Making use of financial tools to provide welfare services. A comparative perspective between common pressures and actor’s agency (Andrea Ciarini)
The recent economic crisis and mounting budgetary constraints have put severe pressure on social spending, reducing fiscal space for investments in high-quality social services. Given these pressures and in response to a demand for a more ‘efficient’ use of both public and private resources, many studies have thus begun to focus on alternative sources of funding for welfare provision, including ‘impact finance’ tools (McHugh et al. 2013; Dowling, 2016). In several European countries, some banks have launched social bonds to address social issues affecting targeted vulnerable groups or to finance non-profit organizations and social innovation projects. In the same vein, …