Challenges of the Unemployment Protection System and Active Policies in Spain

The NorSpaR project aims to analyse the main public policy initiatives by which Norway and Spain cope with the new social and economic challenges derived from the so‐called New Social Risks (NSR). Although both countries present significant differences in their institutional settings (such as Spanish EU membership), or its belonging to diverse welfare regimes types (Norway is generally included in the Nordic regime, while Spain is part of the Mediterranean one), both countries share a common interest in addressing the aforementioned challenges while maintaining social cohesion. In the last decade, governments in both countries have tried to respond to those challenges by reforming their labour markets, adapting their unemployment schemes, as well as their gender, family and long‐term care policies. The analysis covered in this project includes three areas of public policy addressing NSR. First, dependency is one of the most daunting challenges for post‐industrial societies experiencing population ageing and with an increasing number of frail people in need of care. This situation is forcing governments to rethink their long‐term care policies. Second, family and gender public programs need to respond to the growing difficulties of families in reconciling professional and family life. Third, in the transition to a post‐industrial order, and in a context of mass unemployment, social protection systems have a renewed prominence. Along with the so‐called passive policies offering financial support to the unemployed, active labour market policies are geared to put people back into work.