The Netherlands: social partners' involvement in unemployment benefit regimes

Since 2002 the role of social partners in the Dutch unemployment benefit system has been reduced to an advisory one in the development phase of unemployment benefit (UB) programmes. There is no involvement any more of social partners in the implementation, management and monitoring phases of UB programmes. In 2006 unemployment insurance (UI) eligibility criteria have been both tightened (raise of the required number of weeks of previous employment) and lessened (less strict as to the involuntary character of unemployment). In reaction to the financial crisis the government has temporarily opened up possibilities of short-time working arrangements in order to prevent mass redundancies in enterprises that suffered a sudden reduction in demand.