Who are the Powerful Actors? : An Analysis of Brokerage in the Networks of Organizations Dealing with Unemployment and Precarity

Other contributions to this book have examined the impact of political context on political behavior in the field of unemployment and precarity and have focused on the multi-organizational nature of the unemployment and precarity field and its network dynamics. This chapter consists of a research design that analyzes the impact of the actors’ networks on the various types of political engagement of organizations in the field of unemployment and precarity politics while taking into consideration the key role of welfare regimes. We performed a comparative analysis of Cologne, Kielce, and Turin. While they differ in their degree of flexibility in labor market regulations, these three national cases are comparable in terms of their restrictive approach vis-à-vis the unemployed and precarious workers. Relationally, we have singled out the role of brokerage as a main network attribute of the actors. The primary point that we would like to emphasize is that brokerage stands out as a valuable measure that captures actors’ capacity to foster exchanges within the field in terms of both bonding in the public domain and creating linkages between the public and the policy domains (Cinalli 2004, 2007). We have focused on three main variables of political engagement: mobilizing members, lobbying, and general involvement in political activities.