Problem addressed

The main objective of the project is to make the right to employment accessible as stated in the preamble of the French Constitution: Everyone has the duty to work and the right to get a job. This right, which also exists in the constitutions of various countries in Europe and around the world, is not yet a reality for everyone.

Despite the numerous attempts that have emerged and the various public services that have been established, long-term unemployment in France affects more than 2 million people and around 34.3 million people in OECD countries.

Our society creates  exclusion when people want to work but cannot access a job that matches their skills and abilities. That is why the entire society, just like the State, must take part in developing solutions to effectively combat unemployment deprivation because "unemployment is a trial, not only because of the precarious situation it entails, but also because it is a factor of exclusion [...] it isolates us, depriving us of the right to participate in social life." (Parrique, Timothée, Ralentir ou périr, l’économie de la décroissance, seuil, 2022,p.136.)

Innovative solution

To try to provide a solution in France that could be replicated in other geographical areas, a starting point is therefore the notion of employment deprivation. Unlike administrative categories that designate unemployed individuals, it "allows for great flexibility in hiring and can thus take into account the multifaceted aspects of professional precariousness" (DARES, p.21) and consequently find a solution suitable for those farthest from employment.     

Information through door-to-door outreach, at the foot of buildings, at school exits, within associations, or even at bus stops are some of the strategies implemented by project teams with the aim of reaching out to those furthest from employment and reducing non-take-up. This information dynamic is accompanied by the integration of willing individuals from the creation, implementation, and development of the project. Together, people deprived of employment (PDE), economic partners, employment services, residents, local elected officials, among other members of the Local Committee for Employment (LCE), work jointly to identify the needs of the territory and the skills of the PDE. This process leads, on the one hand, to the identification of jobs that are accessible and suitable for the willing PDE, and on the other hand, to the identification of useful work that will transform into economic opportunities with a view to creating the Company for employment purposes (CEP). The forms of involvement planned in the project and the dynamics of cooperation engaged thus seem to constitute a true enactment of deliberative liberalism, which aims to re-embed the economy in democracy by restoring self-confidence and trust in others, while giving people a new place in the system of relationships.

It is not about identifying previous work experiences or degrees to force people into the job market at any cost, but about highlighting their skills, what they wish to do, what they know how to do, and what they want to learn, with the aim of finding a solution that meets their personal needs (health, family, mobility, etc.) and employment needs, either through partners in the social and solidarity economy or through the traditional economy. If the solution is not found in the proposals made through local partners, PDE are offered a job in a CEP.

The CEP's establishes an exceptionally inclusive and demanding employment framework: no selection hiring, permanent contracts, chosen time, with an adaptation of the workload to the abilities and constraints of the employees to make employment accessible.

Key results and benefits

• Since the beginning of the experimentation, around 7725 people have exited unemployment, thanks to territorial cooperation, the economic partners of the region, and the 93 Companies for employment Purposes (CEP) created in 85 territories in France to date within the project. 58% women – 42% men ; Average age 47 years  (2024) ; 23% of them are people with disabilities
• Have a job help people to get back to the public sphere,  place common to all , get back to the school to pick up their children, they’re perceive otherwise by society and theirs families. (Dignity, participation in local life, citizenship)
• They have a job that make sense because it respond to societal and global challenges : ecological transition, local development, Social cohesion.
• Faced with the constraints of the current economic model and the organization of work, this logic of inversion rooted in territorial cooperation can also contribute to a redefinition of prosperity through practices that promote emancipation, thus offering bottom-up solutions that can contribute to a different way of thinking and conducting public policy adapted to the territories, three out of four of which have a poverty rate among households higher than the French national average. (DARES, 2024,p.34)
• Access to a suitable job, with a permanent contract, on a chosen schedule, based on the voluntary participation of individuals, their wishes, and their skills, reduces poverty and precariousness. Permanent contract and flexible working time means projects, family vacations, better material living conditions , higher income, better health.
• The ecological transition is the field generating the most additional jobs within the experimentation, representing 36% of the share of activities created (in FTE) and 32% of the gross margin generated within the CEP. These jobs fall within the three domains and the seven pillars which make up the circular economy:  extraction/exploitation and sustainable purchasing, eco-design, industrial and territorial ecology, functional economy, responsible consumption, extending the duration of use, and waste recycling.
• Social cohesion, second field of the additional jobs created 23% FTC: building shared values and communities of interpretations, reducing disparities and exclusion:  services for people living in the area (sewing, delivery, transport, bike repair…) in solidarity mobility—assisting people who cannot afford or live too far from the nearest city to access medical services, buy food etc. The management of charity food shops, car workshop for people under the poverty level, local selling truck (It help isolâtes people to access to food, to talk with other peoples..)

Potential for mainstreaming

A third law has begun to be debated in the National Assembly in France with the aim of integrating the project into French public policy on employment integration.

Regarding Europe, more and more experts and international actors are highlighting the relevance of establishing the right to employment or a job guarantee as a tool in the fight against poverty. Question highlighted and documented by the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights and Extreme Poverty in 2023, who explains that the "job guarantee" aims to "remedy the paradoxical situation in which structural unemployment and underemployment coexist with significant unmet societal needs, as neither the state nor the market currently provide the collective goods necessary for the transition to a green economy and the growth of the personal services economy." 

At the European level, this issue has been the subject of various political and union initiatives, a report by the European Commission, and a dedicated fund to support this kind of approach. In this context, and considering the experience and results obtained from the French experiment, it inspires 80% of the projects in Europe selected under the FSE - Social Innovation + call for projects, which will begin to be deployed in May 2025. The project is also being implemented in Italy and Belgium.