Research projects

The climate crisis poses urgent challenges: achieving global ecological sustainability while ensuring human well-being. Social protection systems play a pivotal role in this process. Paradoxically, in Europe, these systems are simultaneously confronted by severe environmental threats and new social risks, while also contributing to these challenges through their dependence on economic growth and legitimacy tied to growth.

WELRISCC investigates how European welfare states address these challenges and manage the social risks arising from climate change. Specifically, the project examines how 16 European welfare states respond to "third-generation social risks" associated with climate change. These risks are categorized into:

Direct social risks: arising from immediate environmental threats such as droughts or floods (e.g., health crises, loss of property).
Indirect social risks: stemming from policy measures aimed at climate mitigation and adaptation (e.g., the regressive impacts of carbon taxes on low-income households).
From a comparative welfare state perspective, the project hypothesizes that country-specific approaches to these risks are shaped by existing institutions, interests, and ideas. By combining previously disconnected debates and methodologies, WELRISCC creates innovative datasets and provides fresh theoretical insights.

The project aims to:

Map current welfare state responses to climate-related social risks across Europe.
Explain the variation in these responses by identifying underlying institutional and policy drivers.
Develop new theoretical approaches for studying the interplay between climate change and welfare states.
Led by an interdisciplinary team with diverse European expertise, WELRISCC delivers comprehensive and cutting-edge insights into the role of welfare states in addressing the climate crisis.

 

Funded by CHANSE

 

Project Lead: Katharina Zimmermann

International Partners (PIs): Vincent Gengnagel (Europa-Universität Flensburg), Maša Filipovič Hrast (University of Ljubljana), Arvid Lindh (SOFI Stockholm), Kenneth Nelson (Oxford), Bruno Palier (Sciences Po Paris)

Project Duration: 03/2025 – 02/2027

 

The “Green Transition Attitudes: Social Risks and Deservingness in the context of Climate Change” project seeks to elucidate changes in public perceptions of deservingness towards various welfare beneficiaries in Europe amid the challenges of climate change and the transition to carbon-neutral societies. The primary objective is to understand how social risks associated with climate change and transition policies are perceived and what welfare policies are likely to gain public and political acceptance, thereby enhancing their efficacy.

Scientific consensus underscores the necessity for rapid and transformative decarbonisation to avert the worst impacts of climate change. Both climate change and its associated mitigation and adaptation policies can exacerbate existing social risks, disproportionately affecting disadvantaged populations, regions, and nations. Such dynamics place additional strain on welfare states, which must meet human needs within environmental limits, even amid global competition and low economic growth.

The project innovates social research by examining new lines of social conflicts and cleavages in a Europe confronted by climate change and NZT ambitions. Specifically, the project addresses three key research questions:

1. How are social risks related to climate change and NZT framed publicly and perceived by different social groups and individuals?

2. Who is perceived as deserving to benefit from public support in this evolving context?

3. How do public framings, group-specific, and individual perceptions of social risks and deservingness play out across different national contexts?

Traditional social risks, emerging from industrialisation and urbanisation, include old age, ill-health, and unemployment, while second-generation risks related to deindustrialisation, globalisation, and demographic changes include balancing work and family responsibilities and inadequate labour market skills. The project shifts focus to third-generation social risks emerging from climate change and NZT, such as floods, droughts, heavy storms, heatwaves, and water stress, which threaten living and working conditions, economic security, and health. Low-income groups are particularly vulnerable, with limited capacity to respond. Additionally, policies aimed at NZT might unintentionally deepen social inequalities by imposing costs unevenly across different social groups. Addressing these third-generation social risks, welfare states must re-design their programs in response to complex interactions between economic and social systems. New social insurance schemes, active labour market policies, poverty relief, and extended health programs are among the discussed policy responses. Structural conditions like climate exposure and economic decline, as well as national NZT strategies and social risk population structures, will shape these welfare actions (Zimmermann, forthcoming). As climate change challenges confront existing welfare paradigms, perceptions of who deserves public support undergo significant re-evaluation. The well-established deservingness theory, which focuses on control, attitude, reciprocity, identity, and need (CARIN criteria), provides a foundation for this analysis. However, climate change and NZT present new groups deserving support, such as climate refugees and youth with insecure futures, and may alter traditional deservingness criteria. Understanding these shifting perceptions is crucial for effective policy-making. Policies targeting only low-income groups may be perceived as unfair by middle-income groups facing high climate-related expenses (“paradox of redistribution”). Public support for welfare programs may increasingly depend on environmental behaviors, calling for nuanced policy designs that balance public sentiment and practical support requirements. Addressing knowledge gaps in public framing of climate-related social risks, the relevance of deservingness theory in this new context, and national variations in perceptions, the project brings together international experts in sociology and political science. Through cross-disciplinary collaboration and stakeholder engagement, we aim to develop actionable policy recommendations that enhance the legitimacy and effectiveness of welfare programs in the age of climate change and NZT.

For more information visit our project website: www.greentransitionattitudes.com.

Funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG)

Research team: Katharina Zimmermann, Vincent Gengnagel, Ludwig Ipach, Christian Möstl, Beke Langosch

International partners: Wim Van Lancker, Adeline Otto, Maša Filipovič Hrast, Tatjana Rakar

Project duration: 01.06.2024 - 31.05.2027

Related publications:

Zimmermann, K., & Gengnagel, V. (2023). Mapping the social dimension of the European Green Deal. European Journal of Social Security, 25(4), 523-544.

Zimmermann, K., & Gengnagel, V. (2023). Green deservingness, green distinction, green democracy?Towards a political sociology of a contested eco-social consensus. CPE, 7. (2) 2022, 292 – 303.

The project investigates the transformative potential of the European Green Deal (EGD) on domestic climate policies across European Union (EU) member states. The EGD, launched in 2019, aims to achieve climate neutrality by 2050 through ambitious environmental and economic reforms. While its objectives are widely celebrated, the implementation across diverse national contexts reveals significant variations in outcomes and conflicts among stakeholders. This study explores how the EGD functions as an external driver of institutional change within domestic climate policy fields, focusing on the interplay of beliefs, power struggles, and legitimacy among key stakeholders.

Adopting a comparative case study approach, the project examines three EU member states—Germany, Poland, and Sweden—selected for their distinct economic structures, political orientations, and climate policies. These countries provide a fertile ground for analyzing how the EGD influences domestic beliefs, reshapes institutional norms, and either mitigates or exacerbates conflicts. The analysis is grounded in the strategic action field framework and the "usages of Europe" model, which together offer insights into stakeholders' strategies, including the cognitive, strategic, and legitimizing use of the EGD to achieve their objectives.

The study’s findings will elucidate the conditions under which the EGD leads to either incremental changes—preserving existing norms while introducing modest policy adaptations—or disruptive shifts that redefine domestic climate policy paradigms. It also seeks to uncover how different actors, such as governments, industry representatives, and environmental organizations, engage with the EGD to influence public opinion, policy frameworks, and power dynamics.

By focusing on four key EGD policy instruments, including market-based tools like emissions trading and regulatory measures, this research delves into the mechanisms of stakeholder interaction and conflict resolution. Through qualitative methods, such as interviews, document analysis, and stakeholder mapping, the project aims to reveal how beliefs about the EGD’s legitimacy shape the pathways of institutional change.

This research contributes to the broader understanding of climate governance by highlighting the critical role of domestic contexts and stakeholder dynamics in realizing the EGD’s vision. It provides actionable insights into how multilevel governance strategies like the EGD can address global challenges such as climate change while accommodating the socio-economic complexities of diverse political systems. By identifying the drivers of both success and resistance, the study offers a roadmap for policymakers to enhance the EGD’s effectiveness and foster sustainable transitions across the EU.

The project is a subproject of the DFG Research Unit Big Structural Change

Funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG)

Projektbeteiligte: Katharina Zimmermann

Projektlaufzeit: 01.12.2025 – 31.12.2028

The dissertation project aims to analyze intra-familial labor division in context of active social citizenship. It argues that contemporary discussions about the institutional promotion of an adult worker family model, fail to grasp the rising focus on self-responsibilities predominant in contemporary European welfare states. While at the same time, contributions about active social citizenship mostly ignore that welfare states do not treat all citizens as individuals but e.g. as dependent family members. Therefore, the dissertation project plans to link feminists’ perspectives on social citizenship with perspectives on active social citizenship. With a cross-country comparison of social rights, the project links empirical research on the normative assumptions about intra-familial labor division that underpin contemporary welfare regulation with the analysis of norms and practices of intra-familial labor division within social citizen’s every-day life.

Involved partners: Laura Lüth

Related publications and presentations:

• European Social Policy Network (ESPAnet) Germany: Social policy and crises – multiple perspectives (doctoral workshop): The ‘Managerial Family’? Shifting Ideas on Familial Care Work. Wissenschaftszentrum für Sozialforschung Berlin (WZB), 17.03.23.
• Laura Lüth: "Activating the Family - Family Models in Times of Social Investment" 22. November 2022, Gastvortrag im Rahmen des "PhD programme in Politics, Policies and International Relations", während Gastaufenthalt an der Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spanien.
• Deutsche Gesellschaft für Soziologie (DGS): Polarisierte Sorgewelten. Gesellschaftliche Aushandlungen von Sorgelücken (Adhoc Gruppe): Die „unternehmerische Familie“ – Neue Formen gesellschaftlicher Anerkennung für familiale Sorgearbeit? Bielefeld: 30.09.22.
• European Social Policy Network (ESPAnet): Reconsidering concepts and ideas in welfare state policies (stream), Präsentation und Konferenzpapier: The ‘Managerial Family’? Shifting Ideas of Familial Care Work. Wien, 14.09.22.
• Deutsche Vereinigung für sozialwissenschaftliche Arbeitsmarktforschung (SAMF): „Shifting Ideas of Familial Care Work – Moral economies of Social Investment” (Doctoral Workshop/ Poster Präsentation auf der Jahrestagung des SAMF). Berlin, 18.05.22 – 19.05.22.
• Deutsche Gesellschaft für Soziologie (DGS)/ Österreichische Gesellschaft für Soziologie (ÖGS): Eltern zwischen Homeoffice und Kinderbetreuung – Neuordnung familialer Arbeitsteilung und der Geschlechterarrangements? Wien [online], 23.08.2021.
• International Public Policy Conference (IPPA): Family Complexity and Social Policy around the World (stream), Präsentation und Konferenzpapier: Activating the Family – Family Models in Active Social Citizenship. Barcelona [online], 08.07.2021.
• Laura Lüth: European Social Policy Network (ESPAnet): Unintended consequences of family policies (stream), Präsentation und Konferenzpapier: Activating the family – familial social rights in times of social investment. Leuven [online], 31.08.-03.09.2021.
• European Sociological Association (ESA): Intersectionality, the Welfare State, and Women’s Work (RN-session), Präsentation und Konferenzpapier: Activating the family – familial social rights in times of social investment. Barcelona [online], 31.08.-03.09.2021.

Whether it's the shortage of skilled workers, work-life balance, or social-ecological transformation, the four-day week is currently at the center of societal debates. Conflict lines, however, vary in different European countries. In Germany, where half of the women are employed part-time, an increase in female full-time employment is discussed as the "greatest hope against the shortage of skilled workers.” In contrast, the Spanish Minister of Labor, Yolanda Diaz, advocates against “long, male working hours” and for the universalization of the 32-hour work week. The question of a socially accepted working time reform cannot, as we argue, be explained solely by union power resources or the influence of existing social and tariff policy institutions but requires a fundamental analysis of the relationship between care and wage labor.

Answering how the relationship between care and wage labor influences the societal acceptance and political implementation of working time reforms, we compare the development of societal power resources around the reform of social and tariff policy institutions as well as gendered patterns of "atypical" employment in Germany and Spain between 2000 and 2020. In addition to quantitative methods, qualitative methods such as expert interviews are used.

Project lead: Prof. Dr. Katharina Zimmermann

Project implementation: Laura Lüth, M.A.

Project member: Merle Koch, B.A.

Project duration: 01.10.2024-31.03.2026

Funded by the Hans-Böckler-Stiftung.