Research – Jaakko Harkko

My research program

I build evidence through causality, policy effectiveness, and implementation & governance.

CAUSALITY

Policy debates often confuse correlation with causation. My goal is to produce evidence that answers the question decision-makers actually face: what causes change, for whom, through which mechanisms—and with what uncertainty?

POLICY EFFECTIVENESS

Policies rarely operate one at a time. Effectiveness depends on how instruments and services combine, in what sequence, and under what conditions. I study what works in realistic policy mixes—and where interactions create synergies, trade-offs, or unintended effects.

IMPLEMENTATION & GOVERNANCE

Even strong evidence can fail in practice. Implementation quality, governance structures, and leadership often determine whether an intervention works at scale—and whether it lasts. I study the levers that turn evidence into reliable practice.

My Research Program in a Nutshell: Bridging Life-Course Dynamics and Welfare State Policy Implementation

Society’s biggest social problems require research-based knowledge on individual-level human capital formation, as well as on employment transitions and trajectories. Addressing them also calls for an understanding of policy measures taken by governmental agencies. However, there has been limited knowledge exchange between micro-level life-course analysis and “life-course informed” macro-level welfare state research, both of which have been transformed since the early 1990s. However, at their current states, these perspectives rarely meet. My research aims to integrate these perspectives, arguing that they are complementary rather than parallel tracks and that each is essential to understanding the other.

The gap between current practices and what could be achieved is also a practical one. Service systems accumulate practices on the basis of expert opinion, professional habit, and political compromise, then defend them whether they work or not. The cost is paid most heavily by people who are already disadvantaged, but the failure is broader than that: evidence-based services help people before they fall into severe disadvantage, not only after. My research aims to disentangle the causal mechanisms that produce suboptimal services, which often harm those already worst off. The program covers micro-level transitions and trajectories as well as policy implementation, with the research frontier lying in identifying the service-level and policy-level determinants of individual well-being and implementation outcomes.

For more detailed information, visit my publications site: Publications – Jaakko Harkko