Recent Events
ESPAnet/AIPRIL Workshop - "Zero poverty world: Minimum income protection across the globe"
Workshop 16-17 September 2025 - University of Antwerp
Organizers: Ive Marx, Sarah Marchal, Julia Shu-Huah Wang, Ninke Mussche
This workshop brought together leading social policy scholars to reflect on the challenges and possibilities of ensuring minimum income protection in affluent societies and beyond. Building on the recently published volume Zero Poverty Society (OUP, 2024) by Sarah Marchal and Ive Marx, discussions explored questions of targeting, means-testing, administrative complexity, non-take-up, and the political economy of minimum income schemes. The debate also examined how new technologies, such as real-time data systems and AI, might reduce barriers to access and improve the effectiveness of support.
The event further highlighted a pioneering global project led by Julia Shu-Huah Wang (National Taiwan University) in collaboration with the University of Antwerp. Drawing on comparative data from more than 50 countries worldwide, the project allows for a systematic assessment of income protection policies across all inhabited continents. By situating debates on minimum income in a broader international perspective, the workshop underscored both the shared challenges of designing robust and politically sustainable safety nets and the distinct trajectories of policy development in the Global South.
