain cross-national variation in pandemic policy-making. Our exploratory results – based on bivariate statistical associations – reveal that structural determinants – the level of political and interpersonal trust, a country’s overall resources, democratic experience and, to a lesser extent, political check and balances – shape crisis policy-making more than conjectural factors such as the magnitude of the crisis at stake. These results call for further research into the determinants of crisis policy-making that we propose to address with a new research project focusing on the modalities, determinants and impacts of exceptional decision making in times of Covid-19.

Diffusing Human Trafficking Policy in Eurasia

The issue of human trafficking is particularly important in the region between Europe and Asia due to the dramatic increase in the number of persons trafficked into and through the region since the collapse of communism. Women from Eurasia fuel the sex industries around the world but increasingly, men and children from this region are also victims of labor exploitation. This book analyses how human trafficking policies aimed at combatting this phenomenon have diffused from the international to national level policymaking in one of the largest source regions for human trafficking in the world. The book adds another dimension to human rights-based policymaking with gendered regulatory policy embodied in criminalization statutes and redistributive policy with victims’ service laws by exploring factors that promote and impede policy adoption. Using a mixed method approach, the book uniquely develops the diffusion of innovation theory to include policy variation with adoption and implementation in a new substantive area (human trafficking) and a new regional area (Eurasia). The main research question examines the top-down and bottom-up pressures involved in why some countries adopt encompassing human trafficking policies and others do not and why some countries successfully implement these policies and others do not. The book traces the development and effectiveness of anti-trafficking institutions established in public policy adoption and their interconnected relationship with policy implementation effectiveness. Across Eurasia there are links between these institutions and the ties that bind them which if weak can cause anti-trafficking network fragmentation.