A rich body of literature within the field of social policy research commonly stresses the ongoing change of social security provision, but scholars seldom agree on the direction and scope of change of these rigid institutions.

This comparative study adds to this thorny debate by analysing the changes in social security benefit rights and conditions for the unemployed and the ill in the UK, the Netherlands and Finland between 1980 and 2006.

This in-depth approach traces the trajectories of benefit reform across countries, different social cash transfer programmes and types of benefit recipient groups over an extensive time period of 26 years.

It is shown that the countries have converged with respect to trends in the national benefit goals, but that the reform of social security benefit rights is very much bound by institutional legacies.

This study therefore argues that the social security benefit programmes are path dependent institutions, where both change and continuity exist.