Implementing a Myth: the Evolution of Conditionality in French Minimum Income Provision
Résumé
Between the late 1990s and the present the logic of conditionality in French minimum income provision has undergone a gradual, but profound transformation. While in the late 1990s its main function was a largely symbolic -of masking the growth of a pure assistance logic within social protection - since then the efforts of successive French governments have turned toward realizing the potential of benefit conditionality as an instrument for putting people back to work and irrigating the growing low-wage sector of the economy. Although the formal responsibilities of nonworking French minimum income beneficiaries have not changed that markedly in recent years, their implications for claimants have. The introduction of the Revenu Solidarite Active (2009) marked a renewed focus on the activation of minimum income recipients. However, this was to be short-lived, as the focus turned to tackling youth unemployment - which grew as a result of the slowdown of the economy.