This study examines, both conceptually and empirically, the welfare mix in the activity field of poverty relief and specific shifts of this mix, i.e. changes towards privatization and marketization. In the first part of the study, the meanings of the concepts ‘welfare mix’, ‘privatization’ and ‘marketization’ are disentangled and the concepts are connected. Based on this conceptual framework, the second part of the study assesses the welfare mix in poverty relief and recent changes thereof empirically. The empirical part focuses on Austria. There, mainly two types of organizational actors, namely public agencies and nonprofits, provide poverty alleviation. Thus, only the roles and contributions of these two types of providers are examined.