Rense Nieuwenhuis, project joint co-ordinator from Stockholm University, has been busy sharing key insights on rEUsilience findings with academic audiences and the wider public. On the 16th May, he presented on “Care, Cash and Inequalities in European Resilience” to the 2024 Ghent Seasonal Doctoral School on “Re-thinking education in conditions of converging crises and proliferating possibilities”. In his presentation, he presented how the EU is using the concept of resilience, presented empirical evidence from across the project, and discussed with the student how inequalities can persist despite many European countries having expensive welfare states. Some of the limits and failures of welfare states discussed include benefit levels being too low, the eligibility conditions being too strict, and issues of non-take-up, gendered dynamics, policy synergies (or lack thereof), and Matthew effects.
A little further afield, Rense gave a keynote presentation on “Inequalities in European Resilience” at the 2024 EASP-FISS conference in Kyoto, Japan on the 14th of June. This keynote was part of a session on Advances in Social Policy research in Europe. He critically examined how the European Union is using the concept of resilience and showed empirical evidence from the project that demonstrates vast socio-economic inequalities that undermine the potential for people to be resilient. What the research highlights is that those groups who are most exposed to socio-economic risks (such as unemployment, low-wage work, low work-intensity, and having a chronic illness) have the least capacity to avoid negative outcomes such as poverty and material deprivation.
Away from academic fora, Rense has been interviewed for the Swedish newspaper ‘Dagens Nyheter’ sharing his concerns on how growing inequality in Sweden poses threat to those with low incomes but also for the broader society. The interview can be read here.