"This paper aims to shed light on the relative importance of the discourse on social investment and social innovation in Austrian social policy by examining their role in academic and civil society discussions and presenting some evidence of current empirical developments. It is shown that the idea of social innovation is increasingly being promoted by industry, the media and civil society. In terms of social investment, the perspective has only recently been taken up by some researchers and interest groups. Depending on its very definition, however, empirical data on social investment expenditures suggest – also in comparison with other conservative welfare states – increasing or decreasing trends of this type of social security expenditures in Austria."

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