Accountability relations in the Norwegian and German immigration sector

The project ´Reforming the Welfare State: Accountability, Democracy and Management`, headed by professor Per Lægreid and located at the UNI Rokkan Centre, investigates how welfare reforms influence responsibility relations, i.e. accountability. The proje ct´s point of departure is recent welfare reforms initiated to increase efficiency, sustainability of and trust in welfare institutions. An important strategy to ensure these aims has been to give welfare institutions more autonomy. However, along this ne w autonomy new questions of responsibility emerge; such as to whom are public welfare managers accountable? The project addresses such questions by comparing reforms of hospitals, welfare administrations and immigration in Norway, Denmark and Germany. A s part of this sub-project I, together with project partners in Potsdam, will examine developments in accountability relations within immigration with a particular focus on Norway and Germany. The observation that there are clear tensions between differen t forms of accountability (political, legal, administrative actors) in this area merits a closer analysis of recent developments in the immigration policy of the two countries. Important research question are; which actors have a more and less prominent p lace in the politics of immigration and integration after the latest reforms? How have recent Norwegian and German reforms of the immigration and integration administration affected the balance between organizational autonomy and political accountability?