Rights, Conflicts and Realities in the Procedure of the Appeal Committees and Social Courts

Workshop "Rights, Conflicts and Realities in the Proceedings of the Appeals Committees and Social Courts".

On 19 and 20 January 2017, a joint event of the research group "Rights, Conflicts and Realities in Social Court Proceedings" of the Research Network for Social Law and Social Policy (FoSS) of the University of Kassel and the University of Applied Sciences Fulda and the project "Recht und Praxis der Widerspruchsausschüsse in der Sozialversicherung. Bestandsaufnahme und Wirkungsanalyse" of the Centre for Social Research Halle e. V. (ZSH) and the University of Kassel. The project is funded by the Hans Böckler Foundation and the Institute for Social Welfare at the University of Kassel.

After words of welcome from Prof. Dr. Rainer Schlegel (President of the Federal Social Court), Prof. Dr. Andreas Hänlein (University of Kassel), Prof. Dr. Simone Kreher (spokesperson FoSS, Fulda University of Applied Sciences) and Dr. Dorothea Voss from the Research Funding Department of the Hans Böckler Foundation, Prof. Dr Armin Höland (Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg) and Prof. Dr Felix Welti (University of Kassel), presented a paper entitled "Recht und Praxis der Widerspruchsausschüsse in der Sozialversicherung. Stocktaking and impact analysis", they presented the central results of the project. Following this, Prof. em. Dr. Hubert Rottleuthner from the Free University of Berlin and, concluding the first panel, Prof. em. Dr. Dr. h.c. mult. Rainer Pitschas from the German University of Administrative Sciences in Speyer in their presentations examined the conflict between citizens and social service providers in the mirror of both the sociology of law and administrative sciences.
The second part of the first day showed, in a report from the project by Elisabeth Krausbeck (Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg) and Christina Buchwald (ZSH e. V.) as well as a commentary from the FoSS by Prof. Dr. Simone Kreher and Prof. Dr. Susanne Dern (both Fulda University of Applied Sciences), what is known about the people who file an appeal and sue.
Finally, Sabine Böttcher (ZSH e. V.), with another report from the project, and Prof. Dr. Theresia Höynck (University of Kassel), with a comment from the FoSS, presented the topic "What do we know about the people who participate in the decision-making process on a full-time and voluntary basis?

To round off the first day of the workshop, Filmladen Kino showed "I, Daniel Blake", followed by scientific explanations by Prof. em. Dr. Michael Adler (University of Edinburgh).

The second day was opened by Prof. Dr. Armin Höland with a report on social administration in conflict. The commentary from the FoSS was written by Jun.-Prof. Dr Minou Banafsche and Prof. Dr Tanja Klenk - both from the University of Kassel. In the following panel, Prof. Dr. Felix Welti explained the state of knowledge on the basis for decision-making, with a particular focus on expert assessment, as well as the commentary by Prof. Dr. Kirsten Aner (University of Kassel). The closing plenary included a lecture by Prof. em. Dr. Michael Adler (University of Edinburgh) on "Social Conflict and Administrative Justice" as well as a presentation on conflict with the social administration, social jurisdiction and social policy by Britta Rehder (Ruhr University Bochum).

On the project "Law and Practice of Appeals Committees (WA) in Social Insurance. Stocktaking and Impact Analysis":

Prof. Dr. Felix Welti (University of Kassel) and Prof. Dr. Armin Höland (Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg) are leading the research project funded by the Hans Böckler Foundation since October 2014, in which the Zentrum für Sozialforschung Halle e. V. (ZSH) and the University of Kassel are cooperating. The appeal committees of the statutory health/care, pension and accident insurances decide on approximately 500,000 appeals by insured persons in the four major branches every year, control the legality and expediency of the decisions, have a filter function on the way to the social courts as well as a key position in the protection of social rights, contribute to the quality assurance of the work of the social insurance institutions and implement the principle of self-administration in procedural practice.
The aim of the project is to gain legal dogmatic, legal factual and legal sociological insights in a field that has been little researched so far. After the evaluation of publicly available sources, namely statute law, statistics and literature sources, interviews with experts on the judicial, lawyer and association perspective, a court file analysis as well as a survey of the members of the appeal committees, results on the organisation, the working methods and effects of the appeal committees in social insurance are now presented at the end of the project.