SEMINAR: Ruhrgas workshop

The proposed workshop builds upon the ongoing project 'Reforming the Welfare State: Accountability, democracy and management', funded by the Norwegian Research Council. The project aims to examine how reforms in three areas of the welfare state in three c ountries have affected accountability relations. The main topic revolves around the dynamics between accountability and reforms, and will assess these dynamics in three sectors of the welfare state (welfare administration, hospital sector, and immigration ). Moreover, the project has a distinct comparative ambition, and conducts comparative analyses between Norway, Germany and Denmark. The project is headed by professor Per Lægreid, University of Bergen and Professor Werner Jann at Potsdam University is a partner in the project. The workshop will focus on developments in the accountability relations from a cross-sectoral and cross country perspective. Thus, starting from a theoretical discussion on the first day, on the second day different accountabilit y forums and their changing role as a result of recent welfare reforms should be debated by comparing recent developments in the three sectors with a special emphasis on Norway and Germany. One aim of the workshop is to study the impact of welfare state reforms in Norway and Germany in a comparative perspective for public accountability and to advance our understanding of the conceptual and methodological challenges of studying accountability empirically. The workshop will bring together selected schola rs of the project with additional distinguished researchers on welfare state reform and accountability mainly from Norway and Germany but also from selected other European countries. It involves leading scholars in the field as well as early career schola rs and PhD students. A main aim of the workshop is to develop and strengthen the network between the Norwegian and German research groups on this research topic by discussing the development of joint publications.