Congress: 15 Annual Spanet Conference. New Horizons of European Social Policies. (Lisboa. September, 14-16,2017)
Abstract: Welfare state in Spain shows some sub-national heterogeneity in service provision. First, because some characteristics of local communities (for instance, ideological orientation of local government or local economic base). Second, because responsibilities about public services are distributed according to municipality size. And third, because regional governments (Comunidades Autonomas) play a crucial role in welfare service provision; in fact, this level of government has main responsibilities on the most important welfare policy areas (education, health or social services) establishing different agreements whit local governments in order to produce some services. Nevertheless, an additional factor that could produce some variation among local welfare systems is the role that civic associations play as co-producer of publics services.
In order to study variations in local welfare system in Spain, this paper tries to analyze the role of civic association as co-producer of public services in five Spanish municipalities. These cities are similar in population size, and thus, in public service responsibilities; although they are situated in different regional governments. In these cities, a representative survey among civic associations was carry out asking about main activities, internal organizations and co-production of public services. Using this information, the papers tries to answer four questions: how many associations are involved in co-production of public services?, what are the most important services that civic association co-produce; what kind of association, according to their main activities and internal traits, are more actives in local public services co-productions?; and finally, how many variations exist in these processes according to municipalities?