Professor Stefan Kühner

Profile

Areas of expertise

• Comparative and global social policy analysis
• Social investment and productive welfare policy
• Child wellbeing and benefit stigma
• Partisan theory and historical institutionalism
• Comparative research methods

Academic biography

I joined the Department of Sociology and Social Policy, Lingnan University, Hong Kong, where I am now Associate Professor and Director of the BSocSci (Hons) Programme in Social Sciences and MSocSci Programme in Comparative Social Policy (International). I am also the Associate Dean of Undergraduate Studies in the Faculty of Social Sciences. 

My general academic interest centres on comparative and international political economy of welfare with emphasis on the policies and politics of welfare state change in historical perspective. Specifically in Hong Kong, my research spans across various social policy issues over the life course. As such, I have examined the social gradient in multi-dimensional child wellbeing, the experiences of young people with changing school-to-work transitions, the effects of working family support on gendered labour market outcomes, and the effects of zero pillar pensions on poverty alleviation and coverage rates among the elderly. I am also now developing new research projects examining the benefits stigma and shame faced by various societal groups across East Asia.

I am co-author of the The Short Guide to Social Policy (2nd Edition, 2015, Bristol: Policy Press) and the Unicef Innocenti Report Card 13, Fairness for Children. A League Table of Inequality in Child Wellbeing in Rich Countries. My latest peer-reviewed research is available in Social Policy & Society, the Journal of Asian Public Policy, the International Journal of Social Welfare, and the Journal of International and Comparative Social Policy.

Professional activities

• Co-editor of the book series, Research in Comparative and Global Social Policy, launched together with Policy Press.
• Secretary of the East Asian Social Policy Research Network.
• Centre Fellow in the Centre for Social Policy and Social Change at Lingnan University, Hong Kong.

Research

Current, selected research projects

Towards a Better Understanding of the Take-up Rates of Welfare Schemes Targeting Hong Kong Older Adults and the Stigma Attached to Them, Hong Kong Policy Innovation and Co-ordination Office (Chou, K.L. & Kühner, S.)

The Voices of Ethnic Minority Children on Their Lives and Wellbeing in Hong Kong, Hong Kong Committee for UNICEF (Lau, K.W.M. & Kühner, S.)

Children's Views on their Lives and Wellbeing in Hong Kong, Lingnan University Research Committee (Lau, K.W.M., Kühner, S. & Rees, G.)

Recent publications

Recent, selected publications

(Please see https://stefan-kuehner.com/publications/ for hyperlinks)

Books

Mok, K. H. and Kühner, S. (eds.) (2018) Managing Welfare Expectations and Social Change: Policy Transfer in Asia, Abingdon/New York: Routledge.

Hudson, J., Kühner, S. and Lowe, S. (2015) The Short-Guide to Social Policy, Second Edition, Bristol: Policy Press.

Special issues

Mok, K.H., Kühner, S. and Yeates, N. (2017) Managing Welfare Expectations and Social Change: Policy Responses in Asia, Social Policy & Administration, 51(6).

Mok. K. H. and Kühner, S. (2017) Managing Welfare Expectations and Social Change: Policy Transfer in Asia (Introduction to Special Issue), Journal of Asian Public Policy, 10(1).

Kühner, S., Devine, J. and Nakray, K. (2015)  Meeting Emerging Global Policy Challenges: Positioning Social Policy Between Development and Growth?, Journal of International and Comparative Social Policy, 31(2). 

Hudson, J. and Kühner, S. (2013) Qualitative Comparative Analysis and Applied Public Policy Analysis: New Applications of Innovative Methods, Policy and Society, 32(4).

Journal articles

Kühner, S. and Chou, K. L. (2020) The Politics of MPF Reform: Lessons from Public Attitudes in Hong Kong, Social Policy and Society (First View).

Yang, N. and Kühner, S. (2020) Beyond the Limits of the Productivist Regime: Capturing Three Decades of East Asian Welfare Development with Fuzzy Sets’, Social Policy and Society (First View).

Kühner, S., Lau, M., Jiang, J., and Wen, Z. (2019) Personal Income, Local Communities, and Happiness in a Rich Global City: Evidence from Hong Kong, Journal of Asian Public Policy (First View).

Yu, S., Chau, R. and Kühner, S. (2019) Defamilisation and Familisation Risks, Adult Worker Models, and Pro-employment/Decommodification Measures for Women: The Case of Hong Kong, Journal of International and Comparative Social Policy, 35(2), 194-210.

Kühner, S. and Chou, K. L. (2019) Poverty Alleviation, Coverage and Fiscal Sustainability: Investigating the Effect of a New Social Pension in Hong Kong, International Journal of Social Welfare, 28(1), 89-99.

Kühner, S. (2018) Partisan Ideology, Veto Players and Their Combined Effect on Productive and Protective Welfare Policy: How the Left Still Matters? Policy Studies, 39(2), 165-187.

Mok. K.H., Kühner, S. and Huang, G. (2017) The Productivist Construction of Selective Welfare Pragmatism in China, Social Policy & Administration, 51(6), 876-897.

Kühner, S. and Nakray, K. (2017) India’s Emerging Social Policy Paradigm: Productive, Protective or What?, Journal of Asian Public Policy, 10(1), 40-56.

Kühner, S. (2015) Analysing the Productive and Protective Dimensions of Welfare in the Asia-Pacific: Pathways Towards Human Development and Income Equality?, Journal of International and Comparative Social Policy, 31(2), 151-173. [Online Appendix .xlsx]

Hudson, J., Kühner, S. and Yang, N. (2014) Productive Welfare, the East Asian ‘Model’ and Beyond: Placing Welfare Types in Greater China into Context, Social Policy and Society, 13(2), 301-315.

Hudson, J. and Kühner, S. (2013) Beyond Indices: The Potential of Fuzzy Set Ideal Type Analysis for Cross-National Analysis of Policy Outcomes, Policy and Society, 32(4), 303-317.

Hudson, J. and Kühner, S. (2013) Qualitative Comparative Analysis and Applied Public Policy Analysis: New Applications of Innovative Methods (Introduction to Special Issue), Policy and Society, 32(4), 279-287.

Hudson, J. and Kühner, S. (2012) Analyzing the Productive and Protective Dimensions of Welfare: Looking Beyond the OECD, Social Policy and Administration, 46(1), 35-60.

Kühner, S. (2010) Do Party Governments Matter After All? Executive Ideology, Constitutional Structures and Their Combined Effect on Welfare State Change, Journal of Comparative Policy Analysis: Research and Practice, 12(4), 395-415.

Hudson, J. and Kühner, S. (2010) Beyond the Dependent Variable Problem: The Methodological Challenges of Capturing Productive and Protective Dimensions of Social Policy, Social Policy and Society, 9(2), 167-179.

Hudson, J. and Kühner, S. (2009) Towards Productive Welfare? A Comparative Analysis of 23 OECD Countries, Journal of European Social Policy, 19(1), 34-46.

Hudson, J., Kühner, S. and Hwang, J. (2008) Between Ideas, Institutions and Interests: Analyzing Third Way Welfare Reform Programmes in Germany and the UK, Journal of Social Policy, 37(2), 207-230.

Kühner, S. (2007) ESPAnet/JESP Doctoral Researcher Prize Paper: Country-level Comparisons of Welfare State Change Measures: Another Facet of the Dependent Variable Problem within the Comparative Analysis of the Welfare State?, Journal of European Social Policy, 17(1), 5-18.

Book chapters/reports

Lau, K. W. M. and Kühner, S. (2019) Children’s Worlds 3rd Wave National Report: China – Hong Kong (SAR), Lingnan University, Hong Kong.

Lee, H. J., Kim, J., Hudson, J., Kühner, S. and Jun, G. (2018) The Composition and Effects of Cash and In-Kind Programs (In Korean), Korean Institute for Health and Social Affairs Research Report 2018-08, Seoul: KIHASA.

Kühner, S. (2017) Convergence of Government Ideology in an Era of Competition: An Empirical Analysis Using Comparative Manifesto Data, in Horsfall, D. and Hudson, J. (Eds.) Social Policy in an Era of Competition: From Global to Local Perspectives, Bristol: Policy Press.

Hudson, J. and Kühner, S. (2016) Fairness for Children. A League Table of Inequality in Child Wellbeing in Rich Countries (Unicef Innocenti Report Card 13), Florence: Unicef Innocenti Research Centre.

Richardson, D., Hudson, J., Kühner, S., Frey, V. and Patana, P. (2015) Comparing The Effects Of Cash Benefits And In-Kind Childcare Services On Family Outcomes, OECD Social, Employment and Migration Working Paper, Paris: OECD.

Kühner, S. (2015) The Dependent Variable Problem within the Comparative Analysis of the Welfare State Revisited: What If We Waited a Little Longer?, Social Policy Review 27: Analysis and Debate in Social Policy, Bristol: Policy Press. [SOCX-Update-8-15 .xlsx]

Hudson, J. and Kühner, S. (2014) Analyzing the Productive Dimension of Welfare: Looking Beyond Greater China, in Mok, K. H. and Lau, M. (Eds.) Welfare Regimes in Transition: Managing Social Change and Social Policy in Greater China, Routledge Research on Public and Social Policy in Asia, Milton Park: Routledge.

Kühner, S. (2012) Welfare Retrenchment under Left and Right Government Leadership: Towards a Consolidated Framework?, Social Policy Review 24: Analysis and Debate in Social Policy, Bristol: Policy Press.

Hudson, J. and Kühner, S. (2011) Tiptoeing Through Crisis? Re-evaluating the German Model in Light of the Global Recession, in Farnsworth, K. and Irving, Z. (Eds.) Social Policy in Challenging Times. Economic Crisis and Welfare Systems, Bristol: Policy Press.