The governance of social protection is of crucial importance to
all countries in central and eastern Europe. All are adapting their
systems to changing socio- economic structures. With increasing
poverty, budget deficits and unemployment, they have been reorganising
pension and health insurance; have started to set up tax-financed
social assistance schemes with a wider scope than previous rudimentary
arrangements; and in most countries have set up funds to finance
unemployment benefits and labour market policies. A pluralistic social
protection system is emerging.
While the reform and adaptation of benefit packages and the financing of
new or modified benefits have received considerable attention, the
question of governance has not - whether of newly autonomous schemes,
of new or extended tax-financed schemes, or of the social protection
system as a whole. Governance is about the effectiveness and equity of
administrative arrangements for social protection. Thus, for example,
in Hungary over 20% of families have below-subsistence living
standards. This is not necessarily a reflection of bad policy; it is
due in part to administrative arrangements that result in waste or
inappropriate decisions.
Pluralistic systems of social protection require a strong structure of
governance to ensure that individual schemes provide protection that is
both adequate and affordable. That requires mechanisms of governance
at the level of (a) national policy, (b) national management of social
protection, and (c) individual schemes.
There are deficiencies at all three levels. The public consultation
process on long-range reforms is not always effective, national
coordination of sub- systems hardly exists and, at the scheme level,
most supervisory mechanisms are not yet operating.
As part of its work to assist in the development of appropriate
governance procedures, the Team organised an international tripartite
meeting in Larnaca, in collaboration with the Ministry of Labour of
Cyprus, which hosted the meeting, and the ILO's Social Security
Department.
The "Roundtable on the Design and Governance of Social Security" tackled
a wide range of issues. It was attended by 57 senior officials from
governments, employers' organisations and trade unions from 14 central
and eastern European countries, as well as social security experts from
Belgium, Canada, Cyprus, Germany, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom,
the ILO and the International Social Security Association (ISSA).
The speakers at the Roundtable included Andreas Moushouttas, Minister
of Labour of Cyprus, Janis Ritenis, Minister of Welfare, Labour and
Health of Latvia, Jozica Puhar, Minister of Labour, Family and Social
Affairs of Slovenia, and Pavel Kaminsky, Deputy Minister of Social
Protection of Russia. The Russians spoke powerfully about the
organizational difficulties in achieving pension reform.
Lenia Samuel of Cyprus, Alette van Leur of the Netherlands, Keith
Banting of Canada, Jiri Kral of the Czech Republic, Peter Rosenberg of
Germany, Istvan Kameniczky of Hungary and Roger Beattie of ILO provided
reviews of their countries' experience and problems with administration
and management of complex national systems, and analysed actual and
potential roles of tripartite governing bodies and boards in their
national contexts.
The director of CEET outlined the challenges for the governance of
social protection in a changing social climate in western and in
eastern Europe. Michael Cichon (CEET) identified "missing links" and
the structure of governance in European social protection systems. Bob
Kyloh (CEET), BjÓrn GrÛnewald (CEET} and Martin Hutsebaut (ETUI,
European Trade Union Institute) analysed roles of social protection in
industrial relations and the political agenda of employers and unions.
Pauline Reid-Barrett (UK) and Warren McGillivray (ISSA) spelled out the
interest of national governments and social security institutions in
the management and administration of national protection schemes.
