The Non-Take-Up of Health and Social Benefits: What Implications for Social Citizenship?

Since the 1960s, a specific stream of literature in the field of social welfare has been concerned with the phenomenon of non-take-up, i.e. people who are entitled to social benefits but do not receive them. This issue of non-take-up is becoming increasingly salient and reaching policy agendas, including in Switzerland. It questions both the conditions of access to social benefits and their adequacy or even legitimacy when some people prefer not to claim their rights.
What does non-take-up say about the aims of social policies and the way they are perceived by concerned people? What does it say about the underlying norms of those policies and the ways these norms are incorporated or contested by (potential) beneficiaries? What does it say about the public service and its capacity to reach its communities and support them?
This special issue starts with an introduction to the topic of non-take-up of health and social benefits, focusing more specifically on the case of Switzerland. Building on this state of the art, the agenda is further developed to explore what non-take-up of social benefits says about the reconfiguration of the relationship between citizens and the state. The five authors of the special issues contribute to this new research agenda in three different ways: by emphasizing the temporal dimension of non-take-up; by supporting a view of recipients as capable and critical actors; and by arguing for a systemic and relational approach to non-take-up.