This book explores the extent to which a transformation of public employment regimes has taken place in four Western countries, and the factors influencing the pathways of reform. It demonstrates how public employment regimes have unravelled in different domains of public service, contesting the idea that the state remains a 'model' employer.

This paper compares the systems of public employment in Germany, France, Great Britain and Sweden and analyses to which extent qualitative changes concerning the employment regulation and personnel systems in these countries occurred since the beginning of the 1980s. Starting from similar civil servant systems the countries headed in different directions. While a far reaching shift towards employment characteristics of the private sector has taken place in Great Britain and Sweden, the systems of public employment in Germany and France are still very distinct and exhibit most features of the traditional civil service system.