Active labor market policies are characterized by a process of selection and construction of the informational basis that is considered relevant for grounding the appropriateness of choices on people’s entitlement, on their employment path and on the job position. In particular, disabled people’s employment paths are based on technical instruments of evaluation of the degree and the kind of disability; these define the recipients’ working identities and «inform» the employment programs by building up the conditions that promote capabilities. Thus, in this article we present a comparison between two governing instruments for disabled people’s employment in Italy. We compare a groundbreaking measure («Care budget») with standard devices. Our aim was to investigate how the different informational bases embedded in these instruments build up different paths toward employment and in which way they affect the disabled people’s participation and the promotion of their capabilities. only subscribers can see the full article

The article outlines the history of social Europe and describes the present situation, focusing on the implications of the European Council of Lisbon in March 2000 when Heads of State and governments decided to set a new ambitious objective for the EU: to become the most competitive knowledge economy in the world, based on full quality employment with an increased social cohesion. The common strategy for occupation, the new social agenda and the efforts for greater co-operation on inclusion and social protection are examined in detail. The article also takes a look at the future scenario, examining the results of the Convention from a social perspective and drawing some conclusions on the prospects of the intergovernmental conference.only subscribers can see the full article